Our heroine rises to the occasion

One of my more unpopular opinions is that there is no point get upset about bad adaptations of Jane Austen because even the "good" ones seriously misrepresent her.

For example consider the 2008 version of Sense and Sensibility. I've read people getting upset about the "sex scene" before the credits and the duel. But both events are in the novel and that sex is hardly very sexual. The hundreds of shots of heaving breasts in empire-waist gowns in other filmed versions of Austen are far more shamelessly erotic.

In any case, both of these things—I mean the sex and the duel not the two heaving breasts—very clearly appear in the novel.

Something that no one gets very bothered about in the 2008 version is the scene where Willoughby pulls out a copy of Byron and educates Marianne about Romantic poetry. It's not just that Byron was still an unknown as the events in the book took place. The problem is that in the book it is Marianne who educates Willoughby about poetry.

Let's go to the text. Willoughby comes back the day after rescuing Marianne (Austen begins the chapter by mocking that rescue). Austen sets up his reaction by having the exposition suddenly become very male. And let's remember that Willoughby could, at this point, go for either sister.

 Miss Dashwood had a delicate complexion, regular features, and a remarkably pretty figure. Marianne was still handsomer. Her form, though not so correct as her sister's, in having the advantage of height, was more striking; and her face was so lovely, that when, in the common cant of praise, she was called a beautiful girl, truth was less violently outraged than usually happens. Her skin was very brown, but from its transparency, her complexion was uncommonly brilliant; her features were all good; her smile was sweet and attractive; and in her eyes, which were very dark, there was a life, a spirit, an eagerness which could hardly be seen without delight.

 This is—I categorically state on my own authority—a pretty classic male reaction and solid evidence that Austen really gets male attitudes.

Austen has not spent much time discussing the appearance of the two eldest Dashwood sisters before now. Now that a man is checking them out, she moves to that point. And one of the first things that the exposition notes is that, objectively speaking, Elinor has a better body than Marianne. Yes, I now it says so in English that seems more elegant than that but Austen says it in the ordinary talk of her day.

And I could put it more crudely if you want. "Elinor has nicer breasts but Marianne is taller and has a prettier face." That is the sentiment behind the language here.

Soon, however, personality takes over. It's not the eyes but the expression in them. Marianne Dashwood hits John Willoughby like a tsunami. It's not her looks that win the day—her sister is more than reasonable competition—what dooms him is her mind, her expression and her behaviour.

Read what happens when they discuss poetry and we see that every time Willoughby shows any initiative of his own, Marianne washes over him like another wave:

Encouraged by this to a further examination of his opinions, she proceeded to question him on the subject of books; her favourite authors were brought forward and dwelt upon with so rapturous a delight, that any young man of five-and-twenty must have been insensible indeed, not to become an immediate convert to the excellence of such works, however disregarded before. Their taste was strikingly alike. The same books, the same passages were idolized by each -- or, if any difference appeared, any objection arose, it lasted no longer than till the force of her arguments and the brightness of her eyes could be displayed. He acquiesced in all her decisions, caught all her enthusiasm, and long before his visit concluded, they conversed with the familiarity of a long-established acquaintance. 

This effect is even more marked in Pride and Prejudice by the way. Eliza is the one who does in poor Mr. Darcy.

And here we come up against what might be called the Republic of Pemberley mindset. That is people who get upset not because the filmed version isn't true to Jane Austen but because it isn't true to their fantasies about Colin Firth improbably falling in love with them. For these fantasists, this all happens in a world where sex is absent. So much absent that they don't want to be reminded that Jane Bennet is considerably more attractive than her sister Eliza or that Elinor has a better body than Marianne and that Jane Austen is not only aware of sex, it is  major driving force in Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice and Mansfield Park.

Women in Austen do not "sit around waiting for things to happen to them" as Margaret Dashwood says in the 2008 television version. John Willoughby shows up after some boredom but Marianne Dashwood happens to him, he does not happen to her. And this is crucial because otherwise this is just another maudlin tale of an innocent girl swept up by a cheap seducer. Another tale in which virtue is reduced to the possession of a hymen. Willoughby is a schnook to be sure but what happens to Marianne in this story is very much her fault. That it is her fault is the whole point of the novel.