Bonnets ready, with 2025 marking two and a half century since Jane Austen’s birth, does ‘bad boy’, Mr. Darcy still does this for Gen Z?
From erotic sound books to one-woman comedy shows, an Austen invasion this year is underway with different reinterpretations of her work offered from those who are skilled enough to see a marketing opportunity.
Many promise their own modern twists on classic people like Pride & Prejudice, but should Austen’s work really update to appeal to modern taste?
Nichi Hodgson – whose book The Curious History of Dating: From Jane Austen to Tinder Compare Regency Romance with NOW – understand how the ‘rituals of the era’ can sometimes be an obstacle to people who want to read the stories’.
Nichi Hodgson
“But when you read the books, it’s really about the emotions and characters,” she insists.
“Mr. Darcy … At the beginning he is a bad boy. The most important tenants of the connection … want to kiss all night, you know, it is still an appeal to people. ‘
Of course, this is what you will not find in Austen’s classicers, any explicit sex scenes.
As Hodgson explains: ‘People didn’t really have sex before marriage, but it’s completely frowned.
“Skip forward to the Victorian era and actually one-in-three working class brides were already pregnant on their wedding day … but in the era of Jane Austen it wasn’t the thing.”
But for modern readers who prefer to take a story that is a bit more tight in bed, Audio Erotica platform Bloom stories has just released its version of Pride & Prejudice.
Listeners hear 14 hours of their steaming re -determination of Austen’s iconic love story.
Hannah Albertshauser, CEO of Bloom Stories, acknowledges that they “created it because people have been dreaming about Lord Darcy for generations”.
‘Sexual desire undoubtedly existed in Austen’s time, but it was rarely expressed in the literature.
“With this adjustment, we wanted to celebrate sexual empowerment by voting to the desires that were once unsaid, and of course emphasize the female agency and pleasure.”
The fact that people still re -reign today’s work is probably proof of her solid plots … but is it protest to assume that younger readers will just pick up proud and prejudice with a sexer?
Matthew Semple
Australian playwright Matthew Semple says the original is ‘absolutely a story for and from and through young people’.
“Jane Austen wasn’t much older than many Gen Z’s today when she wrote it.”
Place and prejudice
His performance was transferred to London from a sold -out in Australia and played the classic novel for laughter.
Five actors scurry to play twenty characters in a chaotic retelling of Elizabeth Bennet and Mister Darcy’s love story.
“After opening it in Brisbane … we had to add about a month’s shows because it just came up,” he says.
And although there is enough for his audiences to find funny, “many of the cultural aspects”, he insists, it is still as relevant today as it comes to “the way we consider gender politics“.
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Young stand-up comedian Rosalie Minnitt agrees: “We still wrestle with this idea of love that came from that period of history.”
Minnitt is currently on tour with her Austen-inspired one-woman show after her character Lady Clementine was one of the outstanding hits at the Edinburgh Benefits.
“We are in a very interesting space with generations, men and women who do not really understand each other, people who are struggling with appointments, and it feels like the show has tackled a very interesting new energy,” she admits.
While the world of appointments of Austen’s times has changed wildlife, Minnit – whose performance is about her character’s hunt for “The One” – believes that plus can change.
“So much of her work has been about the pleasure of the world she lived in … abandoned by men and put under pressure by your mother, that’s all I think modern women are still doing.”
Posted and prejudice runs at the safes, Waterloo until April 27.
Rosalie Minnitt: Clementine tour through the UK, including the Soho Theater in London on May 9 and 10.
Nichi Hodgson’s book The Curious History of Dating: From Jane Austen to Tinder is available to order online.
