Review: Miss Austen Regrets
It’s about time for another Jane Austen fanfiction review, don’t you think? I’m in the mood, having viewed Miss Austen Regrets last night. It’s 90 minutes of Jane Austen as an aging spinster, but much feistier than the older Austen played by Anne Hathaway in the last few scenes of Becoming Jane. Olivia Williams plays Austen, and she does it well. Miss Austen Regrets also shows the relationship between the older Austen and her young niece, Fanny, which made me think a little more about Austen’s age and situation when she wrote Miss Bates, the spinster of Emma. Was she concerned that she had become the annoying spinster, a character without her own life, dependant on her a lovely young woman/her niece for news, joy, and connection to society? It’s something to think about.
If you want to watch Miss Austen Regrets, you’ll need to rent it from Netflix or buy the DVD of the recent Sense & Sensibility (it’s on the Special Features disc).
Sense & Sensibility (with Miss Austen Regrets) (BBC TV 2008)
