‘Pride and Prejudice’

A bunch of women chattering for 400 pages.

I admit it. I own up to it. For years that was my sexist assessment of Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice.” I think I faked it in English literature class, but then that was a long time ago. Anyway, I know I never finished it or even came close.

So it is with some irony that in this, my final “Classics on Cassette” column, I turn to “Pride and Prejudice.” I had to give this 1813 classic one more chance because it is the favorite book of both my wife and my sister.

Cover to Cover Cassette of Wiltshire, England, has a reading of “Pride and Prejudice” by actress Irene Sutcliffe that shows what a fool I was about this book. Eleven hours of listening later, I had to agree with others much wiser than I: This is a masterpiece.

And it is all the more so in the hands of Sutcliffe. She takes the most irritating character in the book, Elizabeth Bennet’s mother, and carves her image into your brain.

You can just see Mrs. Bennet sitting there scheming--not darkly, just irritatingly--to marry off her daughters to young men of means.

The setting is a country village modeled after Steventon, Hampshire, where Jane Austen was born in 1775, the daughter of a country parson.

Sitting in the parlor of her parents’ comfortable house, Austen often scribbled away at her writing desk while the conversations of her family swirled around her. Little did they know that this girl, who never married or even tarried far from her village, would produce “Pride and Prejudice,” perhaps the greatest English novel purely about character.

For those of you who need reminding, the plot of “Pride and Prejudice”--and there is a plot, to my great surprise--revolves around Elizabeth’s uncertain interest in a Mr. Darcy, a young man of pride who is regarded at first with great prejudice by Elizabeth.

The other Bennet girls also make efforts to secure husbands as the book moves along, but it is to Elizabeth that the story always returns.

Elizabeth is smarter than most men, but she is conscious, too, of femininity. There is a constant struggle to be recognized as the equal of any man while at the same time not scaring off a husband. Austen was far ahead of her time, of course.

And after I had finished listening to “Pride and Prejudice” I could see both my wife and my sister in Elizabeth Bennet. No wonder they adore this book.

There are so many rich moments: Elizabeth’s audacious confrontation with Lady Catherine de Bourgh, who does not want Mr. Darcy to marry her. Or Elizabeth’s first glimpse of Mr. Darcy’s estate, Pemberley, and her thinking of how she had spurned his advances: “I might have been a mistress (of this estate),” she muses wistfully.

But it is for Mr. Darcy that she saves herself, a painful process made the more difficult by her mother’s unpredictable actions, by Lady Catherine’s opposition, and by Mr. Darcy’s aloofness.

Near the end, though, there is this scene, which Sutcliffe reads with awesome insight:

“Elizabeth’s spirits soon rising to playfulness again, she wanted Mr. Darcy to account for his having ever fallen in love with her.

‘How could you begin,’ said she. ‘I can comprehend your going on charmingly, when you had once made a beginning; but what could set you off in the first place?’

(Darcy replies:) ‘I cannot fix on the hour or the spot, or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun.’ ”

Anyone who has ever fallen in love will instantly appreciate Austen’s genius in that one scene. And there are many more like it.

The Sutcliffe reading for Cover to Cover sells for 30 pounds sterling, or about $51 U.S. at current exchange rates. Are you a special fan of Jane Austen? Then you’ll never regret buying these tapes (no rentals). The company accepts Visa and Mastercard and will write in the latest exchange rate.

If you’re not quite so committed and would just like to rent an unabridged reading of “Pride and Prejudice,” I highly recommend one done by Nadia May for Classics on Cassette of Ashland, Ore.

This version rents for $15.95, and you can also purchase it for $33.95. You may recognize May’s voice from other audio books in your experience. She also reads under the name Donada Peters.

A new reviewer will take up this space next month as I move on to new professional challenges, and Book Review editor Jack Miles, whose idea this column was, has given me permission to conclude with this thought about audio books:

Only the lack of technology prevented this method of enjoying great literature from becoming a major means of access to books many years before now.

Does it sound like heresy when I say that I would now rather listen than read? Well, so be it. The point is, I am now listening to books I would never have gotten back to, or would never have taken up at all. That’s my argument in a sentence.

WHERE TO ORDER TAPES:

Cover to Cover Cassettes; International call: 0264 89 227; P.O. Box 112; Marlborough, Wiltshire SN8 3UG, England.

Classics on Tape; 800-729-2665; Box 969, Ashland, Ore. 97520

Editor’s Note: Best wishes to Keith Love. Classics on Cassette will continue on schedule next month with “The Mill on the Floss.” Our new man with the earphones: John Espey.