Janeite
Janeitism did not begin until after the publication of J. E. Austen-Leigh's "A Memoir of Jane Austen" in 1870, when the literary elite felt that they had to separate their appreciation of Austen from that of the masses. The term "Janeite" was originally coined by the literary scholar George Saintsbury in his 1894 introduction to a new edition of "Pride and Prejudice". As Austen scholar Deidre Lynch explains, "he meant to equip himself with a badge of honor he could jubilantly pin to his own lapel". In the early twentieth century, Janeitism was "principally a male enthusiasm shared among publishers, professors, and literati". Rudyard Kipling even published a short story entitled "The Janeites" about a group of World War I soldiers who were secretly fans of Austen's novels.
Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason
Fielding has said that the first Bridget Jones story was based on the Jane Austen novel "Pride and Prejudice". There are parallels between "The Edge of Reason" and the Austen novel "Persuasion", in which the main character is persuaded by her friends to break off her relationship with her "true love". Again, Fielding borrows a name from Austen, this time a Giles Benwick, after Captain Benwick. She also reworks several scenes in "Persuasion": for example, Rebecca, Bridget's rival for Mark's affection, dives into a shallow river and hurts her foot, a mirror of the incident in "Persuasion" when Louisa, Anne's rival, falls on her head at Lyme. In both cases, the protagonist (Anne/Bridget) first overhears Darcy praising Rebecca/Louisa for being "resolute" - praise of the very trait that contributes to the accident. Then, when Bridget attends her goddaughter Constance's birthday party, Mark Darcy rescues her from a young male child who is determined to climb onto her back; in Persuasion, Captain Wentworth (Anne's lost love) does precisely the same thing, in the same manner, for Anne. At Bridget's mother's Book Club poetry reading, Mark overhears Bridget commenting that women remain fixated on men who have forgotten them, and is moved to write her a secret note expressing his continuing regard (which he then fails to give to her due to a mix-up). This, with a happier immediate outcome, also happens in Persuasion, when Wentworth overhears Anne making a similar observation about "women's constancy" to Captain Harville, and writes her a proposal which he gets to her by stealth. Later in the Fielding novel, when Giles and Rebecca become romantically involved, Fielding parodies Austen's description of Captain Benwick and Louisa having fallen in love over poetry, commenting that Giles and Rebecca "fell in love over self-help books".