h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I just spent the whole day at work just kind of lazing around reading and perusing the internet. I did some work. Just not the whole time. Terribly dishonest of me, I know.

I think my favorite author is Jane Austen. Isn't that odd? I plan to do some research on her. Should be fun. I read "Northanger Abbey" today and I thought it was delightful. The funniest thing about when I read one of her novels is that I start to write and even talk like her. I use antiquated vocabulary and old-fashioned sentence structure...I love it.

I don't know why I love it so much. Jane's literature, that is. One of the reasons might be that she writes perfectly dramatic love stories without any sex. Her characters are just the most chaste creatures ever. I like that. Novelists who resort to pages and pages of sex scenes are using fillers for a reason, probably because they've written the same story fifty-three times with only the barest of detail changes. They've no imagination, is the problem. Jane has imagination. At least, enough to write pages and pages about her varied characters, even if they do have very similar settings and situations. She almost always keeps me guessing, as well, at least the first time through. And sometimes the second, as with Pride and Prejudice, which, I think, is my favorite novel of hers. It takes a couple of readings to get the whole picture, sometimes.

I am amazed at the timelessness of certain phrases, situations and ironies. Austen wrote at the turn of the 19th century, and yet, her observations are as sharp and true now as they were then. For example, there is a speech in Northanger Abbey which Henry makes about the word "nice" and it's total lack of real meaning due to over and mis-use. My freshman year at college I remember an upperclassmen named Josh lamenting the same thing, only he also included such words as "sweet" and "interesting" as having shared the fate of the ubiquitous "nice." Some things never change, except, perhaps, the voices speaking the sentiments. I would also venture to say that no one is quite like Jane Austen as a builder of real, full, rich characters. Any current novelist would do well to learn a few things from the mistress herself.