How I learned to love Jane Austen
Three lessons on storytelling and life from an author I once loathed
I’ve been trying to read Jane Austen since I was a teenager. I say trying because, well, the books are long. The print is small. The text is full of strange words like “thither” and “alacrity.” And despite watching (and loving) pretty much every film adaptation, I’d never made it past page 50 in any of the six novels Austen completed during her lifetime.
Until late last year, when I stumbled across this free audio version of Pride and Prejudice from Apple Books.
To my infinite surprise, I couldn’t turn it off. I listened in the kitchen. I listened in the shower. I listened as I folded laundry and brewed coffee and drove to work. When Pride and Prejudice was over, I listened to it again. Then I listened to Emma. Then Persuasion. And as I did all this listening, Jane Austen began to infiltrate my own writing in some surprising ways.
I do not write regency romance. But as I worked through edits for my debut novel, Favorite Daughter, I found myself wondering what Austen might’ve done with the characters. My book is about family, and family dysfunction, and women who behave badly—all themes she covered well.
I’m not the only contemporary fiction author who draws inspiration from her.
Eleanor Catton has described Jane Austen as the unlikely godmother of her literary ecothriller Birnam Wood. That might sound farfetched—and please, for the love of God, do not pick up Birnam Wood expecting it to be like Emma. But it says a lot about the intelligence of Austen’s storytelling that we’re still emulating her today. And I tend to agree that she can teach us a lot.
Here are three lessons I learned about storytelling (and dare I say, life?) after finally reading Jane Austen.
1. All people are a bit silly.
As a satirist, Austen’s M.O. is to poke fun at the ridiculous things her characters do and the absurd situations they get themselves into. What amazes me is that she does it with so much affection and so little meanness.
Mrs. Bennet from Pride and Prejudice is a classic example. She’s a nosy, naive, superficial drama queen who spends the whole novel embarrassing everyone. Yet by the end, somehow, we love her. We adore her. Despite—or perhaps, because of—all her bullshit, she feels like a friend. We all have that one pal in our lives who, like Mrs. B., is just a bit extra.
2. People are full of contradictions.
Whenever I listen to Pride and Prejudice, I catch more instances of the characters saying one thing but doing the opposite. Elizabeth Bennet, for example, regularly accuses Darcy of being cold and pompous, yet she’s the one who’s always laughing at people and teasing them for their blunders. She chides her sister Jane for being blind to others’ faults, yet she goes out of her way to believe the best of Wickham even though he is obviously a super bad dude who’s manipulating everyone.
These contradictions in Elizabeth’s character—and the misassumptions she makes—end up driving the plot. They also give her a lot of depth. She’s messy. She’s inconsistent. She lacks self-awareness. In other words, she’s just like us.
3. Small stories matter. Women’s stories matter.
Some critics at the time of its publication argued that Emma didn’t have enough plot. I think that’s a stupid bunch of crap, and here’s why.
Emma is a clever but vain twenty-one-year-old who meddles in people’s romantic affairs for sport. She presumes to know what’s best for everyone when, in reality, she doesn’t even know what’s best for herself. Her misguided attempts at matchmaking end up hurting a lot of people, and she risks alienating herself as a result.
It’s a domestic story with personal stakes. And what keeps us interested, even in the absence of more “exciting” plot devices like car chases and explosions, is how we come to see ourselves in the character.
As Eleanor Catton says in the interview I’ve linked above, the reader “becomes” Emma over the course of the story. When she behaves badly, we’re situated deeply enough in her head to understand why she’s acting this way, which almost makes us feel like we’ve done the bad thing ourselves.
And we want desperately to be forgiven.
End notes
Currently reading: 52 Weeks to a Sweeter Life for Caregivers, Activists and Helping Professionals by Farzana Doctor. I rarely dip into nonfiction, but the weekly tips and experiments in this workbook have really helped me practice self-care and maintain a sense of balance in my day job as a healthcare worker. Highly recommend!
I’m also blazing through Happy Place. This is my first time reading a book by Emily Henry—thank you to
for the encouragement—and I can now say with confidence that the hype is well-deserved. Such a joyful treat!Insomnia update: Thank you to everyone who reached out to me with notes of support and encouragement after my last letter. (And crossword tips—the answer was indeed ALDI!) I’m still struggling, but it really helps to know I have such awesome people in my corner.
Are you an Austen superfan? What’s your hot take on the 2005 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice? (I know you have one!) Hit reply or drop me a comment to let me know! And thanks as always for reading.
If you enjoyed this post, please consider forwarding it to a friend. I’ll be sending these letters a few times per month in the lead-up to my book’s publication. Find me at morgandick.com or on Instagram @morgandick_author for more.
I just read the novel adaptation Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld (a fave!) and enjoyed what she did with it 💖 So bold to do so as well 🎉
ohh this gives me SO much hope with austen's books! i've tried reading pride & prejudice but couldn't get past the first chapter. this post has inspired me to listen to the audiobook version - thanks morgan!!