Joking with Jane Austen in January by Diana Birchall

Mr. Collins and Lizzy

Of all the many reasons why I have loved Jane Austen for so long, one of the very greatest is her sublime brilliance as a humorist. This quality in her naturally appeals to me so much because, like Lizzy, I “dearly love a laugh.” But there’s more to it than that. It’s not just her obviously famous jokes and witticisms – it’s the unique quality she has that the more you reread her, the more wit you find! In what will seem an ordinary, polished, wordy 18^th century sort of transitional paragraph that you’ve paid little attention to on earlier readings, suddenly you notice – why, she’s doing it again, there’s a shrewd subtle joke in there, that you dig up like a hidden golden bone and discover with ever-renewed delight and refreshment. She’s still giving me such moments, fifty years on from my first reading – which is an incredible feat in any author.

So, since this month’s theme is Joking with Jane Austen in January (and we unquestionably need a little joking just about now!), I thought I would focus on what is to me a supremely witty moment in each of her novels. Choosing them reminds me of the scene in Emma which itself centers on a joke.  At the Box Hill picnic, the party is asked to say “either one thing very clever, be it prose or verse, original or repeated — or two things moderately clever — or three things very dull indeed.” Talkative Miss Bates immediately says, “Three things very dull indeed. That will just do for me, you know. I shall be sure to say three dull things as soon as ever I open my mouth, shan’t I?” Emma very rudely answers, “Ah! ma’am, but there may be a difficulty. Pardon me, but you will be limited as to number — only three at once.”

And that is my problem! How can I choose but one funny moment from each of the novels, when each one contains hundreds, maybe thousands?  So I will start by choosing some of my favorite jokes, which are perhaps among the most famous, in the three earliest novels today, and three more next Friday.

Pride and Prejudice was not Jane Austen’s first published work, but it is usually the one most people read first, as I did. I was in college, with aims to become a Literary Lady myself (hah!), but in those days Austen was rarely part of the curriculum; and I discovered and read her on my own along with other women writers I then enjoyed – the Brontes, Colette, Dorothy L. Sayers, Nancy Mitford. No one then discovered Jane Austen through the movies that have made her so much more widely known and more accessible today; there were no Jane Austen movies then (yes, I know, the 1941 Greer Garson/Laurence Olivier, but that was way before my time and I’d never heard of it). So Jane Austen felt like my own private delight – until I joined the Jane Austen Society, and with it, found my social and creative niche for a lifetime.

I still remember my first reading of Pride and Prejudice. I came to it a bit after my other favorite women authors, having put it off because I thought the title sounded a bit heavy and serious, and I had the idea that I loved melodramatic delicious Victorian novels, nothing earlier. But once I started reading, you all know what happened: instant falling-in-love and compulsive devouring of the lively Bennet world and its delights. Then there came a crucial moment, the scene where I suddenly realized that was actually one of the funniest things I had ever read! You know the moment. When cloddish clown Mr. Collins, learning that he can’t have Jane, the first and prettiest of the girls, turns his mind to, of all people – Lizzy! By then Austen has made it already abundantly clear that her Elizabeth is one of the brightest and most delightful females ever created by an author’s pen, and the idea that this clodhopper confidently dares to select her is just too killing! Here is the moment to savour:

“Having now a good house and very sufficient income, [Mr. Collins] intended to marry; and in seeking a reconciliation with the Longbourn family he had a wife in view, as he meant to chuse one of the daughters, if he found them as handsome and amiable as they were represented by common report. This was his plan of amends — of atonement — for inheriting their father’s estate; and he thought it an excellent one, full of eligibility and suitableness, and excessively generous and disinterested on his own part.

His plan did not vary on seeing them. Miss Bennet’s lovely face confirmed his views, and established all his strictest notions of what was due to seniority; and for the first evening she was his settled choice. The next morning, however, made an alteration; for in a quarter-of-an-hour’s tête-à-tête with Mrs. Bennet before breakfast, a conversation beginning with his parsonage-house, and leading naturally to the avowal of his hopes, that a mistress for it might be found at Longbourn, produced from her, amid very complaisant smiles and general encouragement, a caution against the very Jane he had fixed on. ‘As to her younger daughters she could not take upon her to say — she could not positively answer — but she did not know of any prepossession; her eldest daughter, she must just mention — she felt it incumbent on her to hint, was likely to be very soon engaged.’

