Paper #3: “You Make Me Feel Like a Natural [Austen]”

[NOTE: Wednesday's reading is in the post BELOW this one.]

In Chapter 7 of Culler’s Literary Theory, he writes that “no one would ever have thought of being in love if they hadn’t read about it in books” (96). In the same way, we might argue that Jane Austen single-handedly created many common-sense notions and genres, including:

• Marriage and courtship (in life or fiction)
• The plucky heroine
• Sisters and/or the family in fiction
• The modern novel and/or the romance novel
• The romantic comedy (in film, especially) 
• The “period piece” (again, in film)

For your third theoretical paper, I want you to discuss how Pride and Prejudice largely created and continues to shape one of the previous categories. What ideas or passages in the book seem to be the most influential and why? Where do we see them emulated today in other works of art? Consider how Austen has created a theory that is so tried-and-true it became a common-sense notion, almost unquestioned in life and art. Discuss at least one other work (post-Austen) that seems to have been inspired by its example, or takes its truths to be self-evident (even if they change/challenge them a little).

Use Culler and at least two other sources to help you discuss this. Sources can be articles, novels, stories, films, etc.—though you must quote from anything you discuss. Don’t merely recount the plot of a movie that resembles it—zero-in on a passage or some dialogue from the film to help us see it. But be sure to use Culler as your ‘lens’ to focus the discussion of how a work can define a culture’s discourse about one of the above terms, and where theories of identity and genre come from.

REQUIREMENTS

• Page limit optional, but say something meaningful
• Must close-read from Pride and Prejudice; don’t just summarize the plot
• Use Culler to help focus your discussion
• Two additional sources
• DUE IN TWO WEEKS: Wednesday, November 3^rd by 5pm