A discussion on Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility regarding the recent film adaptation.

On Wednesday November 4, The 92nd Street Y hosted a panel discussion about Jane Austen’s first novel, Sense and Sensibility, in light of its recent movie adaptation. The panel featured renowned writers Radhika Jones, Francine Prose, and Sadie Stein, with the conversation moderated by New York Times staff writer Alexandra Schwartz.

For anyone who doesn’t know, Sense and Sensibility was Jane Austen’s first novel, and tells the story of the Dashwood family. The two protagonists are sisters Elinor and Marianne Dashwood, who are polar opposites in their mannerisms: while Elinor is more polite and reserved, Marianne is full of passion and expresses herself freely. After the death of their father Henry Dashwood, the girls find themselves in a dire financial situation. The story revolves around their relationships with other characters, as well as the love and respect they learn to feel for one another.

The panel started with Schwartz asking each of the panelists what they love about Sense and Sensibility. For Sadie Stein, it was the first of Austen’s stories she’d read, and she commented that the characterization and humor of the book were highlights to her. Francine Prose followed, talking about her endless fascination with Austen’s incredible world-building skills. The novels start with an array of facts, some more useful than others, but altogether they immediately pull readers in and keep them captivated throughout the book. Radhika Jones then added that she herself has a sister, and so she feels a kind of kinship to protagonists of this book. Sense and Sensibility focuses on the ups and downs in the relationship between the sisters, which exists outside of all the romance and drama of the story.

The next topic was how Austen starts the novel, immediately exhibiting the taboo topic of money and the character’s perceptions of one another. However these serve as an important precursor to all the conflicts of the novel, such as the tension between the sisters, constrictive social conventions, morality, and more. “She’s a genius, and I marvel more by the year at how incredible this talent and imagination is,” Schwartz said. However, a constant underlying theme the panelists focused on was the need for the characters to depend on others and how irritating that could be. “It really stood out to me, rereading it to prepare for tonight, how many people dislike each other in this book and how often we are told about that,” Radhika Jones said.

The panelists then detailed which of the two sisters were their favorites. For Jones, she found that Elinor has “good manners” but is not actually as restrained as most people assume her to be. Elinor very much takes part in the disliking of people, it’s just that she doesn’t articulate them how Marianne does. While Elinor may not exhibit her passions the same way her sister does, they still do exist, but she constrains them for the sake of politeness. Riding on that, Stein added that Elinor stands for convention, while Marianne’s mindset is much more modern. However she highlighted that Austen probably “feels for both of them” and Stein agreed, as she likes both characters for their differences. Lastly, Prose joined by saying Elinor is a better judge of character, and “the kind of judge of character we imagine Jane Austen was.”

One specific element of Sense and Sensibility which stands out among Austen’s works is the particularly unappealing love interests, Schwartz pointed out. Prose added that she didn’t “get” Edward Ferrars, with the book detailing everything he is not and the new film adaptation presenting him as quite dull. Nothing really points to him being the final love interest because of how he is talked about throughout the book. One reason for this, Schwartz noted, is that Sense and Sensibility is an anti-romantic story, in which Austen is very uninterested in detailing how these characters ended up falling for one another. Prose then concluded that a secret of Austen’s works is that she isn’t actually interested in the marriage plot, having different ideas of what women’s destinies should be.

The discussion then moved to their opinions on the film adaptation, all of which were not very positive. Stein started by saying it didn’t bother her, and that she didn’t have any strong feelings about it. Prose, however, said she hated the movie, remarking that the female characters were portrayed with no depth, “which is such a crime to do to women in a Jane Austen movie.” Jones added that she found the movie unmemorable, contrasting it with the Ang Lee adaptation which used Austen’s language in a striking way. The lack of memorable language in this new film was disappointing to Jones, asserting that it is essential to have Austen’s actual writing in adaptations of her work.

Jane Austen is an author whose legacy remains imprinted upon the public’s consciousness. However there are more to her stories than just romance, with deep insights into people’s relationships and societal convention. Having these discussions allows us to search deeper into Austen’s work, and even when adaptations are not ideal, they prompt wonderful conversations which unite Austen readers.

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