Mr. Collins had only to change from Jane to Elizabeth — and it was soon done — done while Mrs. Bennet was stirring the fire. Elizabeth, equally next to Jane in birth and beauty, succeeded her of course.”

“I cannot imagine how they will spend half of it.”

Sense and Sensibility, Austen’s first published novel, was the one I read after Pride and Prejudice and did not come to love it as quickly, though of course later I became a lost soul in love with them all. But I’ll challenge anyone to write anything wittier or more cynical than the early scene when the odious John and Fanny Dashwood are whittling the fortunes of poor Mrs. Dashwood and her daughters, down to size. Here is a sample of their conversation:

“I believe you are right, my love; it will be better that there should be no annuity in the case; whatever I may give them occasionally will be of far greater assistance than a yearly allowance, because they would only enlarge their style of living if they felt sure of a larger income, and would not be sixpence the richer for it at the end of the year. It will certainly be much the best way. A present of fifty pounds, now and then, will prevent their ever being distressed for money, and will, I think be amply discharging my promise to my father.”

“To be sure it will. Indeed, to say the truth, I am convinced within myself that your father had no idea of your giving them any money at all…Altogether, they will have five hundred a-year amongst them, and what on earth can four women want for more than that? They will live so cheap! Their housekeeping will be nothing at all. They will have no carriage, no horses, and hardly any servants; they will keep no company, and can have no expences of any kind! Only conceive how comfortable they will be! Five hundred a-year! I am sure I cannot imagine how they will spend half of it; and as to your giving them more, it is quite absurd to think of it. They will be much more able to give you something.”

Priceless, is it not? And now we come to the early novel Northanger Abbey. With so much engaging repartee between the naïve Catherine and the clever Henry Tilney, and Austen’s original satire of Catherine’s and Isabella’s Gothic reading, we are spoilt for choice with an abundance of witty dialogue. I will light on just a small and amusing scene between Catherine and the far more worldly, crass and scheming Isabella, highlighting the contrast between them in their girlish activities:

Cathereine and Isabella

“’For heaven’s sake! Let us move away from this end of the room. Do you know, there are two odious young men who have been staring at me this half hour. They really put me quite out of countenance. Let us go and look at the arrivals. They will hardly follow us there.’

Away they walked to the book; and while Isabella examined the names, it was Catherine’s employment to watch the proceedings of these alarming young men.

‘They are not coming this way, are they? I hope they are not so impertinent as to follow us. Pray let me know if they are coming. I am determined I will not look up.’

In a few moments Catherine, with unaffected pleasure, assured her that she need not be longer uneasy, as the gentlemen had just left the pump–room.

‘And which way are they gone?’ said Isabella, turning hastily round. ‘One was a very good–looking young man.’

‘They went towards the church–yard.’

‘Well, I am amazingly glad I have got rid of them! And now, what say you to going to Edgar’s Buildings with me, and looking at my new hat? You said you should like to see it.’

Catherine readily agreed. ‘Only,’ she added, ‘perhaps we may overtake the two young men.’

‘Oh! Never mind that. If we make haste, we shall pass by them presently, and I am dying to show you my hat.’

‘But if we only wait a few minutes, there will be no danger of our seeing them at all.’

‘I shall not pay them any such compliment, I assure you. I have no notion of treating men with such respect. That is the way to spoil them.’

Catherine had nothing to oppose against such reasoning; and therefore, to show the independence of Miss Thorpe, and her resolution of humbling the sex, they set off immediately as fast as they could walk, in pursuit of the two young men.”

Let us continue this discussion of Joking with Jane in January  next Friday, when we shall enjoy some moments of highest hilarity in Emma, Mansfield Park, and Persuasion. See you then, and in the meantime I invite you to tell some of your own favorites of Jane’s Jests in the comments!