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"My character’s rules are all about things. She follows these rules - which are totally from some book, but which are absurd. But her rules are right out there, and in the end she says it’s O.K. to like boys and clothes and be who she is. I’ve been meaning to read Emma, like, forever" ("Austen Anew" 55). This quotation revealing Alicia Silverstone’s take on her role in the 1993 hit movie Clueless is both strikingly vacuous and surprisingly insightful.
While she may have never picked up Emma, Silverstone illustrates in this comment why she and so many others are drawn to the text today: both Emma and Cher, the protagonist of Clueless, subscribe to social "rules" while subverting the expectations of their world through the assertion of free will. This dynamic hinges on one condition: the characters’ choices must conveniently live up to society’s demands. Cher and Emma are allowed to be individuals because they are ideal characters. Silverstone makes clear that while a......

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Approximate Word Count: 4115
Approximate Pages: 17 (250 words per double-spaced page)

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