Jane Austen The Novelist

Jane Austen is known as a novelist, but for me she was also an historian. Her novels go deep into detail about how life was at the end of the 18th Century --- for the British landed gentry. The plots within her novels explore how women were, how they thought and their dependence on marriage in order to get some sort of social standing and economic security. Jane questions the ‘sensibility’ of this Century and her use if biting irony, along with her realism, humour and social commentary, have earned her acclaim among critics, scholars and popular audiences. Her novels are part “of the transition to 19th Century literary realism.”

Born in Steventon, Hampshire, on 16th December, 1775, Jane Austen was born to George and Cassandra Austen. George was the rector of the Anglican parishes at Steventon and at nearby Deane, and came from an old, respected and wealthy family of wool merchants (unfortunately, George’s branch of the family fell into poverty). Jane was a month late in being born, George saying at the time of his wife: “certainly expected to have been brought to bed a month ago.” Jane was the second daughter and seventh child in a family of eight, with six boys and two girls. The two girls became close companions --- Jane and Cassandra --- as neither girl married.

George was a scholar who encouraged his children to learn, including his two daughters. The atmosphere within the home was one of “open, amused, easy intellect” and ‘ideas’ were discussed both politically and socially. Talking of his two daughters, “Mr Austen’s predictions for his younger daughter were fully justified. Never were sisters more to each other than Cassandra and Jane; while in a particularly affectionate family, there seems to have been a special link between Edward and Cassandra on the one hand, and between Henry and Jane on the other.” From 1773 until 1796, George Austen supplemented the annual income by farming and by teaching three or four boys at a time. This brought in £200 a year. This was a very modest income when compared to the typical annual income of a gentry’s family which was £1,000 to £5,000.

During this time, Jane grew up attending church regularly, socialized with friends and neighbours, and enjoyed dancing at balls. Of course, her main love was reading and composing novels, which Jane would read out loud to her family, as part of the evening entertainment. Talking of dancing, her brother henry said of Jane: “Jane was fond of dancing, and excelled at it.” In 1783, Jane and Cassandra were sent to Oxford to be taught by Mrs. Ann Cawley, who took the two girls with her when she moved to Southampton (a year later). The girls were sent home when they caught typhus with Jane nearly dying from it. They were taught at home until 1785, when both Jane and Cassandra attended boarding school in the Reading Abbey Girl’s School, which was ‘ruled’ by Mrs. La Tournelle. The lessons included French, spelling, needlework, dancing, music and theatre. As the school fees were too high for their father to afford, both girls returned home before December 1786. After this, Jane “never again lived anywhere beyond the bounds of her immediate family environment.” From now on, Jane was ‘educated’ at home, reading from her brothers school books and using her father’s library, which was large and varied. George encouraged both of his daughters to write by providing expensive paper and other materials for both writing and drawing.

Growing up in such a lively and affectionate family gave Jane so much ‘scope’ for her writing. Her world was one of minor landed gentry and the country clergy, in the village and the country town, and she had occasional visits to Bath and London --- Jane wrote what she knew about. At least from the age of eleven years old, Jane wrote poems and stories for her own amusement and that of her family’s. Janet Todd tells us that the: “stories are full of anarchic fantasies of female power, licence, illicit behaviour, and general high spirits.” Even at such a young age Jane had a talent for writing. Between 1787 and 1793, she compiled copied of 29 early works into 3 bound notebooks, now known as the “Juvenilia.” The 3 notebooks Jane called “Volume the First”, “Volume the Second” and “Volume the Third”, and they contain 90,000 words. When she was fifteen or sixteen, Jane decided “to write for profit” or in other words, to become a professional writer. At eighteen years of age, she began to write longer and more sophisticated works.

From 1793 to 1795, when Jane was eighteen to twenty, she wrote “Lady Susan”, which is a short ‘epistolary (written in the form of letters) novel, and has been described as Jane’s most ambitious and sophisticated early work. “It is unlike any of Austen’s other works.” The ‘character’ of the novel may have been based in ‘Eliza de Feuillide’ as she inspired Jane with stories of her glamorous life and various adventures. Eliza’s French husband was killed by the guillotine in 1794 and married Jane’s brother, Henry Austen, in 1797.

It seems that Jane had many admirers, some becoming quite close but she refused to give up her independence and marry. At twenty years of age, Jane became good friends with Tom Lefroy. He was training to become a barrister and they would have been introduced at a social gathering of some kind. Writing to her sister Cassandra, Jane writes that Lefroy was a “very gentlemanlike, good-looking, pleasant young man.” The couple became close but Jane wrote again to her sister: “The day will come on which I flirt my last with Tom Lefroy and when you receive this it will be all over. My tears flowed as I write at this melancholy idea.” It seemed that, although they were very fond of each other, marriage was ‘impractical’ because neither had money. In 1798, Lefroy, was still in Jane’s mind as she wrote to Cassandra that, having tea with one of her relatives, she was desperate to ask about him, “but could not bring herself to raise the subject.” A sad episode in Jane’s life.

