jane austen

well folks, my year of jane austen has come to an end. (i just have to watch that bbc jane austen movie series to be complete...) really, it was a year of british literature written by women, but who's being picky?

mostly, i decided to read these books because i had a very poor education in british literature. my continental european literature knowledge is quite thorough... i had only ignored what was written in english! i had an english literature class in high school, but remember nothing about it except that the teacher was not that great or inspiring. i'm sure i read no austen or chaucer. i think we only read some shakespeare. so this year, inspired by a fun woman named jennifer that i met whilst living in savannah, ga, i started to read austen. i first read pride and prejudice because then i wanted to read pride and prejudice and zombies. that book was terrible! but austen herself got me hook, line and sinker.

my favorite austen book is either pride and prejudice or mansfield park. my least favorite, in fact i might even hate it, was sense and sensibility.

i also read jane eyre, by charlotte bronte. i also hated this one. everyone my whole life has been raving about jane eyre, jane eyre, i love jane eyre. i couldn't have cared less about her as a character and was so saddened by the ending--it just seemed like she was still doing what she felt pleased others. she just wanted the right person to please. but on a bronte kick, i read wuthering heights (emily this time) as well. i loved it! it might be one of my favorite books of all time. but it's so dark and brooding, for those of you who know me this is probably no surprise :)

a final book that was so much fun and a great find in the genre was the scarlet pimpernel by baroness orczy. here was a crossover for me: she was a hungarian baroness relocated to london that wrote a ton (in english). this book was great, and there are more in the series that i think i will investigate once i head back to the athenaeum in a couple of weeks.

currently, i am reading the chronicles of narnia (i have also never read these...). he's irish, but i'll count it here! and a couple of years ago, i read shelley's frankenstein. in that vein i think i'll kick off 2010 with bram stoker's dracula. but i am also looking for other quality british literature to read for the year. furthermore, my american literature knowledge and education might just be worse than my british. any suggestions?