Author Topic: PC170: Five Ways Jane Austen Never Died  (Read 14482 times)

Talia

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on: August 16, 2011, 03:07:10 PM
PodCastle 170: Five Ways Jane Austen Never Died

by Samantha Henderson

Read by Amal El-Mohtar

Originally published in Fortean Bureau

I buck out of the timestream, recover, and bend over, retching air. That’s why you don’t eat for 24 hours before you make a jump, and a purge or two’s not a bad idea, either. I learned that the hard way.

When I can straighten up, I back against the damp plaster wall (the walls at Chawton were always damp, though Edward never believed it) and wait, listening. In the late summer afternoon, heavy with heat, the ticking of the clock in the study sounds loud and portentous as a drumbeat. Scant golden light lies sluggishly against the drapes on the other end of the hallway.

Cassandra is away, visiting our brother and sister and their innumerable brood. My mother is nursing a migraine with her feet up on the best sofa in the parlor.

And Jane is coming up the stairs.

I draw my modified Glock and stand, waiting in the shadows.


Rated R: Contains Some Violence
« Last Edit: September 06, 2011, 05:23:10 PM by Talia »



stePH

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Reply #1 on: August 16, 2011, 05:25:43 PM
I'm sure there's a lot more than five ways.  :P

[edit]
...oh, and...

BOOBIES!

[Moderator edited to be only large text, instead of ginormous]
« Last Edit: August 19, 2011, 12:24:57 AM by Ocicat »

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Bdoomed

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Reply #2 on: August 17, 2011, 05:14:27 AM
Really enjoyed the last vignette of the story, who'da thought vampires?  That's not to say the rest of the story was any less fantastic.  :)

I'd like to hear my options, so I could weigh them, what do you say?
Five pounds?  Six pounds? Seven pounds?


Kaa

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Reply #3 on: August 17, 2011, 04:57:41 PM
I suspect it's going to be just me, but...this one fell flat for me. I've never read a single word written by Jane Austen, nor do I know the first thing about her other than that she wrote some books.

So...a lot of this seemed to be references to stuff that I would probably understand if I had read her books or knew anything about her.

And no, I doubt I will be reading any of her books just so I'll retroactively understand this. :)

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iamafish

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Reply #4 on: August 17, 2011, 09:11:12 PM
yeah, put me in the camp that didn't get this because, while I may have a copy of Pride and Prejudice on my bookshelf, I didn't buy it, nor have a read it. I might at some point, but it's pretty low on a long list that is only getting longer. I'm sure it made sense to an Austin fan, but I am not the target audience for this. Sorry.


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Reply #5 on: August 17, 2011, 10:36:49 PM
Alas and Alack I must follow on the same path and say that it wasn't particularly great. Each bit was in itself a fun little taste, a bit like using flash fiction as a teaser for a full book. They were well written and each and everyone might make a great story by themselves but having not read any Austin before I have no idea how these were related. So, in short, after long, I think it works fine, its alright as a series of vignettes about this adventurous, faceless lady, but without knowing her from earlier it lacks that wow factor.



danooli

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Reply #6 on: August 17, 2011, 11:05:06 PM
I'm more familiar with Jane Austin's work, I rather hate to admit, through Masterpiece Classics adaptations than through the actual reading of her works, but I do love her characters.

That said, I don't know enough about her life to know what elements were fact and which were fiction.  However, I feel as though poor Miss Austin has been dragged through a macabre sort of ringer in these vignettes and it's a bit disturbing to me.  Vampires, suicide, child-birth and all...but, it was very well written and the narration was also well done  ;D



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Reply #7 on: August 18, 2011, 02:14:29 AM
I didn't realize that I'd have to read Jane Austen BEFORE listening. Because I just didn't really get it. Sorry.



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Reply #8 on: August 18, 2011, 03:15:58 AM
I thought the story was a little hard to follow, but I loved the concept. Jane Austen and her Time-Traveling Commandoes! Woo-hoo! I would so travel back in time to rescue Jane from a horrible Victorian-era death. Of course she's probably make some cutting remark about it that would make my stupid male brain spin, but hey, that's why we love her, right?

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Reply #9 on: August 19, 2011, 08:32:13 AM
I love Ms. El-Mohtar's voice -- such a lovely tone and accent.


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Reply #10 on: August 19, 2011, 02:25:04 PM
So, Jane Austen is my favorite author (other than Chaim Potok...and Tolkien... ;)) I haven't read too much about her personal life, but there is a lot of speculation about why she died so young so that part is right out of history. I really enjoyed this story, and managed to get completely wrapped up in each of the vignettes despite their relatively short length. The cursed idol story was probably my least favorite, and the time-traveling-assassin one needed a little bit more to orient me and for some reason the sister-as-vampire one was my most favorite.

"To Elizabeth it had appeared that, had her family made an agreement to expose themselves as much as they could during the evening, it would have been impossible for them to play their parts with more spirit or finer success." - Pride and Prejudice



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Reply #11 on: August 20, 2011, 11:55:36 AM
Eh, I read this in a "Year's Best" anthology and started skimming about halfway through.  I may have to give it a listen just for Amal's reading, but in my initial experience with it, I found it to be an interesting experiment that resulted in a confusing and honestly kind of boring story.  I applaud the experimentation, but not the actual product.



olivaw

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Reply #12 on: August 20, 2011, 03:07:45 PM
Don't think I've ever read any Austen, but I do occasionally find myself living a Jane Austen (with zombie pirates and samurai badgers) lifestyle.

