Ana Iris Marques Ramgrab Meet Jane Austen: the Author As Character In
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ANA IRIS MARQUES RAMGRAB MEET JANE AUSTEN: THE AUTHOR AS CHARACTER IN CONTEMPORARY DERIVATIVE WORKS PORTO ALEGRE 2013 UNIVERSIDADE FEDERAL DO RIO GRANDE DO SUL PROGRAMA DE PÓS-GRADUAÇÃO EM LETRAS ÁREA: ESTUDOS DE LITERATURA ESPECIALIDADE: LITERATURAS ESTRANGEIRAS MODERNAS LINHA DE PESQUISA: TEORIAS LITERÁRIAS E INTERDISCIPLINARIDADE MEET JANE AUSTEN: THE AUTHOR AS CHARACTER IN CONTEMPORARY DERIVATIVE WORKS AUTORA: ANA IRIS MARQUES RAMGRAB ORIENTADORA: SANDRA SIRANGELO MAGGIO Dissertação de Mestrado em Literaturas de Língua Inglesa, submetida ao Programa de Pós- Graduação em Letras da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul como requisito parcial para a obtenção do título de Mestre. PORTO ALEGRE Abril, 2013 FICHA CATALOGRÁFICA RAMGRAB, Ana Iris Marques Meet Jane Austen: The Author As Character In Contemporary Derivative Works Ana Iris Marques Ramgrab Porto Alegre: UFRGS, Instituto de Letras, 2013. 142 p Dissertação (Mestrado - Programa de Pós-graduação em Letras) Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul. 1. Literatura Inglesa. 2. Jane Austen. 3. Autor Como Personagem. 4. Adaptação. 5. Metaficção Historiográfica. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The end of this journey was only possible because of the generosity and comprehension of my family, who had to endure five years of all Jane Austen all the time. Of course they had to endure 32 years of me first, so they had some training. Anyway, thank you Dad for teaching me to like books and for never denying me money to buy some more, even though I have no space left to store them. Mom and Clau, I’m sorry for all the times I made you sit through my explanations, complaints and endless repeating of the same films, but you also have to admit that watching Colin Firth, James McAvoy and Matthew Macfadyen in wet shirts was no sacrifice. To my supervisor and “academic mother”, Sandra Sirangelo Maggio, all I can say is that if I stuck to the end, it was only because of your unwavering support, saintly patience and endless supply of fine biscuits. The most deserving acknowledgements to professors Rosalia Neumann Garcia (UFRGS), Elaine Barros Indrusiak (UFRGS), Fabiane Lazzaris (UNIPAMPA) and Adriana Amaral (Unisinos) for being true friends as well as excellent tutors. I also have to thank the participants of GEL – Grupo de Estudos Livres, PAG’s Book Club, and Introdução à Pesquisa Científica (a.k.a Monday’s Therapy) who became my support group in the past four years, through academic and personal turmoil, with the wit and energy that we all love in Elizabeth Bennet. Also, much love to my outside support group: friends and staff at Shamrock Irish Pub – long live the Jane Austen Beer Club! I am grateful for the support provided by CAPES through a PAG/REUNI scholarship that was fundamental for my experience as a Masters student and my growth as an educator. And finally, I have to thank Miss Jane Austen, just because. RESUMO A escritora inglesa Jane Austen possui, além do status de autora canônica, um apelo popular não apenas em função de sua qualidade como escritora, mas também pela força imagética de suas obras quando adaptadas para o cinema. Em Amor e Inocência (2007), o diretor Julian Jarrold apresenta um episódio ocorrido na vida da autora, com base em fatos extraídos da biografia Becoming Jane Austen , escrita em 2003 por Jon Spence. O filme explora um possível envolvimento entre a jovem Jane e o estudante irlandês Tom Lefroy. Essa produção, enquanto apresenta o início da carreira da escritora, sugere que o trauma da relação mal sucedida com Lefroy possa ter sido a fonte temática que inspirou sua obra ficcional posterior. Esta dissertação verifica de que forma o filme articula as questões históricas sobre a vida de Austen com as situações ficcionais apresentadas em seus romances para chegar a um produto final tão coeso e verossímil, embora ficcional. Especial atenção é dada ao estudo da construção da personagem protagonista, que resulta da combinação entre o conteúdo imagético das obras de Austen e os elementos biográficos pesquisados por Spence. Além dessas fusões, há ainda que ser considerado o ícone Jane Austen, que habita o imaginário dos ingleses e dos leitores pelo mundo afora. Na evolução das adaptações fílmicas das obras de Austen testemunhamos a fusão entre as personagens e a própria autora, especialmente no caso de Elizabeth Bennet, em Orgulho e Preconceito (1813). Para realizar esta análise, lanço mão dos conceitos de adaptação e apropriação propostos por Linda Hutcheon, e do conceito de metaficção historiográfica estabelecido pela mesma autora em A Poetics of Postmodernism: History, Theory, Fiction (1988). Ao término do trabalho, espero que esta discussão investigativa e argumentativa