Jane Austen
Austen's novels have resulted in sequels, prequels and adaptations of almost every type, from soft-core pornography to fantasy. From the 19th century, her family members published conclusions to her incomplete novels, and by 2000 there were over 100 printed adaptations. The first dramatic adaptation of Austen was published in 1895, Rosina Filippi's "Duologues and Scenes from the Novels of Jane Austen: Arranged and Adapted for Drawing-Room Performance", and Filippi was also responsible for the first professional stage adaptation, "The Bennets" (1901). The first film adaptation was the 1940 MGM production of "Pride and Prejudice" starring Laurence Olivier and Greer Garson. BBC television dramatisations since the 1970s have attempted to adhere meticulously to Austen's plots, characterisations and settings. The British critic Robert Irvine noted that in American film adaptations of Austen's novels, starting with the 1940 version of "Pride and Prejudice" and continuing on to today, class is subtly downplayed as the United States is officially an egalitarian nation where all people are equal and the society of Regency England depicted by Austen that is grounded in a hierarchy based upon the ownership of land and the antiquity of the family name is one that Americans cannot embrace in its entirety.
Reception history of Jane Austen
Austen's novels appeared in some European countries soon after their publication in Britain, beginning in 1813 with a French translation of "Pride and Prejudice" in the journal "Bibliothèque Britannique", quickly followed by German, Danish, and Swedish editions. Their availability in Europe was not universal. Austen was not well known in Russia and the first Russian translation of an Austen novel did not appear until 1967. Despite the fact that Austen's novels were translated into many European languages, Europeans did not recognise her works as part of the English novel tradition. This perception was reinforced by the changes made by translators who injected sentimentalism into Austen's novels and eliminated their humour and irony. European readers therefore more readily associated Walter Scott's style with the English novel.