Jane began the novel “First Impressions” in 1796, completing the initial draft in 1797, when she was 21 years of age. She read the novel out loud to her family and it became an “established favourite.” The novel was published in 1813 as “Pride and Prejudice.” The novel is one of the most popular novels in the English language. It follows the vivacious heroine, Elizabeth Bennet, and the romantic clash between her and Mr. Darcy (her proud beau). Jane’s radiant wit sparkles in this novel as her characters dance a quadrille of flirtation and intrigue. The novel is a superb comedy of manners of the Regency England. One quote from the novel is: “A lady’s imagination is very rapid; it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony in a moment.”

Following the completion of this novel, Jane turned her attention to “Elinor and Marianne” (November 1777-1778) which we know today as “Sense and Sensibility”, which was published in 1811. The story tells of Marianne Dashwood who falls in love with the dashing but highly unsuitable John Willoughby, ignoring her sister Elinor’s warning that her impulsive behaviour will leave her open to gossip. Elinor, on the other hand, is struggling to conceal her own romantic disappointment. The two sisters learn that sense must mix with sensibility if they want to find personal happiness in the society where status and money govern the rules of love. I love this quote from the novel: “I wish, as well as everybody else, to be perfectly happy; but, like everybody else, it must be in my own way.” It was around this time that Jane Austen met her future sister-in-law Eliza de Feuillide, who was a French aristocrat whose first husband (the Comte de Feuillide) had been guillotined during the French Revolution. The description of this execution, related by Eliza, filled Jane with such horror for the French Revolution, that it stayed with Jane her whole life.

During the middle of 1798, Jane started on her third novel “Susan”, which we know today as “Northanger Abbey.” This work was completed about a year later. It tells the story of Catherine Morland and her dangerously sweet nature, her innocence and self-delusion. She is repeatedly drawn into scrapes while vacationing in Bath but blossoms into a discerning woman who learns truths about love, life and literature whilst visiting Northanger Abbey. A lovely quote from this novel is: “There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature.”

In December 1800, Jane moved out of her “comfort zone.” Her father retired, left Steventon and moved the whole family to 4, Sydney Place, Bath. This meant that Jane had to leave the only home she had known which affected her writing. It is possible that Jane had a very busy social life which took up most of her time, but it could be that she was very depressed in Bath and found it hard to ‘start again.’ When her father died, Jane, her mother and sister went from relative to relative until 1809 when Jane’s brother Edward offered the three ladies a large cottage in Chawton village, which was part of Edward’s estate, Chawton House. Jane, her mother and sister moved into the cottage on 7th July, 1809. They settled into their new life, described by Jane’s niece Anna as “a very quiet life, according to our ideas, but they were great readers, and besides the housekeeping our aunts occupied themselves in working with the poor and in teaching some girl or boy to read or write.”

During this Century. It was the norm for a woman to become a mother and wife, but writing was regarded as a ‘secondary form of activity’ but not full-time! A woman had no legal power to sign contracts so Jane published her books anonymously. Jane made £140 from “Sense and Sensibility,” which gave her some financial and psychological independence. During her lifetime her name “Jane Austen” never appeared on her books and she was known “by the author of Sense and Sensibility.” We learn that the Prince Regent admired Jane Austen’s novels, keeping a set at each of his residences. Jane was invited to visit the Prince Regent and, although she did not actually like the Prince, Jane could not refuse the invitation. She did not approve of the Prince’s way of life, his gambling, womanising, drinking and ‘disreputable reputation.’ However, Jane still dedicated her novel “Emma” to the Prince (a hint was given to her to do this by James Stanier Clarke, the Prince Regent’s librarian).

Emma was published in December 1815. It is the story of Emma Woodhouse who is beautiful, spoilt, vain and witty. She tried to organize the lives of the inhabitants in her sleepy village, playing matchmaker, but often with disastrous effect. She is quoted as saying: “I always deserve the best treatment because I never put up with any other.”

Jane became ill in 1816 but continued to write. She finally died on 18th July, 1817, at 41 years of age. Jane Austen was buried in the north aisle of the nave of Winchester Cathedral. In her epitaph, her brother James praise Jane’s personal qualities and mentions the “extraordinary endowments of her mind.” Jane’s achievements as a writer was not mentioned.

“Mansfield Park” was published in 1814. Fanny Price is adopted into her uncle’s household, ASs Thomas Bertram, and grows up as an outsider amongst her cousins at Mansfield Park. When her uncle goes away on business, Mary Crawford and her brother, henry, arrives from London, bringing with them the glamour, the seductive taste for flirtation and theatre which all causes a crisis. One quote from the novel is: “Selfishness must always be forgiven you know, because there is no hope of a cure.”

“Persuasion” was published in 1817, 6 months after Jane Austen died. The story tells us of Anne Elliot, who had been engaged to Frederick Wentworth, but mistakenly listened to her ‘friend’ Lady Russell (who thought she could do better) and called off the engagement. Anne regrets her decision and wonders if she should go back to him when the couple meet again a few years later. She says to him: “You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope --- I have loved none but you.”

Jane wrote about what she knew in her novels --- her own life! There is much within her writings which mirror her own situation in life --- how she lived, who she lived with, where she lived. I personally like Jane’s very accurate ‘record’ of the Regency Era she lived in.

(My research comes from Wikipedia and Goodreads)