Our fourth attempt at a classic and the first that actually worked.

Three of us did it at school and were insufferable about that fact. Bridget hadn't, and kept saying "hang on, who's engaged to who now?", which is fair enough if you haven't got a chart, and Deborah had brought a chart.

Fiona's contribution was to spend twenty minutes on Charlotte Lucas, which I wasn't expecting and now cannot unhear. Her line: everyone talks about Elizabeth and Darcy, and the real argument of the novel is happening over at Mr Collins's house with a woman doing sums. Deborah disagreed at length. Gail said she'd forgotten Mr Collins was funny — she had him filed as a horror — and then read out the letter he sends after Lydia runs off, and the room went.

We agreed the mother is treated unkindly by the narration and just as unkindly by all of us, and Yvonne said she'd have been exactly the same with five daughters and no money, which shut everybody up for a moment.

Eight. Much funnier than school made it, shorter than I remembered, and I'd forgotten how much of it is simply people being rude to one another in rooms.