This week's Think Tank (Friday, Oct. 19, noon, Burke Library Room 211) will feature Professor of English John O'Neill talking about: "The Reel Jane Austen: Learning About the Novel from the Movies."
In the 1990's, a series of popular film treatments of the novels of Jane Austen -- including the Emma Thompson/Hugh Grant/Kate Winslett Sense and Sensibility, the Kate Beckinsale Mansfield Park, the Gwyneth Paltrow Emma, and the Jennifer Ehle/Colin Firth Pride and
Prejudice -- appeared in theatres and on television. These were only the most recent versions of the classic author to be filmed; her works have attracted the attention of filmmakers since the beginning of sound film.
Think Tank will feature discussion of some of the film and television treatments of the novels of Jane Austen, focusing on Pride and Prejudice but discussing others as appropriate. We will look at one or two passages in Austen's Pride and Prejudice and at their film treatments in the 1940 and 1995 film versions and ask how what we see on the screen can illuminate what we see on the page. Among the questions we may want to ask are these: How can seeing a film of a novel help us to understand the novel in a new way? Is there a "core" of the narrative that must remain the same as a novel is re-imagined on film? How much can a film deviate from the novel and still deserve to have the same title? Insofar as the films reflect the preoccupations of their times and their audiences, what can these tell us about Austen's original text?
This discussion is a preliminary study for a seminar I Professor O'Neill will be offering in spring, 2002, "Jane Austen: Text and Film."
Lunch will be provided. Please RSVP with your meal card number so we know how many to order.
*** Think Tank is sponsored by the Levitt Center for Public Affairs ***
