Bridget Jones's Diary
by Helen Fielding
Bridget Jones’s Diary, the book, was based on Helen Fielding’s column in the Independent. It was published in 1996 and became a worldwide bestseller. It is very, very loosely modelled on Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, with the plot focusing on the modern equivalent: a 30-something singleton working in London who hopes to fall in love and find a husband. It is both very funny and yet captures the loneliness of 20th-century life.
Pride and Prejudice was a trailblazing book, not least because it has served as the template for every romance novel and Mills & Boon written since. The countless book and screen adaptations of Pride and Prejudice speak to a story that has universal appeal, its characters and plotline appearing in everything from Bridget Jones’s Diary to Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.
Commentary