Originally Posted by
Ecurb
Charlotte Bronte hated Jane Austen's novels. The Brontes and Austen are separated by 40 years, and by a completely different approach to literature. Austen was a humorist and a realist; the Brontes were romantics and fantasists. George Eliot is (perhaps) a little more similar to Austen, but she isn't very funny, either.
IN Austen's six novels, no mad wives appear in attics, nor are there Heathcliffean obsessions, and marital cruelty is limited to hints (did hard-drinking Mr. Price beat his wife?).
For comedies of manners similar to Austen's (there are none equal to Austen's) perhaps you could look at Oscar Wilde's plays, or Forster's novels.