seja útil em três aspectos: contribuindo para o debate sobre autores usados como personagens na ficção derivativa contemporânea; identificando certas necessidades culturais que subjazem ao culto do ícone Jane Austen, conhecido como Austenmania; e verificando até que ponto o conceito de metaficção historiográfica dá conta de propostas narrativas em que a personagem histórica retratada é também uma escritora. Palavras chaves: Literatura Inglesa. Jane Austen. Autor como Personagem. Adaptação. Metaficcção Historiográfica. ABSTRACT Jane Austen enjoys more than the status of canonical author: she is also popular not only because of her achievements as a writer but also for the cinematic appeal of her novels. In Becoming Jane (2007), director Julian Jarrold presents the story of Jane Austen from an episode occurred early in the author’s life. Based on facts extracted from Jon Spence’s biography Becoming Jane Austen (2003), the film explores a supposed relationship between young Jane and an Irish Law student, Tom Lefroy. In Becoming Jane we witness the beginning of Austen’s writing career, and the film speculates that the trauma of a failed relationship with Lefroy was the inspiration for Austen’s mature novels. This work verifies the ways in which the film articulates the historical aspects of Jane Austen’s life with fictional events as presented in her novels to reach a cohesive and credible – although fictional – result. Special attention is paid to the process of constructing a fictional Jane as main character, combining the images contained in her novels with the biographical elements presented by Spence; it is also considered in this analysis the evolving nature of Jane Austen as an icon that inhabits not only the English imaginary but also that of readers all over the world. In the evolution of Austen filmic adaptations, we witness a fusion between her characters and the author herself, especially Elizabeth Bennet from Pride and Prejudice (1813), which adds to the intertextual layers of any film analysis. To deal with the questions of film adaptations, I refer to the concepts of adaptation and appropriation as posed by theoretician Linda Hutcheon. For the specific analysis of the phenomenon of author as character, I turn again to Linda Hutcheon and the concept of historiographic metafiction presented in A Poetics of Postmodernism: History, Theory, Fiction (1988). I hope, by the end of this thesis, that this investigative and argumentative analysis is helpful in three instances: contributing to the discussion of the use of authors as characters in contemporary fiction, be it filmic or literary; identifying the cultural needs of readers and critics that perpetuate the cult of Jane Austen, known as Austenmania; and verifying to what extent historiographic metafiction alone is enough to deal with narratives in which the historical character portrayed is also a writer. Keywords: English Literature. Jane Austen. Author As Character. Adaptation. Historiographic Metafiction. The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid. (…) Yes, novels; — for I will not adopt that ungenerous and impolitic custom so common with novel writers, of degrading by their contemptuous censure the very performances, to the number of which they are themselves adding — joining with their greatest enemies in bestowing the harshest epithets on such works, and scarcely ever permitting them to be read by their own heroine, who, if she accidentally take up a novel, is sure to turn over its insipid pages with disgust. Alas! if the heroine of one novel be not patronized by the heroine of another, from whom can she expect protection and regard? I cannot approve of it. Let us leave it to the Reviewers to abuse such effusions of fancy at their leisure, and over every new novel to talk in threadbare strains of the trash with which the press now groans. Let us not desert one another; we are an injured body. Although our productions have afforded more extensive and unaffected pleasure than those of any other literary corporation in the world, no species of composition has been so much decried. (Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey ) TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………….. 10 1 MEETING JANE AUSTEN…………………………………………. 19 1.1 LIFE……………………………………………….............................................. 20 1.2 LABOR …………………………………………………………………… 31 1.2 LEGACY …………………….…………………………………….…...... 41 2 SEEING JANE AUSTEN……………………………………………… 55 2.1 FILMS …………………………………..………………..………….…... 57 2.2 FANS ……………………………………..…………………………….... 75 2.3 FICTION ……..……………………………..………………………….... 83 3 BECOMING JANE AUSTEN………….………………………….…. 90 3.1 BECOMING FICTION IN FILM……………………... ……………………… 91 3.2 BECOMING BECOMING JANE ……………..…………………….. ……...…… 96 3.3 BECOMING ELIZABETH BENNET…………………………………………….. 104 CONCLUSION……………………………………………………..…. 121