“Watching Austen, Reading Ourselves”

Jane Austen’s adaptations on screen have multiplied during the last decades, giving rise to a phenomenon which not only challenges common assumptions about the relationship between literature and audiovisual products, whether in film or television format, but also questions our shared beliefs as individuals both mirrored and shaped by our own entertainment products. Blurring time and space boundaries, these adaptations position themselves as important cultural items, worth an attentive look. This article intends to analyze two screen adaptations of Jane Austen’s novels: the 2005 film adaptation of Pride and Prejudice and the 2008 TV adaptation of Sense and Sensibility, as they work to update Austen's work to contemporaneity