Department of English

In this century, Jane Austen has become arguably our most widely adapted English novelist. Her plots and characters seem everywhere - the basis of hit Netflix series, feature films, video games, mysteries, tarot decks, fashion lines … even air fresheners. This course will explore why, starting with several of Austen’s novels and a few of the popular forms she loved. Alongside her fiction, we'll examine as many Austen adaptations, commodities, and swag as we have time for. On the way, we’ll learn about how genre, media, and creative appropriation work in the real world. 

This course is an ideal introduction to English at Penn. It satisfies the College's General Requirement for Sector III: Arts and Letters, as well as several sectors of the English major. Required work: Two essays, one of which may be creative, and a final project.