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Jane Austen
Jane Austen (1775-1817), English author wrote numerous influential works contributing to the Western literary canon including Pride and Prejudice (1813) which starts;
“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. However little known the feelings or views of such a man may be on his first entering a neighbourhood, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding families, that he is considered as the rightful property of some one or other of their daughters.” —Chapter 1
Austen had rejected suitor Harris Bigg Wither at the last minute and never ended up marrying, but still she expresses a keen grasp of the traditional female role and the ensuing hopes and heartbreaks with her memorable protagonists including Emma Woodhouse, Fanny Price, Catherine Morland, Anne Elliot, and Elizabeth Bennett of Pride and Prejudice. Writing in the romantic vein, Austen was also a realist and has been lauded for her form and structure of plot and intensely detailed characters who struggle with the issues of class-consciousness versus individualism: self-respecting men were supposed to become lawyers or join the church or military, and respectable women married to improve their station in life.
Jane had started writing at an early age and her family were highly supportive, though as was done at the time her works were published anonymously. Her combination of irony, humour, and sophisticated observations of the societal and cultural machinations between the classes epitomise the often absurd problems of inheritance, courtship, morals, and marriage in Regency England. Modestly successful during her life, her works have gone on to inspire adaptations to the stage and film and have endured the test of time even into the 21st century.
Born on 16 December, 1775 Jane Austen was the daughter of Cassandra (née Leigh) (1739–1827) and the reverend George Austen (1731–1805). The Austens were a very close-knit family; Jane had six brothers and one sister, Cassandra, who would later draw a famous portrait of Jane. They lived in the village of Steventon in Hampshire county, England, where George was rector. Young Jane was tutored at home and attended the Abbey School in Reading, Berkshire.
Jane was inseparable from her older sister Cassandra. They sang and danced and attended balls together. When George retired around 1801, he moved his family to Bath where he died in 1805. Adjusting to the ensuing financial difficulties, Jane, Cassandra and their mother then moved to Southampton for a time before settling in a cottage on the estate of Edward Austen in the village of Chawton, Hampshire in 1809, which is now a museum. Austen had missed Steventon life and now returning to the Hampshire countryside she wrote in earnest, revising and writing new works including Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814), and Emma (1815).
Possibly suffering from Addington’s disease, Jane Austen died on 18 July, 1817. She lies buried in the north aisle of the nave in Winchester Cathedral in Winchester, England.
In the Memory of
Jane Austen
youngest daughter of the Late
Rev.d George Austen
formerly rector of Steventon in this County
She departed this Life on the 18th of July, 1817,
Aged 41, after a long illness supported with
the patience and the hopes of a Christian
Posthumous publications were Persuasion (1817) and Northanger Abbey, a satirisation of Ann Radcliffe’s Gothic novels like The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794). Although Austen had many critics, among them Charlotte Bronte, Mark Twain and Lionel Trilling, she also had many admirers during her life and since, including the Prince Regent, Andrew Lang, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Virginia Woolf, and Sir Walter Scott who wrote;
“That young lady has a talent for describing the involvements of feelings and characters of ordinary life which is to me the most wonderful I ever met with.”
Biography written by C.D. Merriman for Jalic Inc. Copyright Jalic Inc. 2006. All Rights Reserved.
The above biography is copyrighted. Do not republish it without permission.
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Question (JA's Legacy)
We all know that Jane Austen is still a very influential author. In my research on finding more authors who write about the same topics she does, I've come across the fact that contemporary authors write fiction books set in the time of Jane Austen, called "historical romance". What is your opinion on these types of books? Do you think they portray the era correctly, respect the rules back then and so on?
Posted By antonia1990 at Wed 25 Jun 2008, 7:27 PM in Austen, Jane || 2 Replies
Need Passage Ideas from Austen (Emma?)
For a communication class I'm taking, I'm doing a project about improving a communication skill, and one of the parts to it is to pick a passage from a book that involves the skill (or lack thereof). My skill involves perception: listening carefully without going beyond the intended meaning of remarks. One possibility in Austen I am thinking may work here is Emma because I remember that Emma completely misreads communication from a certain gentleman, thinking he has affection for Harriet, when really he has affection for Emma. This leads to all sorts of problems because Harriet is really in love with someone else, but because Emma has convinced Harriet about the intentions of this gentleman, Harriet refuses the proposal of the other guy that she loves and who is more appropriate for her given his social class. Does anyone remember where this passage is in Emma representing her faulty perception (I forget the gentleman's name)? Or can you think of other passages in that book or other Austen works that would be good for such a perception example? Emily
Posted By emilyrose at Sat 7 Jun 2008, 7:08 AM in Austen, Jane || 0 Replies
A SECULAR AND NARROW WORLD: Hers and Ours?
