Adaptations of Jane Austen’s, Emma, are usually period pieces diligent in capturing and replicating the manners, dress, language and values of the original text. Clueless, written and directed by Amy Heckerling, deviates drastically from the norm, as the film is not a period piece. While Emma is set in the early nineteenth century in the country village of Highbury, sixteen miles out of London, England, Clueless is set in Bronson Alcott High School almost two hundred years later, in the late twentieth century. Despite the significantly different geographical and historical setting and the diverse social values, lifestyles, and issues than those depicted in Emma, Amy Heckerling’s high school setting retains and is
Jane Austen’s novel 'Emma' and Amy Heckerling’s Clueless, as significant and satirical reflections of Regency England and postmodern America respectively, indicate how the transformation process can shape and improve literacy, intertextual and logical importance. The transformation is evident in the compositions Jane Austen’s ‘Emma’ and Amy Heckerling’s ‘Clueless’ enabling us to investigate the assortment of logical subjects. Regarding ‘Emma’ the perspective throughout the Regency time frame examines the strict values of love and marriage inside the inflexible social hierarchy. Austen’s advances the significance of etiquette throughout the text. Austen reveals a neo-women’s activist perspective, shown in the female protagonist revealing the female protagonists’ scholarly capacity and social equity in an otherwise patriarchal society. However, the close resemblance of the story; ‘Clueless’, Heckerling composition conveys entirely transformed values, reflected through the actions of the current upper-working class of contemporary Los Angeles. The critical analysis of commercialism in the informal social class system of modern America reiterating social expectations of gender and social characterisation within the microcosm of the typical American educational system. The transformation in attitudes of Austen, reveals an exhaustive utilisation of setting, a close examination of dialect and various artistic procedure.
Jane Austen's novel "Emma" published in 1815 and the film adaptation "Clueless" written and directed by Amy Heckerling in 1995 both share a similar interest in maintaining a high social status. Emma Woodhouse of the novel "Emma" and Cher Horowitz from the film "Clueless" are both spoiled young lady living in a high-class society. Emma Woodhouse is part of the rich, upscale society in a large and populous village in the nineteenth century England, while Cher Horowitz lives in a rich, upscale Beverly Hills, California USA. Both of the main characters, Emma and Cher shows arrogance and lack of acceptance to other social class due to their use of power and wealth, which they are unaware of it themselves. Emma and Cher's immaturity has resulted
Emma Woodhouse, who begins the novel "handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and a happy disposition" (Austen 1), suffers from a dangerous propensity to play matchmaker, diving into other’s lives, for what she believes is their own good. Despite this, she is a sympathetic character. Her matchmaking leads only to near-disasters and her expressions of remorse following these mistakes are sincere and resolute. Jane Austen's Emma concerns the social milieu of a sympathetic, but flawed young woman whose self-delusion regarding her flaws is gradually erased through a series of comic and ironic events.
Appropriations provide audiences with a relevant contemporary sense of culture, while simultaneously providing insight into consistent behaviours over time, from the era of the original text to the era of the appropriation. This paradigm is reflected in a comparison study involving Jane Austen’s novel Emma (1818) and Amy Heckerling’s Clueless (1995). In her novel Emma, Austen reflects on the rigid social structure that formed the basis of Regency Society. Similarly, Heckerling’s Clueless emphasises how physical image determines status. Likewise, Austen’s emphasis on arranged marriages and love marriages, is contrasted by how Clueless highlights the open love, lust and sex prevalent within modern relationships. By considering the context of
The plot for Clueless was about a student name Cher who is a smart and rich girl who is trying to survive her high school days and the daily drama of girls.The plot for Emma is about a twenty year old who believes she will never marry anyone and believes she is a perfect matchmaker.A major
Throughout history, notions of beauty have been integral to social life and culture, and are often reflected in period texts. An example of this is Jane Austen’s Regency era novel Emma (1815), and its 1995 film appropriation Clueless, written and directed by Amy Heckerling. These texts use the beauty ideals of their respective periods to showcase the negative effects of superficiality and the importance of ‘inner’ beauty. This becomes evident through exploration of the beauty ideals of both eras and how representations of these ideals have been appropriated from Emma to Clueless through characterisation.
