Emma

Rating:
Summary: A witty, enjoyable read for everyone.
Review: Jane Austen said of Emma Woodhouse (in a letter) that she had written a novel with a heroine "whom no one would like but myself". Indeed the first sentence (another sterling first sentence by Austen. How does she do it?) paints a picture that is easily understood as a spoilt little rich girl:

"Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever and rich, with a comfortable house and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her."

At the same time we have to disagree with Miss Austen. Readers have fallen in love with Emma (both novel and heroine) since the novel was published, and with good reason

Ronald Blythe states in his introduction to the 1966 Penguin Classics edition of "Emma" that it is "the climax of Jane Austen's genius and the Parthenon of fiction." I do not dispute it for a second. This novel is my favourite work from my favourite author.

The book has a plot so timeless than even translating it to modern day Hollywood and casting Alicia Silverstone in the lead still gets you a hit movie, Clueless. OK, it's obvious from the first chapter who is destined to marry Emma but our dashing hero, Mr Knightley, is still the only person who ever criticises Emma, indeed he spends a large part of his time in the novel telling either Emma or her friends about her flaws.

Austen wrote to her niece Anna (writing a novel at the time) that "Three or four families in a country village is the very thing to work on" and stayed close to this for most of her own works. Yet at the same time, in a letter to her brother Edward (another incipient novelist) she played down her concerns as "the little bit (two inches wide) of ivory on which I work with so fine a brush, as to produce little effect, after much labour." 'Emma' is certainly the novel on the smallest piece of ivory with the finest brush, yet it pokes as much fun and wields as savage a knife on the social conventions of Austen's England as any other novelist of the time.

Austen was capable of writing novels with genuine popular appeal at the same time as she flouted the conventions of fiction. 'Emma' is a marvellous example, an easily read, enjoyable novel with a heroine who is in charge of her own destiny and who marries for no other reason than she loves a good, strong man.

Everyone deserves to read a novel this good. Just because teenage girls will adore this novel and swoon over Mr Knightley doesn't mean the rest of us should be stopped from this marvellous read. I enjoy Austen immensely and this is my favourite. I probably read it once or twice a year.

When you come to choosing the edition I once again find myself recommending the Penguin Classics edition for its Introduction. This time it is Fiona Stafford who does such a good job (though I think the '66 edition Introduction by Ronald Blythe was a fraction better.)

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful
Review: Emma is the first Jane Austen novel I ever read, and 13 years later it's still my favorite. It's also the most accessible, easy to read Austen novel. I literally could not put this book down. I thought all the characters, especially Emma, were wonderful. The title character, whie arrogant, was well meaning in her attempts to play matchmaker for the people around her. I could really relate to her, because I recognized that I've met people like her. She was at once funny, well intentioned, spoiled, controlling, and sweet. This book is really funny. The introduction is very useful in helping the reader keep all the events of the story straight. As well, it gives readers insight into the times, and into Austen's views about society. I really appreciated having the cast of characters printed at the beginning of the book, because there are alot (sometimes, it seems, too many) characters inhabiting the book. Because each person in the novel is so distinct and well drawn, the occasional confusion is worth it. I highly reccommend this book to anyone!

Rating:
Summary: good
Review: I also expected more, but i liked it a lot. And yes, it is for serious readers (you cant read Jane Austen if youre not one). Is funny and I liked Emma a lot. Although mr. Knightley was too old :p But is great. You must read it.

Rating:
Summary: A beautiful story about relationships
Review: I definitely recommend this book to first time Jane Austen readers, and especially to young girls, for it is so cute and so amusing. I wish I were "forced" to read this in High School for I would have surely written good papers on it. I can't see how anyone can dislike this classic. Jane Austen's character "Emma" has her faults of course, be she is a true character that is amusing and utterly charming, unlike those characters in Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility, which by no doubt are wonderful books, but Emma truly has to be my favorite Austen work. It is predictable, even without having seen the movie that was based on this work (that mind some of you was written over 200 years before Alicia Silverstone existed...gosh!) but the predictability of it made it all the more enjoyable, like a sort of mystery in romance. I definitely recommend this book to anyone over the age of 11 or 12. I know I'll make my kids read it some day. It is superb!

