the jane austen book club [karen joy fowler]
this book is about friendships forged through a love of jane austen, about a book club of people (most of whom only knew one another though jocelyn, the organizer of the club) that sees each other through some of the roughest things we can experience in life and who together, learn important lessons about love and life as they view their day to day experiences through the lens of austen's writing.
they meet once a month to discuss a book and actually, seeing their example has inspired me to want to begin such a book club of my own. sharlene and i have talked about reading a classic a month, but we'd be discussing mostly over the phone or email i think.. the hazards of a long-distance book club. a part of me longs for a local version of that too though, evenings by the fireplace or by moonlight, sharing snacks and sipping on drinks and chatting about books.
if you look at life as the plot of a story, "... all parents wanted an impossible life for their children -- happy beginning, happy middle, happy ending. No plot of any kind. What uninteresting people would result if parents got their way." (p. 179) but through the course of the story, the characters all realize that, beyond a certain point, we don't need to seek out the unhappy times, or to dwell in this state of self-pitying emotion, but to truly *sieze* the opportunity to be happy each day. this can be seen in how allegra and sylvia extend forgiveness and a second chance to corinne and daniel, despite the seemingly unforgiveable things they had done. they are willing to overlook the pain that their lovers had caused them, and to make themselves vulnerable again by trusting again, and it is this that allows them to have their happy ending. "Sylvia was not a happy-ending sort of person herself. In books, yes they were lovely. But in life everyone has the same ending, and the only question is who will get to it first. ... What if you had a happy ending and didn't notice? Sylvia made a mental note. Don't miss the happy ending." (p. 243)
" 'I guess I think we all deserve more than we earn,' said Sylvia, 'if that makes any sense. I'd like the world to be forgiving. I feel sorry for Dick Musgrove, because no one loved him more than he deserved.' We were quiet for a minute, listening to the fly buzz, thinking our private thoughts. Who loved us? Who loved us more than we deserved?" (p. 237) but yet, the converse of that desire to be loved more than we deserve is that we need to love others in spite of their faults. we need to extend grace to cover each others' shortcomings, and to make love work in the face of so much that can tear us apart. as fowler writes, "You didn't walk out on someone you loved. You didn't sit silent while they poured their drunken hearts into your phone machine, as if you didn't even hear them. People in love found the one way to stay together." (p. 178)
the book ends with this quote:
"The mere habit of learning to love is the thing." - Jane Austen
it is apt because all of the characters learned to love in its many varied forms --whether it was to fall in love for the first time (like jocelyn and grigg), or for the twentieth time (like bernadette), or to fall in love again with their husband (like prudie) or to allow themselves to remain in love with someone who had hurt them (like sylvia and allegra). would this have been possible if it was a book club reading any other author? :)
