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Last week I finished Northanger Abbey, the last book from Jane Austen I didn’t read and thought about something I can do to look back on all the great novels, which I will certainly read over and over again. I found this challenge on tumblr and decide to answer all 30 questions and do it right - on livejournal, because I’m not that familiar with the other network and still like LJ a little bit more. Well, here it is ! Please excuse the mistakes, I'm really not a native speaker ! :D
1. Favorite Austen Heroine - For me it’s Emma Woodhouse. I think she’s the most humorous of all Austen heroines and still she’s clever, reasonable and even, if her good heart sometimes needs to be put in the right direction, she always wants to do the right thing and make everyone around herself happy.
2. Favorite Austen Man - Two weeks ago I would say Mr. Knightley without any thought, but now I can’t really tell. I finished last Austen Novel, Northanger Abbey and Henry Tinley somehow stole my heart away. He’s courteous and still funny in his silly way, so I just can’t avoid him.
3. Favorite Austen book - Emma ! It’s the first story I discover, the story which brought me to Austen and I will always too grateful for it.
4. Favorite quote from the books - There’s too many quotes I adore, but if I had to choose, I’d pick this one:
“The more I know of the world, the more I am convinced that I shall never see a man whom I can really love.” (Sense & Sensibility)
5. Favorite moment in the books - I always try to remember books as a whole, and rate them as a whole, so it’s hard for me to pick just a moment and still there’re plenty of them ! Well then, I choose the first that crossed my mind: The misunderstanding with ‘courtship’ in Emma.
6. Favorite movie adaptation - I’ll name three. Emma (1996), Northanger Abbey (2007) and Mansfield Park (1999), because they did a wonderful job on all of them and pictured the stories so well that I liked it more after seeing the films then after reading the books - and that’s weird, because films are mostly worse than books they’re made of.
7. Favorite Austen couple - A couple? I have no idea and I think I’ll be never able to tell. I love Emma and Mr Knightley and their way they found to each other. I love Elizabeth and Mr Darcy, because they’re just amazing and they will always be a symbol for everything that Austen Novels are. And last but not least I love Henry Tilney and Catherine Morland, because he didn’t love her at first sight, he started to love her because she loved him.
8. Least favorite couple - Funny Price & Edmund Bertram ! Expanation comes in number 20.
9. Most hated foe of a heroine - Mary Crawford, even if I don’t like Funny and Edmund as a couple, she was just getting on my nerves and Isabella Thorpe, but let's say it is a love/hate relationship, because she's amazing ! She's so selfish and cunning, and she pretends to be a friend of Catherine so well !
10. Most frustrating family member - Lydia Bennet (Pride & Prejudice), she’s such a silly creature !
11. Least favorite book - Sense & Sensibility. The characters are silly, and even if there’re some good scenes, the story is sort of boring. I knew Willoughby is a bad guy from the very beginning. Marianna is selfish, silly and childish and still gets the best man, yeah and even though this all, Elinor loves her ! This book is for me like a proof, that no one, even Jane Austen can't do everything amazing.
12. Least favorite Austen heroine - Elinor Dashwood is my answer. Even if Marianne has so many bad qualities, she’s still somehow agreeable, but Elinor is perfect ! She’s forgiving, she loves her little sister, suffers silently and even tries to be a friend of her feo. Everything I can say is that she’s annoying with her perfection.
13. Least favorite Austen man - Edward Ferres, what’s so gentle about him ? His not funny, not reasonable, not clever, he has no job, no money and he’s not good looking. But ok, not everything bad about Austen is in Sense & Sensibility, there’s something weird about Captain Wentworth too !
14. Favorite love confession from the books - It’s most certainly the love letter, Captain Wentworth wrote to Anne in Persuasion. The whole book I thought he’s weird and heartless, but in the end I realize he was just scared he'll be refused for the second time.
“I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone forever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you …”
15. Favorite love confession from the films - Emma (1995)
“And I rushed back, anxious for your feelings. Came to be near you. I rode through the rain. I’d ride through worse than that, if I could just hear your voice telling me that I might at least have some chance to win you … Maybe it’s our imperfections which make us so perfect for one another. Marry me. Marry me, my wonderful, darling friend.”
16. Least favorite film adaptation - Mansfield Park (2007) I haven’t seen all of the adaptations, but this was so bad, that I can hardly imagine, I’ll ever find something worse and I love you Billie, but sorry girl, you sucked at this !
17. Moment that made you sad/cry while reading - Austen books are rather comical then sad, so there're not many moments you have opportunity to cry, but I know, Anne's diary in Persuasion did impressed me with his hopeless atmosphere.
18. Moment that made you smile/happy while reading, while watching - Pride and Prejudice (2005), at the lake, when Mr Bingley and Mr Darcy are getting ready for Mr Bingleys proposal to Jane and of course Mr Tinley proposal in Northanger Abbey (2007).
19. Moment that made you laugh while reading - The necessary conversation, between Henry Tinley and Catherine Morland about Bath, while their first dancing. It’s so sweet !
20. Moment that made you mad while reading - It’s like half of the Mansfield Park, that made me mad ! I truly believe Henry Crawford loved Funny, and every time she rejected him I was like: Come on girl ! People can change ! And in the end, he has done, what he’s done, only because she didn’t want him. He deserved a second chance - full stop. And of course Emma insulting Miss Bates at the picnic.
21. Favorite Jane Austen-related photo - I'll never decide this ! SORRY ! :)
22. Favorite Austen female casting decision - Romola Garai as Emma. She’s beautiful, sort of childish. Exactly how Emma should be.
23. Favorite Austen male casting decision - I think many of Austen fans would choose Colin Firth without giving it a thought, and I can’t say anything against it. He’s amazing but he’s still replaceable. Mathew replaced him rather well, didn’t he ? So, let’s say I love Jeremy Northam, he’s the right guy for Mr Knightley and because I first saw the movie, he will always be Mr Knightley for me, but even he was replaced. Not so well, but still. I don’t hate Johnny Lee Miller for being Knightley. So I’m going to make a controversial choice. JJ Field as Henry Tilney. There’s something in his smile that is adorable and he has this roguish look - I can’t imagine this can be replaceable !
24. Favorite supporting character - Jane Bennet, no doubt about it !
25. Favorite family connection (i.e. sister-sister, mother-daughter, etc.) - The relationship between Lizzie and her father. But certainly Pride and Prejudice leads in the question. It has the most developed family relationships of all Austen books.
27. Favorite quote from the films - I have no idea, but the first thing that came to my mind was following:
„And those are the words of a gentleman. From the first moment I met you, your arrogance and conceit, your selfish disdain for the feelings of others made me realize that you were the last man in the world I could ever be prevailed upon to marry.“
28. Favorite moment from the films - Pride & Prejudice (2005), Lizzie’s arrival at Pamberly. I love Keiras face expression there, it’s like “WTF !! This all could have been mine?!”
29. Favorite character back story or secret - The secret that Frank Churchill is secretly engaged to Jane Fairfax. I like how the 2009 adaptation showed them in both in a good light in the end, because I believe they didn’t want to hurt anybody.
30. Character you most relate to - Emma, that’s why I like the book and her as a heroine the most. I always try to help people around me, to see every one of them happy and time to time I fail.