Ah, Emma, Emma. When I first read Emma – it was years ago, I must have been somewhere around 14 or 15 – I found both the story and the heroine so very alluring and without a fault that I feared the resolution of picking up this book again would leave me with such altered thoughts that I would end up resenting the book. At one point, it almost seemed so – I noticed I had had too high a regard for Emma at first, she wasn’t quite as extraordinary and witty as I had thought. A great dislike was very near to be developed, for a while all I could see Emma was ill-witted and manipulative, musing over her designs in the seclusion of Hartfield.
Then, as the story went on, Emma seemed to become more sensible, more mature, and she truly seemed to understand just how spoiled she was and how much damage her actions and words could actually do – I immediately liked her better and from that point on, my affection for her grew more and more. (I did remember how the story ended all along, so I never feared for her not having a happy and most satisfying ending, I just didn’t remember the particulars)

Why all this mattered so much, why I cared as deeply about Emma’s character was, well, because I see a lot of myself in her, many similarities, even though I might take too many liberties by comparing myself to the intelligent and beautiful Miss Woodhouse. I relate to her and thus didn’t want to resent her – that would mean I’d have to resent myself as well, and no sensible person wants to degenerate ones view of oneself willingly like that. I didn’t force myself to like Emma, but it happened in the end, and I’m happy.

It was also extremely interesting and gratifying to read Emma in English, I was a little hesitant to try it at first but I did better than I had thought, it wasn’t near as difficult as I had imagined.