What your favorite authors are saying about Jane Austen

From the palatial estates of Crazy Rich Asians to the high school hallways of Clueless, Jane Austen’s influence is everywhere — literary, cinematic and, let’s be honest, in every modern rom-com where the couple starts out loathing each other. Her wit, elegance, and ruthless precision in depicting the lives of women have ensured that, more than two centuries after her death, Austen isn’t just beloved — she’s essential.

Ahead of our upcoming Celebration of Jane Austen this Thursday, March 27 — featuring a special reading by acclaimed actress Emily Mortimer and a conversation with Jennifer Egan, Kevin Kwan, Helen Fielding, Vivian Gornick and Alexandra Schwartz — we asked some of our favorite writers to tell us what they love most about Austen.

How do your Austen favorites stack up against those of Pulitzer Prize winner Jennifer Egan? How did Pride and Prejudice influence Helen Fielding when she was writing Bridget Jones’ Diary? Read a sample of the responses below and see them all when you sign up for the Unterberg Poetry Center’s new Substack!

Jennifer Egan, author of The Candy House and A Visit from the Good Squad

“My favorite Austen novel shifts each time I read through her oeuvre. This time I’ve settled on Mansfield Park for the sheer variety of the novel’s action and settings: a naughty theatrical spectacle undertaken on the languid premises of a stately home; a seductively malign brother-sister duo; and time spent in a working-class waterfront household teeming with slovenliness, alcoholism, and loud, wild children. Any of these elements would be unimaginable in the more rarefied milieus of Emma and Pride and Prejudice, and I relished the widening of Austen’s lens in Mansfield Park to include such a vivid range of experience.”

Kevin Kwan, author of Crazy Rich Asians and Sex and Vanity

“My favorite Jane Austen novel is Mansfield Park, and likewise, l loved the 1999 film adaptation by Patricia Rozema. It managed to be a little subversive while maintaining the spirit of the novel, and watching Harold Pinter portray Sir Thomas Betram was an added bonus.”

Helen Fielding, author of Bridget Jones’ Diary

“When I was writing Bridget Jones in the original newspaper column the BBC’s adaptation of Pride and Prejudice was mesmerizing the British nation. I found the columns increasingly featuring Mr. Darcy, Mark Darcy, and Colin Firth, and when I was asked to make the columns into a novel I simply stole the plot from Pride and Prejudice. I thought it had been very well researched over a number of centuries, Jane Austen wouldn’t mind and anyway, she was dead.”

Sloane Crosley, author of Grief is for People, Cult Classic, and I Was Told There’d be Cake

“I have a soft spot for Mansfield Park (not that it needs the charity) but what comes to mind at this moment is the 1996 adaptation of Emma, starring Gwyneth Paltrow. Is this turn about the room, so to speak, the reason Paltrow was then cast in Great Expectations two years later? She’s a perfect Emma, playing her with a little stubbornness (a favorite trait of Austen’s characters), both a meddler and a Pollyanna, ignorant of her own power. As a citizen of Earth, I love Clueless, but that’s its own beast. Paltrow’s Emma is ripped from the pages. Actually, I think of the movie quite a bit because of how it portrays Mrs. Elton (Juliet Stevenson), Queen of the Humblebrag. Her constant invocation of mysterious third parties who insist on complimenting her conversation and her cooking is an augury of all social media.”

Want to hear what more of your favorite writers are saying about Jane Austen? Sign up for the Poetry Center’s new Substack, and don’t miss our Celebration of Jane Austen with Jennifer Egan, Kevin Kwan, Helen Fielding, Vivian Gornick, Alexandra Schwartz, including a special reading by Emily Mortimer. Thu, Mar 27.