"If I am a wild Beast I cannot help it. It is not my own fault."

I've been tagged by multiple people for the Janeite tag, which was making the rounds back in September (cough... cough cough cough... yes, I'm very late), and now I'm finally following through with it.

Here are the official rules (which of course I've bent to suit my own whims and inconsistencies)--

~Thank and link back to the person who tagged you.
~Tell how you were introduced to Jane Austen and share one fun fact about your Janeite life (this fun fact can be anywhere from "I stayed up all night reading Emma," to "I visited Chawton and met Anna Chancellor.").
~Answer the tagger's questions.
~Write seven questions of your own.
~Tag as few as one or as many as seven other Janeites and let them know you've tagged them.

So!  First of all, big thank you to Miss Elliot, Hannah, and Melody.  Since they've each tagged me with seven original questions, I chose not to answer twenty-one questions but instead to pick and choose my favorites from the bunch and just do seven all told.  (My blog, my rules. :P)

Second, the story of how I was introduced to Jane Austen... I've told this one on the blog before but it never hurts to repeat it.  I was 14, had outgrown a lot of the juvenile fiction at the library, was raring for something to read, and my mom said she thought I was old enough to try Pride and Prejudice.  So off I trotted to Borders (BACK WHEN BORDERS STILL EXISTED) with a gift card my grandfather had given me for my birthday, purchased the Modern Library of Classics edition of P&P, read it within a week, fell irrevocably in love and never looked back.  (And since that time I've read all six major novels, plus some of the juvenilia and unfinished works and what have you, watched most of the films, and co-run a blog devoted to the 1995 Pride and Prejudice miniseries.  Phew.)

As for a fun fact... um... I've seen a play of Pride and Prejudice performed live.  It was awesome.

...Yes, that was lame.  I'm bad at fun facts.

So.  Questions.

From Miss Elliot

~If you were Elinor Dashwood, would you buy sugar or beef?

I'd buy sugar. Definitely.  You can live on vegetables, after all.  And I'm not much of a beef person, to be honest.  Or really much of a meat person at all.  I don't dislike it, of course, but I can often just take it or leave it.  (My brother regards this opinion with the shock and horror that his nine-year-old constitution requires him to bestow.)

~Do you think you have to love tea to be a Janeite?

...I think you have to love tea to be a human.
KIDDING.
No, certainly not.  But it doesn't hurt.  :D

From Hannah

~Which relative of any of Austen's heroines/heroes do you find most annoying?

Mrs. Norris from Mansfield Park drives me NUTS.  I hate that woman.  Sir Walter Elliot from Persuasion also drives me batty.  Ugh.

~Provide up to five of your favourite Austen quotes. (I know, hard! Just pick a few random quotes that you love. They don't have to be your absolute favourites.)

"For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours, and laugh at them in our turn?" (Pride & Prejudice)

"What dreadfully hot weather we are having! It keeps one in a continual state of inelegance." (letter to Cassandra

"From politics, it was an easy step to silence."  (Northanger Abbey)

"I cannot make speeches, Emma.  If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more."  (Emma)

"I do not want people to be very agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them a great deal." (letter to Cassandra)


From Melody

~Heehee... okay. How would you react if you were talking to a young man rather close to your own age and he announced that he was a fan of Jane Austen? ;)

I would marry him.  Duh. :D

...Okay, okay, maybe I wouldn't quite go that far quite so soon, but I'd definitely be more Interested in him than I would have been had he not said such a thing.  Heehee.  And obviously I'd press for more details and probably harass him with a million questions about favorite books and movies and quotes and what all.  Because I do that with most people I meet who say they like Jane Austen.  Heh.

~So pretend that all the Jane Austen adaptations made up to this point, are actually being filmed presently, and you have the option to be an extra in one of them.  Which would you select, and what scene would you choose to be in?

I would be in Emma 2009, and I'd be a lady at the Crown Inn ball.  And I'd contrive to dance really close to Emma and Mr. Knightley so I could watch them being cute. :D

~You're at a ball which is comprised of twelve dances.  As they are done two at a time, you will be able to dance with six of Jane Austen's gentlemen.  Three of them are desirable, three of them you do not like at all.  You get to pick.  Which six are on your list?  (They'll still be the ones to ask you, of course. They will magically know to do so, I guess.)

(This question is hilarious, by the way.  Excellent job, Tween.)

I'd pick...

1. Mr. Knightley
2. Mr. Elliot
3. Henry Tilney
4. Henry Crawford
5. Mr. Willoughby
6. Mr. Bingley

(And you can figure out for yourself which I'd think of as desirable and undesirable.  Haha.  Please note that I chose the undesirable ones with how-gross-would-they-be-to-dance-with in mind, not necessarily how-horrible-are-they-as-humans.  Heehee.)

Now for my questions!

~If you could mix-and-match any Jane Austen heroine with a hero from a different novel, who would it be?  (ex: Fanny Price and Mr. Knightley)
~What's your favorite quote from a Jane Austen movie that doesn't actually appear in the novel it's based on? (make sense of that if you can)
~What's your favorite hat or bonnet worn by a heroine in a Jane Austen movie?
~Which Janeite-related location would you most want to visit-- London, Bath, Steventon Rectory or Chawton Cottage?
~What's your favorite kind of tea?  :D
~Have you ever randomly stumbled across a fellow Janeite at a social event?  Tell us about it!
~Who's your favorite parent in a Jane Austen novel?

And I tag... anyone reading this who wishes to do it.  Leave your answers in the comments if you care to (even if you've already done the tag!).