Today marks the 200th anniversary of the publication of Pride and Prejudice. Originally titled First Impressions, it was the first manuscript Jane Austen wrote, but not the first to be published; the first edition title page reads “by the author of Sense and Sensibility.”

When I was in college, my fabulous advisor, the inimitable Dr. Jim Skinner, was the departmental expert in all things Austen. At the time, I wasn’t interested. I’d had a bad run-in with Victorian novels in high school (Thomas Hardy’s Far From the Madding Crowd being a prime example), so I assiduously avoided pretty much everything published in Great Britain in the 1800s unless it was poetry. I know, I know. Austen has nothing in common with the Victorians. She’s closer to the Brontës (whom I also assiduously avoided), but they really aren’t the same thing, either. Still, Dr. Skinner made me promise that someday I’d join him and become a Janeite. To do that, I’d have to read all six Austens.

Yeah, right, I thought at the time. I’ll hop right on that. Just as soon as I fall in love with Hemingway (which wasn’t ever going to happen, given how much I love my Faulkner). So it was some time later–ten years, maybe?–before I finally gave in. I mean, what kind of English teacher could I be if I’d never even cracked the cover of an Austen? And like thousands before me, my first impression of an Austen heroine was Lizzie Bennet.

Talk about your girl crushes. Elizabeth is intelligent, outspoken, loyal, loving, and smart-alecky–all the things I hope I am in my better moments. She loves her dad, gets exasperated with her mother and sillier sisters, and adores her sister Jane. She has some flaws, too, as a good heroine should. She’s too enamored of her own opinion and too stubborn to admit when she’s wrong. That sounds familiar!