My daughter did 3 solid weeks in two summer camps.
She was very glad to get home, and I was glad to have her.
It\u2019s summer. She\u2019s free and I\u2019m unemployed.
We watched the Pride and Prejudice with Colin Firth. The Only True version of pride and prejudice\u2014from 1995
Wait..what? Thirty years ago?
My husband has sucked up different movies and TV shows for the family on a server. When I asked him to include all period drama shows, he found several versions of Pride and Prejudice. It would seem that the Austen novel is remade for the screen very frequently. I accidentally opened a BBC version from the 70s.
We watched the dialogue-heavy version for a bit before I gave up, promising her a better one.
Firth, frozen in time, seemed as brooding and romantic a leading man as ever.
But my Gen Z girl didn\u2019t see it quite the same way. Then again, she didn\u2019t even know the story. I\u2019d read the novel as a book, so I followed along knowing all the twists to come.
She was sure that Mr. Darcy was unforgivable.
The pause button allowed for a lot of discussion of the characters.
\u201cRemember, this novel is written by a master author. Jane Austen wrote these characters to have a dynamic arc.\u201d
She was riveted by the family, Mr. Collins and Lady Catherine de Burgh. I pointed out which characters didn\u2019t really change.
Mr. Darcy changed and so did Elizabeth Bennet. Most of the people stayed the same. The snooty Bingley sisters were mean the whole way through.
Veronica had no respect for the mother.
Spending this extra time on the series, I was having more and more respect for the actors, as well as how Austen created these timeless characters.
Timelessness is always flavored by the moment it was captured. Yes, the period houses and dresses refer to a real thing. But the later interpretation is from new perspective. The people who made their version of a classic put their stamp on it.
And I will see it through many different eyes. I see it the way I experienced it when I read it\u2014which was when I was my daughter\u2019s age. And then I remember when I first saw this version.
I also remember how others talked about this version, even Bridget Jones\u2019 Diary.
And then I get to enjoy it again from the uninitiated perspective of my Gen Z daughter. She was not prejudiced about any of the characters in the story–unless I prejudiced her.
It was the timeless summer, lazily experiencing the beautiful story together.