Pride and Prejudice turned 200 years old this week. So, although this novel is perhaps not my preferred Austen (that would be Persuasion), it was the first of her novels I read, and is still a favorite.  I specifically remember sitting on my bed on quiet seventh-grade afternoons and reading through this story for the first time…and realizing there was a whole world of great books out there of which I had only just scratched the surface.

It is not a perfect novel, nor perhaps is it very weighty or profound, but there is something universal enough about the characters and issues that have “stood the test of time,” even so much as to become (I believe) part of our Western collective subconscious.  It has certainly become part of mine.

I chose this particular scene because (unlike some of you) I actually really liked the 2005 version.  I thought it transferred the story into digestible cinema (Austen fans probably find the miniseries digestible as well–but we’d be the minority) while retaining a central loyalty to the novel.  My contemporary self liked the everyday-life feeling of this version, and although Kiera Knightly as Elizabeth took some getting used to, she grew on me.  This particular scene, also, is really well-done (hardly cut!), and I like the contrast between the harmony of the dance and the conflict in the dialogue.