Rating:
Summary: The Original "Chick Lit"
Review: This is my favorite Jane Austen novel. Yes, Emma the heroine is a flawed human being. She is a spoiled little rich girl always trying to manage other people's lives, an effort that never turns out well. For example, she convinces her less-well-off friend, Harriet Smith, that she deserves better than the honest farmer who loves her and whom Harriet loves, and almost upsets Harriet's chances of happiness as a result. Emma continues in this vein throughout the book, at times being on the verge of doing serious harm, until at last the moment of enlightenment comes - a moment filled with shame and confusion.

Of course, the overall plot in this as in all other Austen novels is the problem of getting married, and in that respect these books represent the original "chick lit." The difference, of course, lies in Austen's brilliant satire of characters like Miss Bates, the village gossip, and in her glorious ability to make the words sing.

Rating:
Summary: Austen's comedy of errors
Review: "Emma" has been called Jane Austen's most flawed heroine, but I'd rather reserve that title for Fanny Price of "Mansfield Park", whose very "perfection" makes her one of the most obnoxious inventions of British literature. How can one stand a hero or heroine who is never, ever wrong? We'd rather have someone like Emma, who, for all her flaws, or maybe because of them, is a delightful creature. She's a hopeless busybody, meddling and interfering in everyone's lives, too much the lady of the manor for her own good; but she means nothing but everyone else's good. Unlike Austen's other heroines who are barely in the leisure class like Elizabeth Bennet or one step away from poverty like Fanny Price, Emma Woodhouse is comfortably well-off; she doesn't need a husband to support her because she'll inherit a fortune from her widowed father, so she's free to cheerfully attempt to marry everybody else off according to her own inclinations. And her main project is her friend Harriet, the child of an unknown father (an enormous social stigma in early 19th-century England), whom she attempts to pair off with a snooty, social-climbing vicar, unable to see the damage she is doing to both. Fresh from one blunder, Emma races headlong into another, and yet another, until you want to yank her chain and bring her up short. And she almost undoes her own self when the man she realizes she has loved all along, her neighbor Mr. Knightley, begins to see potential in Harriet himself.

We know the mess is going to get sorted out sooner or later; Austen has a genius for untangling messes and getting everybody back on the right track, but it's fun to watch Emma racing from one hairbrained scheme to the next and getting caught in the traps of her own devising. And we like her none the less for it. Because Emma, wrongheaded as she often is, doesn't have a mean bone in her body. She genuinely wishes everyone well, even though it's on her terms. It takes an older, wiser and more experienced head like Knightley's to help her see the error of her ways. Knightley is the perfect foil for Emma, with a wit and intelligence as sharp as her own, but providing maturity and stability to balance her free-floating exuberance.

"Emma" is not Austen's best work; just as Emma is a somewhat airheaded creature, "Emma" lacks the depth of Austen's later books such as "Mansfield Park" and "Persuasion". Emma, along with Elinor Dashwood and Elizabeth Bennet, is one of my three favorite Austen heroines, but Emma lacks the insight and maturity of the other two. Too often acts without thinking, but it's just this quality that makes her so endearing at times, even while it makes her so aggravating. Emma is probably Austen's most humanly fallible heroine, and maybe that's why we like her so much. Perfection is for gods and saints; Emma is for real.

Rating:
Summary: Recommended but not outstanding
Review: As good as this book is, it is slow to start does not really pick up until after the 150 pages or so. But stick with it. However, those looking for an introduction to Jane Austen might be better suited with faster paced Pride & Prejudice and gradually make your way toward this one.

