Jane Austen
Even Austen Needed an Editor
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that behind every good writer stands a good editor. Jane Austen was no exception, according to a BBC News story that’s been widely picked up by various news outlets. While studying 1,100 original handwritten pages of Austen’s unpublished writings, Professor Kathryn Sutherland of Oxford University found plenty of blots, [...]
Samuel Clemens vs. Jane Austen: Never the Twain Shall Meet?
Mark Twain loved taking stabs at Jane Austen’s work–but did he really hate her as much as he claimed?
What Killed Jane Austen?
Like everything else about Jane Austen, her death continues to fascinate us. Literary scholars and Janeites still wonder about the illness that plagued the author for more than a year before she died at the age of 41 in July, 1817. It was during this time that she finished Persuasion, the saddest and most pensive [...]
How Did Jane Austen Get So Famous?
The Oxford Times has a short interview with Claire Harman, author of Jane’s Fame: How Jane Austen Conquered the World (Canongate Books), a book that I read as part of my Austen Challenge and definitely recommend. Jane didn’t grow popular until decades after her death, but since then her books have remained constantly in print [...]
The Bitch in a Bonnet
Sometimes it takes a guy to remind many of us women what Jane Austen was really about. In his new blog, Bitch in a Bonnet, Robert Rodi, author of satirical novels, explains why Jane Austen is one of his influences and why it pisses him off that he can’t tell people that because she’s widely [...]
