This is a tad ahead of schedule, but Mark your Calendars!
The Pierpont Morgan Library in New York City will be hosting a Jane Austen exhibit to begin in November 2009:
Jane Austen
November 2009 through March 2010
Jane Austen, Lady Susan, autograph manuscript, written ca. 1793–94 and transcribed in fair copy soon after 1805. The Morgan Library & Museum, Purchased in 1947; MA 1226. |
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This exhibition explores the life, work, and legacy of Jane Austen (1775–1817), regarded as one of the greatest novelists in the English language. During the past two decades, numerous successful motion picture and television adaptations of Austen’s novels have led to a resurgence of interest in Austen’s life and work. This show provides a close-up portrait of Austen, achieving tangible intimacy primarily through the presentation of her autograph manuscripts and personal letters which the Morgan has not exhibited in a generation.
The Morgan’s collection of Austen’s autograph manuscripts and letters is the largest of any institution in the world, and includes the darkly satiric Lady Susan, the only surviving manuscript of any of Austen’s novels. The exhibition will also include first and early illustrated editions of Jane Austen’s novels and letters, as well as contemporary drawings and prints depicting people, places, and events of significance in Austen’s life.
Responding to the revival of interest in Austen’s life and work, the exhibition provides a deeper insight into Austen’s essentially enigmatic character and personality, the craft of writing, and the historical context in which she lived and wrote. The exhibition will explore not only Austen’s personal reading, and the literary influences that inspired and informed her work, but also the response to Austen by later writers as diverse as Scott, Bronte, Nabokov, Twain, Chesterton, and Auden.
[From the Morgan Library website]