Amy Heckerling’s appropriation of Jane Austen’s, Emma into Clueless; as reflective and satirical parallels of Regency England and contemporary America, substantiate the enhancement of textual, intertextual and contextual meaning; as both become aesthetic replays of each other. By adapting the 19th century, genteel society of Highbury to the 20th century, contemporary microcosm of Beverly Hills, Heckerling gives insight into the realignment of social values and attitudes towards marriage, class and gender roles- an insight provoked by the textual counterparts; Austen’s Emma and Heckerling’s Cher. Ultimately, it is through the mediums of film and literature, and the intertextuality of these two texts that one gets to realise, that despite the
Author and journalist, Italo Calvino once stated that, “a classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say”, the perennial feature of a classic novel is able to provide a sense of relatability to the modern reader regardless of societal contexts. The significance of reinterpretation of classical texts lays in its disclosure of the modifications in society; the transformation of attitudes and values is juxtaposed in various milieus making it applicable to a vast audience. The novel "Emma" by Jane Austen scrutinizes the numerous complications of dating, ranging from social hierarchy, family and friendship to love and matrimony. The loosely based adaptation "Clueless" utilizes Jane Austen's ability to decipher human emotion and refashioning it to a much more appealing and marketable American High School setting.
Transformation. What is a transformation? It is when the plot structure and focus of both texts remains intact, but the issues, values and setting are altered. Amy Heckerling’s Clueless transforms Jane Austen’s Emma by humorously depicting modern values. Emma is set during the Regency period, where it was a time of political and social change, with old rural-based values facing challenge from the new urban middle class whereas Clueless is portrayed in a post-industrial, consumer-driven society. Both composers share a common interest in highlighting class distinction; Austen emphasizes on social class in England while Heckerling focuses on the social cliques of youth in America.
Good morning classmates. Today I will be discussing Jane Austen’s classic novel Emma, and how it has been transformed into the 1995 movie Clueless. I will be analysing the context, characters, and setting of the two texts by focusing on two specific themes which are central to both texts. The first theme is the value of self-knowledge and moral integrity, and the second theme is social hierarchy.
Texts and their appropriations presents the ways of thinking and the values existent within their societies. When comparing Jane Austen’s Regency novel Emma and Amy Heckerling’s adaptive feature Clueless, it is evident they offer diverse perspectives significant to understanding the composer’s contexts. In differentiation, Emma highlights the significance of matrimony, whereas this value is cast aside in Clueless. Clueless also
to. So it defines one's rank to be at one of these social functions as
Emma, a novel by Jane Austen, is the story of a young woman, Emma, who is rich, stubborn, conniving, and occupies her time meddling into others' business. There are several recurring themes throughout the novel; the ideas of marriage, social class, women's confinement, and the power of imagination to blind the one from the truth, which all become delineated and reach a climax during the trip to Box Hill. The scene at Box Hill exposes many underlying emotions that have been built up throughout the novel, and sets the stage for the events that conclude it.
Though written over two centuries apart, the protagonists in Jane Austen’s Emma and Amy Heckerling’s Clueless, are very much alike. They are strong female characters of a certain social standing, that are expected to abide by a particular set of rules and adhere to societal norms. Unlike most young women, Austen’s Emma and Heckerling’s Cher are able to disregard social expectations¬ — like Emma’s idea of marriage, and Cher’s idea of sex — simply because they are privileged and socially stable enough to do so. In this way, both young women simultaneously embrace and reject the principles of female social expectations of their specific time periods. Both Austen and Heckerling confront the belief systems of their readers and viewers through characters that do not act “appropriately” within their respective social environments.