This spring, Scotch Plains Public Library will mark the 200th anniversary of Charles Dickens’ birth and take note of Jane Austen’s large presence in 21st century popular culture with a series of films and lectures open to all interested members of the public.
The series will feature four weeks of Saturday double-features, which will juxtapose “traditional” re-tellings at 11 am, followed by imaginative take-offs from the original novels at 2 pm. The films to be shown are:
Saturday, March 24
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Oliver Twist (1951)
Oliver! (1968)
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Saturday, March 31
A Christmas Carol (1984)
Scrooged! (1988)
Saturday, April 14
Emma (1996)
Clueless (1995, PG-13)
Saturday, April 21
Pride and Prejudice (2005)
Bride and Prejudice (2004, PG-13)
Robert Garnett will speak on Monday, April 9 at 7 pm. His topic will be “Dickens in Love.” Professor Garnett explains, “We have left behind Dickens’s world of gas-lit London, horse-drawn cabs and huffing steam engines, but we shouldn’t leave behind the endless variety and color of the world of his novels. He re-awakens us to life. But there’s more to Dickens than thousands of vivid characters and the hundreds of plots and subplots in which they become involved. His novels also look inward – at himself. Restless, idealistic, sentimental, ambitious, sometimes ruthless, he was complex and ever-changing, and he responded to his experience with intensity.
He was especially susceptible to women, in particular; and a look at the three most intense romances of his life gives an insight not only into the female characters in his novels, but also into his own evolving sensibility. We can learn something from Dickens in love, too.”
Robert Garnett is Professor of English at Gettysburg College in Pennsylvania, where he has taught English and American literature, including the novels of Jane Austen and Charles Dickens, for 25 years. He has published a book on the early career of the English novelist Evelyn Waugh, and many scholarly articles on Dickens. His particular interest is Dickens’s passion for three different women over the course of his life, and his book on Dickens and these women, Charles Dickens in Love, will be published by Pegasus Books in the fall.
On Monday, April 16 at 7:00 pm, Librarian Pam Brooks will present a whirlwind tour of YouTube videos on Austen and Dickens. She states, “You will be surprised and amused at the variety of enlightening and amusing treatments of these two literary giants!”
The series will conclude on Monday, April 30 at 7:00 pm when Connie Paul will speak about Jane Austen and her enduring legacy. Paul observes, “As the TV and movie productions and continual books about her confirm, Jane Austen is more popular now than any time since her birth over 200 years ago. Who was she and how did she come to write the six books we love in her brief 41 years? We will discuss her life, her works, our favorite versions of Pride and Prejudice and other works, and what we read in-between reading her novels.”
A retired librarian, Connie Paul co-founded the Central Jersey Chapter of the Jane Austen Society of North America (JASNA) and is currently serving as treasurer. She has taken a group to England to study Austen, and she has been a frequent speaker and ElderHostel leader on the influence of Jane Austen, and her fellow era novelist, Patrick O’Brian.
Registration for these free programs is strongly recommended, and can be completed online at http://www.scoltib.org, by email to library@scotlib.org, in person, or by calling (908)322-5007, ext 202. The Scotch Plains Library is located at 1927 Bartle Avenue, one block from Park Avenue in the center of town. Driving directions and more information can be found on the library web site, http://www.scoltib.org.