My mother-in-law, a woman in her late eighties, finds watching movies adapted from Jane Austen’s novels boring. Her attitude mirrors, somewhat, the reaction of novelist Henry James who saw the characters in Austen’s novels as having “small and second-rate minds,” Philistines one and all. Emerson found Austen to be imprisoned in a wretched and smothering conventionality with an excessive concern for “marriageableness.”1 Not everyone has reacted this way to Austen, not now nor in the nearly two centuries since her death in 1817. Some saw her writing as “a prose Shakespeare,”2 a writer who exposed with her acid solution of words the empty foundations of social and personal morality in a violent and repressive age in English society.-Ron Price with thanks to 1Lee Siegel, “A Writer Who Is Good For You,” The Atlantic Online, January 1998; and 2William MacAuley in Jane Austen: The Critical Heritage, Vol. 2, B.C. Southam, editor, Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., London, 1987. There is nothing to equal your smallness in a small town and the commonplace has never found a finer master than your divine chatter some have said, Jane, yes they have. Petty inconsistencies, parochial vanities, familiar everydayisms, vulgarity and pride, delineated as entertainment and amusement, tissues of character in speech, gently undulating life-surface, triviality but intense relations, satire’s world without bitterness, hermetically sealed with supreme moments quite inarticulate giving you: coolness, patience, poise and leisure obtained so you could write and me too, Jane!----and me too! Your wholly secular and narrow world with people you disliked, tolerated but accepted in the only society you knew where nothing was too little for your little world and happiness=simple pleasures.1 Balance, moderation, courtesy: recipe for survival in two worlds— yours and ours—inner landscapes— the triumph of the ordinarily ordinary and the inherited order over change:2 but we can’t triumph with that recipe and order can we Jane? Can we Jane? Nor could you---would you, Jane?3 1 Jane Austen: A Collection of Critical Essays, editor, Ian Watt, Prentice-Hall Inc., Inglewood Cliffs, N.J., 1963, p. 172. 2 Adena Rosmarin, “Misreading Emma: The Powers and Perfidies of Interpretive History, English Literary History, Vol. 51, pp. 315-42. 3 What would Austen have written if she had lived beyond the age of 41? Ron Price 4 June 2008
Posted By Ron Price at Wed 4 Jun 2008, 9:57 AM in Austen, Jane || 1 Reply
Relevant to todays times
Hey everyone, I am writing an essay (we had to choose our own topic) in English class on Pride and Prejudice. We also had to write a question which we will explore and answer in our essay. The question I have chosen is- Are the themes in Pride and Prejudice applicable to todays times as they were 150 years ago? If you could give me a kick start in the right direction i would really appreciate it.. I have just discovered this site, it is amazing! :yawnb:
Posted By Tiny Dancer at Mon 26 May 2008, 5:24 AM in Austen, Jane || 10 Replies
narrative voice
hi gang, i was just wondering if anyone had any ideas about how best to approach an essay dealing with narrative voice in p&p. it's in regard to a specific passage but was just wondering about the question in general (also dont want to seem like i asking for people to write the damn thing). and wondering if any one had any opinions. as it is quite hard to distinguish between free indirect speech, omniscience etc and also when these devices start and finish damn you jane austen for being such a fine craftsperson lol so any ideas?
Posted By billhicks at Mon 3 Mar 2008, 12:27 PM in Austen, Jane || 1 Reply
How many members of this Forum have read Jane Austen?
How many members of this forum have read Jane Austen's novels? I have read four of her works. The order in which I have read them was: Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Predjudice, Mansfield Park, and Emma. And right now I am reading Persuasion with my younger sister. She hasn't read any of Austen's work, so I have decided to introduce them to her, by us reading them together outloud. I am not sure if the order, in which I have read her works, is the actual order in which she wrote them. If the order, in which I have read her novels,(up above) is not the order in which she herself wrote them, then could anyone, who knows the correct order, please inform me. Have any of the members read Austen's short works-Juvenilia? If anyone has, which one of them was your favorite? I haven't actual read any of her short works, but I am asking this question in order to find out which one I should read first. If anyone has some good websites about Jane Austen, that they can reccomend me, please send me the information. If anyone has anything intresting to tell about Jane Austen's life and works, I am very intrested. just send me a message. God Bless.
Posted By Celine Field at Wed 20 Feb 2008, 3:29 PM in Austen, Jane || 29 Replies
Miss Austen Regrets
I am looking forward to this Masterpiece Theatre film on Sunday. It's supposed to be based on her surviving letters written to her sister and her neice. Someone who saw a preview said it was respectfully done, of which I'm glad.
Posted By sciencefan at Fri 1 Feb 2008, 5:31 PM in Austen, Jane || 11 Replies
What 2 Jane Austen book characters do you most relate to ?
What 2 Jane Austen book characters you admire or even dislike, do you (seriously or humorously) most relate to and please say why for each one mentioned.
Posted By BDuncan at Wed 30 Jan 2008, 9:37 PM in Austen, Jane || 11 Replies
How Could 39YO Austen Be so Interested in "Young People"
Hi! I'm a 56 year old who enjoys reading Jane Austen. I just finished Emma. It took me a while to get used to who everyone was. It also took some perseverance in wading through all the shananigans of the young people to realize at the end what Austen was trying do. I also had to look in the dictionary many times to find the meanings of a word I'm not familiar with. It was a clever, well-done book, but I still cannot imagine a 39 year old women having an interest in the activities of young people. All I can say is, Austen had never married, and maybe this kept her stuck in some sort of "courting" mode. If she had had a husband and family, I do not know if her writings would have included as much courtship and love. Any ideas, why a 39 year old would pick a young person like Emma to spend 400 pages on? It seems odd to me.
Posted By Futurehope at Mon 14 Jan 2008, 7:51 PM in Austen, Jane || 7 Replies
Help..Jane Austen
Hello! i am completely new to this.. Am starting my personal study and want to study Jane Austen but need to compare it to another novel any one got any ideas? It would be really appreciated! Thanks a bunch x
Posted By samg3008 at Thu 29 Nov 2007, 3:37 PM in Austen, Jane || 3 Replies