In books, film and television, Jane Austen is hot. “But this year’s wave of books and biopics is tinged with something different. Instead of acknowledging the enduring pleasures of Austen’s satire, or demonstrating how smoothly her centuries-old observations apply to contemporary society, this round of fanaticism is more interested in going back in time — or perhaps simply backward — to play dress-up in empire-waisted gowns with suitably dashing suitors to swoon over.”