This seminar is a part of the AM Anglistik Literatur II (4 SWS).
In the dynamic interplay between canonical and contemporary women's narratives, novels responding to earlier novels often use especially iconic texts as a springboard for reinvention and criticism. We will consider two very famous such intertextual pairings: Pride and Prejudice (1813) by Jane Austen, and its modern counterpart Bridget Jones's Diary (1996) by Helen Fielding; as well as Jane Eyre (1847) by Charlotte Brontë, and its postcolonial response Wide Sargasso Sea (1966) by Jean Rhys. With more than 1800 current variations published of the courtship between Elizabeth Bennet and Fitzwilliam Darcy since the BBC series of 1995 starring Colin Firth created a Pride and Prejudice phenomenon, chosing just one contemporary version is difficult. Yet Bridget Jones‘s Diary managed to represent its own complex interpretation of romance, female agency and social satire, and resonated deeply with a global female readership, spawning in turn a very successful 2001 film adaptation. It also allowed later variations that engaged with the original text in more modern or even fantastic forms to emerge, as Fielding both played with and subverted literary tradition. Jane Eyre features regularly in English readers‘ favourite novel lists, showing that Brontë's exploration of female agency, emotional growth, and independence continue to have a great impact on contemporary readers. Here, too, countless costume drama versions attest to the novel’s ongoing popularity as generations of readers and viewers re-discovers the text anew. Rhys's post-colonial reimagining of the iconic "madwoman in the attic" exposes silenced features of the original novel and continues to question Britain’s self-complacent (neo-)Victorian navel-gazing. We'll examine themes of female and male identity, power, and representation in imperialism. By tracing the echoes and resonances between these pairs of novels, we will gain insights into an ongoing dialogue between past and present in women's writings about women. Please obtain the above editions to ensure your participation. Austenites welcome! :)
