Jane Austen

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Standard Name: Austen, Jane
Birth Name: Jane Austen
Pseudonym: A Lady
Styled: Mrs Ashton Dennis
JA 's unequalled reputation has led academic canon-makers to set her on a pedestal and scholars of early women's writing to use her as an epoch. For generations she was the first—or the only—woman to be adjudged major. Recent attention has shifted: her balance, good sense, and humour are more taken for granted, and critics have been scanning her six mature novels for traces of the boldness and irreverence which mark her juvenilia. Her two unfinished novels, her letters (which some consider an important literary text in themselves), and her poems and prayers have also received some attention.
Photograph of a colourized print of Jane Austen, from a drawing by a Mr Andrews commissioned by Austen's nephew James Edward Austen Leigh as frontispiece to his "Memoir of Jane Austen", 1870 (fifty years after she died). She is shown seated, with a book on her lap, wearing a blue dress and light brown bonnet.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Literary responses Barbara Pym
BP 's father wrote to her on 3 May 1950 commending this novel, which he had not expected to enjoy since he preferred mysteries.
Wyatt-Brown, Anne M. Barbara Pym: A Critical Biography. University of Missouri Press, 1992.
157n12
Robert Liddell , who had been familiar with it throughout...
Literary responses Harriett Mozley
HM 's brother John Henry (later famous as Cardinal Newman) said her first book had the fault of being too brilliant.
qtd. in
Tillotson, Kathleen et al. “Harriett Mozley”. Mid-Victorian Studies, Athlone Press, 1965, pp. 38-48.
38-9
It was read everywhere by both High and Low Church parties. Several...
Literary Setting Fanny Aikin Kortright
While Annie is employed by the Curzon family, love develops between her and Lord Claude Douglas. He wishes he could forget who he is for her sake, but cannot do it. He sullies their pastoral...
Material Conditions of Writing Ruth Prawer Jhabvala
This venture was triggered by the appearance on the market of Austen 's juvenile play Sir Charles Grandison, itself an adaptation from the novel by Samuel Richardson . London Weekend Television acquired an option...
Material Conditions of Writing E. M. Delafield
In the year of this publication, 1935, Virginia Woolf wrote to her niece, Angelica Bell , I've been seeing E. M. Delafield who writes The Provincial Lady: she is called Dashwood really; Elizabeth Dashwood; and...
Occupation Q. D. Leavis
Working again through the British Council , Q. D. and F. R. Leavis lectured on Austen , Eliot , and Yeats in Rome, Milan, Padua, and Bologna.
Singh, G., and Q. D. Leavis. F.R. Leavis: A Literary Biography. Duckworth, 1995.
283-4
Occupation Lady Cynthia Asquith
Meanwhile she prepared to receive evacuees from London, and volunteered for first aid work, nursing, and night shifts with the ARP (Air Raid Precaution) .
Beauman, Nicola. Cynthia Asquith. Hamish Hamilton, 1987.
311
After the war she became a member both of...
Occupation Lady Cynthia Asquith
For her three weeks' work in this capacity she earned ¥900. She did even better in spring 1957 by appearing on an ITV quiz programme, the $64,000 Question, to answer questions on the novels...
Occupation Elizabeth Jenkins
EJ was one of the founders of the Jane Austen Society , launched in 1940. She campaigned for the purchase (achieved in 1947) of the cottage at Chawton in Hampshire where Austen lived for her...
Occupation Sarah Tytler
As regards the typical feminine curriculum, ST resented the tradition of mandatory music teaching—of the piano—to young women, and the slight to other branches of education in the extravagant favour shown to one branch.
Tytler, Sarah. Three Generations. J. Murray, 1911.
235-6
Occupation Catherine Hutton
As well as collecting illustrations of costume, CH was an early collector of autographs. (She began both these collections at a young age, but presumably had to start again from scratch after her losses in...
Occupation Barbara Pym
This work gave her considerable free time, most of which she spent reading such authors as Austen , Johnson , Scott , and Trollope . She particularly admired the forms of Mansfield 's published scrapbook...
Occupation Eva Figes
EF had a long stint as co-editor of this series, which includes works on Margaret Atwood , Jane Austen , Elizabeth Bowen , Elizabeth Barrett Browning , Frances Burney , Willa Cather , Colette ,...
Performance of text Elizabeth Inchbald
It was published by the end of the year, at the same time as a rival version by Stephen Porter which used both titles (Lovers' Vows; or, The Child of Love) and which...
Performance of text Stéphanie-Félicité de Genlis
Genlis' daughters gave performances of these plays to large audiences (up to five hundred people).
Dow, Gillian. “Books owned by Jane Austen’s niece, Caroline, donated to Chawton House Library”. The Female Spectator, Vol.
1 n.s.
, No. 4, 2015, pp. 1-3.
2
The work was several times translated into English (beginning in late 1780) as The Theatre of Education. A...

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