Two things that I liked very much about this book. The lead character is a likable but strong willed heroine with fixed ideas and the author is not afraid to use that to a disadvantage. Emma is flawed and it makes her interesting to read. Also, you get a stronger sense of community in a small victorian town and how they relied on one another found here than any of her other works that I have read. It's a very charming enjoyable aspect that works in the books favor. As far as premise goes, this is one of the more cohesive and linear of Austen's works and I can see the reason why this has been this has been adapted to film and stage so many times.

What I liked about Bantams edition was there was no droll introduction or afterward by a scholar indicating why the book and author are important and lets the work speak for itself. What they did have was useful footnotes when the characters were referencing now obscure objects, writers and poets making the book more accessible.

But as well as the book starting slowly, the other problem I had was that I found myself not emotionally investing in the characters. Emma is likeable, as stated before, but that was about it. Despite her appeal, she has no impact. Same goes with everyone else save for Miss Bates. The town spinster had me in stitches with her rambling monologues and sweet nature. When someone picks on her, it does make an impact.

A nice story, just not a great one. Outside of the reservations mentioned, I'm glad I read it and recommend it.

Rating:
Summary: Praise for Jane Austen!
Review: i had to read this for my english sophmore highschool class and while most of my peers *hated* this book, i found this book very intriguing and esp. realistic to even today in highschool. the subjects of vanity, friendship, honesty, control, reality, self-desire, relationships, status, and maturity is all incorporated in this book and deeply and straight-forwardly depicts the life of any teenager in any century then or now. Emma struggles to understand her intentions and learns what her mistakes were all about and the reader sees her mature through experiences and constantly learning and realizing her mistakes and flaws and misconceptions. though it was a long story and had a lot of old-language narration, i have to say, Emma is part of the epitome of what ever teenager goes through, female and male. while this is mostly a chick book, guys can find themselves related to the situations that Emma deals with with the other men in the book. i highly recommend this book for people who have patience and are open to the ideals of aristocracy back then. it's amusing, witty, and shocking. really great book.

Rating:
Summary: witty, hugely enjoyable read
Review: I can never decide whether Pride and Prejudice or Emma is my favourite book by Jane Austen. Emma has all the Jane Austen hallmarks - wit, exuberance, and laugh out loud moments, coupled with realistic, well drawn characters and a real feeling of being in the Regency (which is hardly surprising, as that's when the book was written).
Emma is a spoiled young woman who has everything she can possibly want in life: a doting father who lets her do as she pleases, friends, family and a beautiful home. She is understandably please with herself, and this leads to complications as she tries to sort out everyone else's life. She's meddling and interfering, and yet so well meaning she comes across as a likeable character rather than as a busybody.
She takes up Harriet, a young woman of doubtful birth, and encourages her to set her sights on Mr Elton, the local vicar, as a future husband. Poor Harriet is completely bowled over by Emma, and is persuaded to like Mr Elton over the farmer's son she is really in love with. Emma is oblivious to the fact that Harriet and Mr Elton are completely unsuited, and that Harriet and her farmer are made for each other.
Through a variety of hilarious scenes, Emma comes to realize she doesn't know as much as she thought, and learns that it's better to let other people manage their own lives.
The minor characters are wonderful: Mrs Elton with her barouche landau (anyone who's read the book will know what I mean), sweet Miss Bates, and dreadful Mr Elton, who has designs on Emma.
Eventually, Emma learns how to understand her own feelings, and leaves everyone else free to listen to theirs, which leads to a satisfying ending all round.
Hugely enjoyable.

Rating:
Summary: Meddling Yet Satisfying
Review: Jane Austen's book Emma is creatively woven together with the characteristics of Emma Woodhouse, a young lady with much prestige. Even though the flaws of her character are questionable, her intentions are clear. Her role as a matchmaker during a unique time period creates a diversion from reality in the high social class where Emma resides. The encouragement by one lucky guess pushes her to create absolute non-sense. A reader only hopes to read faster in order to reveal and figure out the out come of all her mistakes. Emma hooks readers, addicting them to the humor and "tangled mess" in which she finds herself. This beautifully illustrated book quickly creates an exclusive impression every time it is read.