Review:
Title: Eligible: A Modern Retelling of Pride and Prejudice
Author: Curtis Sittenfeld
Publication: April 19th, 2016
Source: Independent Bookseller
Format: Hardcover
Genre: Fiction; Romance; Retelling
Date Read: May 2016
This version of the Bennet family—and Mr. Darcy—is one that you have and haven’t met before: Liz is a magazine writer in her late thirties who, like her yoga instructor older sister, Jane, lives in New York City. When their father has a health scare, they return to their childhood home in Cincinnati to help—and discover that the sprawling Tudor they grew up in is crumbling and the family is in disarray.
Youngest sisters Kitty and Lydia are too busy with their CrossFit workouts and Paleo diets to get jobs. Mary, the middle sister, is earning her third online master’s degree and barely leaves her room, except for those mysterious Tuesday-night outings she won’t discuss. And Mrs. Bennet has one thing on her mind: how to marry off her daughters, especially as Jane’s fortieth birthday fast approaches.
Enter Chip Bingley, a handsome new-in-town doctor who recently appeared on the juggernaut reality TV dating show Eligible. At a Fourth of July barbecue, Chip takes an immediate interest in Jane, but Chip’s friend neurosurgeon Fitzwilliam Darcy reveals himself to Liz to be much less charming. . . .
And yet, first impressions can be deceiving.
Thoughts:
Before I dive into my thoughts and experiences with Eligible I thought that it was incredibly necessary to give my experience with the original Pride and Prejudice. This review will, understandably, spoil the classic so pay heed. Last school year, at age sixteen, my sophomore English class read Pride and Prejudice as one of the core books in our curriculum. Now granted, we read it in the beginning of the year and it’s been a little while since then, but I do remember the plot and how I felt about it. While I was annoyed with my classmates’ complaints about the romance, I wasn’t entirely enthused with Pride and Prejudice myself. Perhaps the better statement is that I wasn’t enthused with one character in particular: Darcy. By the time everyone else had come around to him I was still thoroughly annoyed; while I enjoyed P&P on an intellectual level, I don’t think that I would have described the book as something that I enjoyed personally.
Now, as for Eligible, I have been eagerly awaiting its release ever since I found out about it. First and foremost because I was curious as to how P&P would translate in a modern setting (especially because half of my class time was spent discussing the dated aspects of P&P). I also was just generally curious as to how a rewrite might adjust some of the ~imperfections~ persay in the manuscript, especially given that it wouldn’t be word for word. To my delight, Sittenfeld accomplished both of these things.
Let’s dive in now, shall we? As with any book, the first portion of Eligible was spent establishing the characters in their said lives. This was perhaps one of the most exciting aspects of the book, because I was so fascinated with how each Austen character would translate to someone in the modern world. The character updates? In my opinion, were a success. Elizabeth (who goes by Liz in this novel) is a columnist and reporter for a women’s magazine, Mr. and Mrs. Bennet are low scale society wannabe’s, Kitty and Lydia are college grads who just haven’t quite grown up yet, Mary is still living at home (but continuing her education), and lastly Jane is a…yoga instructor. If you can’t tell already, one of the biggest positive changes in Eligible that all of the Bennet sisters have a serious involvement in the plot, and their relationships with one another are continuously acknowledged. Obviously Liz remains the protagonist, and Jane being the closest in age the most prevalent Bennet sister, but I was very impressed with the way that Sittenfeld not only updated the Bennet sisters lives, but also fleshed them out as characters and made them valuable in this story. The Bennet parents did in fact have major roles in the Austen version, however their subdued roles as aging parents in Eligible put a curious spin on their ailments but also created the context for the various Bennet sisters constant roles in their parents’ lives.
Another important update that was introduced to the reader early on was the ridding of dated occurrences that just wouldn’t make sense in the modern world (i.e. the inheritance needing a male heir). Sittenfeld smartly replaced these various problems with more modern issues to ail the Bennet family, and I found the process of downsizing a house to be a satisfyingly realistic choice. Along with these logistical updates, Sittenfeld also made the curious decision to make all of the Bennet sisters older than they were in the original Austen novel. Part of the reason was to readjust the stakes of the novel, but it also made all of the Bennet sisters more adult and allowed the Eligible novel to fit nicely into adult fiction.
I feel as though I have neglected the other relationships in the novel, but it should be noted that at its heart Eligible, like Pride and Prejudice, remains family focused. Aside from the Bennet family themselves, ‘cousin Willie’ was incorporated SO well, and I also appreciated that Liz and Charlotte’s friendship was prominent enough to make Charlotte’s relevance more important. In this manner Sittenfeld managed to manipulate all of the characters and side plots to her advantage.
Our romance…well…there’s certainly no lack of it! 😉 As I mentioned before, I struggled a lot to understand Darcy as a character in the original Austen novel (although this lessened with continued classroom discussion), however Sittenfeld takes a lot of time to explain Darcy which allows the reader to sympathize with him more. Bingly… well, I actually found him to be a lot more annoying as a character in Eligible, but that may be because he was around a lot more than the original! (lol)
Let me note now that there are a couple characters that I have failed to mention thus far, but I will leave it at that. Part of the joy of reading Eligible was the surprising ways in which she changed and used characters, so there are a couple I simply cannot mention without revealing too much.
Final Thoughts:
Deliciously outrageous, Eligible could not be a more entertaining read. Even die-hard Austen fans will be tearing through the pages as though the story was the original. Although by no means an edge of the seat read, the plot of the novel remains enticing. Sittenfeld’s thoughtful characterizations blend into developing personas, and while the story does end on a positive note each of the characters goes through a realistic journey. I could not possibly be more pleased with this modern Austen novel, and I think true fans will say the same.
