Newsflash: Jane Austen ≠ You

As I mentioned earlier, I recently had occasion to enjoy an extended Barnes-and-Noble-browse the other day while I was writhing in the agony of my crippling social ineptitude. Multitasking, baby! As I was perusing the "New in Fiction" table, which is my favorite kind of table after "ping pong," I noticed a striking theme. A large majority of these "new" books were rewrites or sequels or "reimaginings" (someone has a good PR person!) of classic works. I have no problem with this per se; I particularly enjoyed Revenge, a straight-up reworking of The Count of Monte Cristo (but who wouldn't love anything that is even remotely Stephen-Fryed?).

What upsets me is that there were SO. SO. MANY. Seriously, I understand that we're living in an age of anti-creativity, and somehow it's perfectly acceptable that every movie is based on a book and every book is based on a movie and no one can think of a better name than iPad for the sweetest gadget ever to be invented. But I think we (as in Amurrica) can do better! I mean come on, we have these now! If we can invent that we can invent anything! So what's with all the pseudo-plagiarism? Plain laziness if you ask me.

(Side note: a Google image search for "weird inventions" yielded many gems, most of which appear to be Japanese/Asian in origin. Surprise, surprise, the Japanese do weird things. Apparently that last one is for keeping your hair out of your food, but I prefer to believe that Japanese scientists have discovered that dressing up as a flower makes your food taste better. This is the kind of inventiveness we need on this side of the Pacific. Come on people, what is the literary equivalent of these? It sure ain't a rewrite of Romeo and Juliet with a modern day setting - I already have Leo and Claire for that, which will do me just fine, much thanks to Baz. P.S. Clearly I will be buying those slippers for the Hare for her bday. Sorry to ruin the surprise, Harie!)

[EDIT: The management would like to take this moment to say that the March Hare in no way endorses this message. I could really take or leave Jane Austen. Really just leave, actually.]

On to my main gripe: I am slowly grasping that for whatever reason, everyone and their mother thinks they can redo Jane Austen (especially Pride and Prejudice), and do it just as well, if not better. In the interests of full disclosure, I should reveal at this point that I am a die-hard J.A. fan (of the super hardcore, vastly more experienced and battleworn "Live-Free-Or-" variety), so I am not disposed to look kindly upon those who attempt to write sequels to one of my favorite books of all time. If I didn't love the books so much, or if I weren't as much of a purist (not Puritan) in general, I probably wouldn't be writing this at all.  As things stand, however, I almost had to burn the Keira Knightley movie version because of that horrendous scene tacked on at the end, which apparently only made it into the American version because we are a nation of idiots. The only reason I didn't burn it was that DVDs are awfully hard to light on fire, although I do believe that they will blend.

I'm sure you've all heard of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (also Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters). Along that line, on the table at B&N was Jane Bites Back, which combines J.A. with everyone's favorite topic, vampires (similar to, but I'm sure in NO WAY inspired by "Mr. Darcy, Vampyre" - nice "Victorian" spelling, that really convinces me that Jane would approve. NOT). I can't even begin to discuss this trend, because it makes me so mad I get all squeaky and crazy-eyed. Another book on the table was called "Mr. Darcy Broke My Heart," apparently a sequel to "Jane Austen Ruined My Life." Another one just released: Pride/Prejudice, which chronicles Elizabeth and Darcy's secret affairs with other people. There's also "Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife," "Mr. Darcy Presents His Bride," "The Darcys and The Bingleys," ETC ETC ETC ETC which are all ridiculous sequels upon sequels to P&P. This shit just will not stop. Write your own damn Victorian-era novel, make up some new characters, do anything else, PLEASE, because I have news for you: SOMEONE ALREADY WROTE PRIDE AND PREJUDICE. Her name was Jane Austen, and if you love her as much as your author "author" bio says you do, maybe you should Stop. Ruining. Everything. She. Wrote. Publish that shit on Fanfiction.net if you have to, but please don't pretend it's actually good literature. 

As an aside, I do want to exclude from this rant modern adaptations such as "Clueless" (which is a take on Emma, for those who are unaware) or "Bridget Jones' Diary" (Pride and Prejudice) because those are only in the bare-bones-plot-sense related to Austen, and have original characters and inventive modern ways to achieve the same general storyline. I actually really like these, because it's an homage in a way that doesn't somehow taint my associations with the real deal. "Mr Darcy's Diary," in my mind, bastardizes P&P in the same way that setting a diaper commercial jingle to the tune of "Ode to Joy" ruins Beethoven. (P.S. OMG DOCTOR ASIAN BABY!!!!!!!! She is fulfilling her parents' expectations WAY ahead of time, what a model for the rest of us!)

When starting to write this post, I was actually unaware of the extent to which this phenomenon has spread. Seriously, every time I clicked on a book on Amazon, the "related books" links showed me 6 more that I hadn't heard of. Clearly, someone needs to take a stand. I'm up for the job, but unfortunately no one listens to me (the world would be a much better place if they did). Let me just say this: if Jane Austen were around today she wouldn't be writing the eighteenth sequel to "Sense and Sensibility," she would be writing something new and controversial that we probably wouldn't understand and would only come to appreciate years later. THAT's what it means to emulate J.A., and let's stop pretending otherwise.