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Emma by Jane Austen


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No, not at all - you can take as long as it takes. in fact, if you fancy going back & looking at the past reading circle choices & commenting on them, it's all to the good. :)

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wow this one really does feel like an uphill struggle. If I concentrate I can read a 400 page book in a day, now in three days I've managed 50 pages. She makes me laugh though, because you read a huge paragraph and by the end all you realise has happened is an invitation to tea has been accepted :)

 

I'm liking Emma at the moment, she's quite devious in a butter wouldn't melt, kind of way.

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There's been an interesting reaction to this one. Although we have some fans, others have struggled with this book. Is it because of the writing style, because life was so different then, or maybe because we're more used to fast paced thrillers etc these days?

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It does feel like a language barrier sometimes. I know she's speaking English but she really takes the long way round lol I don't think it's because of the time period of the story, I just think it's the time period of the author. I get the story, I just have to concentrate on the phraseology (sp).

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I've since read another book set in the same period, but another country & you know what? Plenty hapened in it. I think it was just the fact that nothing of importance ever seemed to happen in the lives of the characters in Emma - it was just too dull for me & very, very repetitive.

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Of all Austen's books I think Emma is the slowest. There is no change of scenery or society, no new characters, and very little happens. If you look at the likes of Northanger Abbey, at least the story moves locations and so different characters are introduced.

 

I love Emma - I love the ongoing importance of the most trivial events and the fact that really minor things are of such interest to everyone. I can appreciate that someone who is not such a fan could find it irritatingly claustraphobic - of the very few characters most are intentionally annoying!

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  • 2 weeks later...

I too, have put this one down, not because I'm not enjoying it but because it caused such a backlog in my reading :) I know I will finish it, but it will be a slow reading week when I do.

 

I am enjoying the book so far, I like Emma and her meddling ways. I love the way she's oblivious to everything that is not in her plans and how everything is so trivial yet vital to the story. Just like many ladies lives where (I think) when husbands worked and they were ladies of leisure.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Phew! I've finally finished Emma! I loved it mostly, but it was a struggle at times, and took me alot longer than normal to read. Why is that? I think it was the language. I found I would read a paragraph, and then have to read it again to find out what had happened!

 

I bought the DVD, with Gwynneth paltrow as Emma, and thought it was wonderful! All the characters were just how I imagined, which doesn't often happen does it? I don't think there was anything left out either.

 

Off to start Empress Orchid now.

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I have to say,I much prefered the film to the book - I think it was easier to get the humour that way. There just wasn't enough action in the text to keep my interested, but with the film, everything happens within a couple of hours, rather than the week it took to slog through the book...

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I recently re-read Emma (I think around last November or December).

 

I fell in love with Emma Woodhouse and her doting, homebody father. I had to be somewhat forgiving of certain antiquated assumptions and resignations (based on Austen's time of being, and place), but also felt as if some of it was very applicable even for modern times.

 

I fell in love with, and dated, a girl who was far above me in "class" in high school. It had its inevitable drama (her mother loved me at first, then realized I was from total poverty and came to hate me and forbid me to be around her daughter).

 

Though this is not the story of Emma, I felt for Harriet Smith, who was subject to her class designation. Though she, more resigned to living out her social purpose than I.

 

Mr. Knightly was loveable too, in his honest mannerisms.

 

This is my favorite Austen book by far.

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  • 6 months later...

I've started to read this as an ebook, and I'm enjoying it so far. I'm not too sure what to think of Emma as a main character.

 

It's not a patch on Pride and Prejudice or Sense and Sensibility though! Still it passes a few pleasant minutes at work between jobs :blush:

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  • 5 months later...
I fell in love with Emma Woodhouse and her doting, homebody father. I had to be somewhat forgiving of certain antiquated assumptions and resignations (based on Austen's time of being, and place), but also felt as if some of it was very applicable even for modern times.

 

I have difficulty reading about the privleges and friendships denied to people of a lower class at that period of time. It seems like such a strange idea to me, but it makes the novel all the more intriguing I think. So despite what Emma would say about these things (and knowing that I would never have been in her class had I been around then), I could still like her because I know that that's just the way society was back then.

 

I think the beauty of Jane Austen's writing is that, even though this book was written nearly 200 years ago and contains some long outdated ideas, it still remains very relevant to today.

 

I love Emma - I love the ongoing importance of the most trivial events and the fact that really minor things are of such interest to everyone. I can appreciate that someone who is not such a fan could find it irritatingly claustraphobic - of the very few characters most are intentionally annoying!

 

I agree. It must have been nice to live in such a time where things were more simple!

 

I absolutely loved this book but I won't gush too much about it here; I've already done that in my own reading list. :smile2:

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I have to say,I much prefered the film to the book - I think it was easier to get the humour that way. There just wasn't enough action in the text to keep my interested, but with the film, everything happens within a couple of hours, rather than the week it took to slog through the book...

 

 

I find a lot of Jane Austen's work translates better on film. I love "Pride and Prejudice" and the A&E version is stellar. "Persuasion" was more difficult to read, but a FABULOUS movie (With Amanda Root).

"Emma" is a one of my favorite books, but I can see how it would be tough to slog through. I have a Jane Austen mood. Then, I'll sit down and read all of the ones I own in a week or two. For me, the language, the style, everything is a mood.

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  • 1 year later...

Seems like nobody has read Emma for a loooooooooong time...except from me!

 

I see many here who thought Emma to be antipathetic. Though I thought the same thing at the beginning,partly because of her snobbery, as the story proceeded, I found her more and more likable. I felt that as the story goes on, we watch her becoming more and more mature. Besides, think:she was an upper-class young woman to whom everybody (apart from Mr.Knightley) kept saying who beautiful, intelligent and generally great she was. In such an environment, it seems natural that her vanity reached quite high levels.

 

Overall, I liked the book very much :friends0:

 

 

Oh, and the Eltons were totally detestable! :razz:

 

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I started reading Emma about 5/6 years ago and I had to put it down in the end and read something else, as Emma was getting on my nerves with her blind stupidity. And I couldn't believe how much of a snob she was. When I attempted to read it the second time I liked her more, and she didn't seem as annoying. She was just really funny. I had a good amount of giggles throughout this book.

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