The gag is, I think, that while she was living through interesting times, such as the Napoleonic Wars, and died just as the gothic horror movement was taking off with people like Mary Shelley writing Frankenstein and Polidori writing The Vampyre, she never wrote about any of this interesting stuff, but instead wrote satires of gentry etiquette and upper-middle-class relationships.

I was mostly listening to see whether there was any plot connection between the stories - was it the statuette that caused the vampirism, which caused her sister's feelings of guilt about the miscarriage? Was it the international intrigue that made her the focus of dimension-hopping assassins? I'd like to think so, but I've not found the hidden clues yet.



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Reply #13 on: August 21, 2011, 07:43:48 AM
A good story but for me, it kinda sailed right past coz what I know of Jane Austen Powers could fit in a thimble. I therefore felt I missed the point(s) of the story.


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Reply #14 on: August 23, 2011, 04:42:05 AM
So here I was, all ready to hit the "skip" button. And then you said "Mermaid's Tea Party". And you followed that up with "Amal El-Mothar". A curse upon your households for enticing me to listen to Austen-inspired tales.

Generally a fun series of vingettes. 3 and 5 will probably tickle the fancy of Austen fans more exclusively. 2 was for Escape Pod. 1 and 4 are for PseudoPod. You had me hooked at The Call of Cthulhu.

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. You now make Austen crawl at the edges of my consciousness. But I cannot stare into the abyss of Austen's work, as I shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.

ia ia Jane'Austen f'tagn

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Kaa

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Reply #15 on: August 23, 2011, 12:01:50 PM
Fenrix, you forgot to work 'gibbering' into your Lovecraft. :)

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Reply #16 on: August 23, 2011, 06:18:20 PM
Has Alan Moore ever written anything about Jane Austen? Something about her secretly founding MI-6 or paling around with HG Wells?

..because he must be punished if he has.

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Reply #17 on: August 23, 2011, 07:24:10 PM
Has Alan Moore ever written anything about Jane Austen? Something about her secretly founding MI-6 or paling around with HG Wells?

..because he must be punished if he has.

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Reply #18 on: August 23, 2011, 07:46:37 PM
Why not? What's he gonna do, destroy another precious childhood memory? Go ahead! I've got plenty!

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Reply #19 on: August 25, 2011, 02:28:16 AM
Nitpick of the Week...

Shanghai wasn't opened to Western ships until a good 25 years after Jane Austen died.

However she died....    ;)



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Reply #20 on: August 25, 2011, 02:57:50 AM
Nitpick of the Week...

Shanghai wasn't opened to Western ships until a good 25 years after Jane Austen died.

However she died....    ;)

Aha! But in this reality, it was!


InfiniteMonkey

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Reply #21 on: August 25, 2011, 02:59:37 AM
And I'm with Dave, I love Austen. I say that without threat to neither my sexuality or my geekhood. She's very funny.

I did find #3 a bit puzzling; did I miss any SF/Fantasy element in that?

Yeah, the story probably plays better if you're an Austen fan, but I don't think that's completely the problem with it. I just wanted a little more there there, if you know what I mean....



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Reply #22 on: August 26, 2011, 02:23:42 AM
I have to say that I rarely engage with stories of the "Five X" vignettes type.  I think I like them better (which is not to say well) in print, where I can take in each vignette separately; but in audio, where I need more of a through-line to keep me engaged, I just find myself drifting in and out.  Separately, any one of these might well have entertained me, but taken together they were pretty forgettable.



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Reply #23 on: August 26, 2011, 07:36:45 PM
I only listened because I absolutely loved the Mermaid tea party. I liked the first story, the second one was ok and I got bored with the third one. I think maybe you either need to be an Austen fan or at least read her work to understand or appreciate the stories. If we were graphing this one out I'd be in the 'didn't get it' quadrant.

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Reply #24 on: August 29, 2011, 08:38:13 PM
Hmm. I did read three Austen novels, watched a few of the movie adaptions and know a little bit about her life (but not very much). At least I got that some of the stories (especially the vampire one) imitated her style quite strongly. And obviously, they toyed with her relationship to her family members, especially Cassandra. On the whole, however, there weren't enough allusions for me to recognize to find the vignettes terribly clever - which may of course be my lack of detailed knowledge. They seemed sort of random.

I have to add though that stories that play with some other work (or, in this case, biographical facts) are not my favourites and need to be better than stand-alone stories to impress me. I never read "Pride and Prejudice with zombies" as the first thing I thought when I saw it was: "Oh, well, someone's slapping some parody shock value on a very popular book for easy publicity." Maybe unfair, but you'd have to really convince me that it is worth picking up.

That said, the stories were okay to listen to. The vampire one worked best for me, perhaps because it created the society feeling I associate with Austen most strongly. The "Mermaid's tea party" impressed me a lot more though.