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"The whinnying of harpies?" : humor in Jane Austen's letters.(AGM 2005: Milwaukee)

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From: Persuasions: The Jane Austen Journal
Date: 20050101
Author:Fergus, Jan

THE LETTERS THAT JANE AUSTEN INCLUDED in the novels are endlessly fascinating, from Darcy's explanation to Elizabeth to the splendid whining letter from Mary Musgrove to her sister Anne at Bath, the one in which she claims that "'my sore-throats, you know, are always worse than anybody's'" (P 164). On a number of occasions, JASNA has called for members to submit letters from the characters--and in doing so we are almost following in the footsteps of Austen's own niece Fanny Knight, who apparently wrote a letter to Jane Austen as though addressed to Georgiana Darcy, hoping to ...

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