Battle of Waterloo

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Hot off the Presses! ~ Jane Austen’s Regency World Magazine, Issue 74

Be on the lookout in your mailbox! – the March/April 2015 (issue 74) of Jane Austen’s Regency World magazine is published this week and is being mailed to subscribers. In it you can read about:

cover-74

  • The Iron Duke: A major exhibition marks the Duke of Wellington’s triumph at the Battle of Waterloo
  • A Book’s Life: One of the rare books at Chawton House Library reveals all
  • Anyone for Pyms? Barbara Pym, the novelist who was known as the “Jane Austen of the 20th century”
  • Georgian Illnesses: Examining some of the ailments suffered by Jane Austen’s characters
  • From Daylesford to Delaford: Is there a connection between Warren Hastings and Sense & Sensibility?

*Plus News, Letters, Book Reviews and information from Jane Austen Societies in the US, UK and Australia

*To subscribe now click here – and make sure that you are among the first to read all the news from Jane Austen’s Regency World!

[Text and image courtesy of JARW].

c2015 Jane Austen in Vermont
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Jane Austen and Starbucks on a Sunday Morning

Ok, a silly story – but Jane Austen is the reason, so must pass on.

Setting:  Starbucks in Simsbury, Connecticut
Time:  late Sunday morning
Reason:  meeting a friend as I pass through town for a quick cup of tea with a pastry

Order: 2 medium cups of tea, 2 blueberry muffins

Posted Question of the Day:  “In What Country was the Battle of Waterloo fought?”

Prize:  20 cents off each cup of tea

So, I know this answer, say that I do to the young man behind the counter, who eyes me with a quizzical “yea, like pigs fly” look;
 “Yea, where then?” he says;
“Belgium” I say –  he is dumbstruck – says “Not one person has gotten it right all day. ”
I proudly comment to my friend “I know this of course because of Jane Austen” –
She gives me the usual, “Oh here comes the Jane Austen stuff roll-of-the-eyes-look” – the young man looks at me as though I am from another planet – but I can tell he is impressed – “everyone says France” he says…

So I get my 20 cents off, then proceed to bore my friend with the whole tale, that if you read Jane Austen, you then must learn about the Napoleonic Wars even though she frustrates all her readers of a historical bent for not even giving a mention to the fact that England and France were largely at war during her entire lifetime [not to mention those pesky colonies] …

[‘The Line Will Advance’ – Image:  BritishBattles.com]

And one of course must confess that if you have come to discover Georgette Heyer just in order to stay connected to Austen’s Regency times, then you will have read An Infamous Army, which teaches more about the ‘Battle of Waterloo’ than most textbooks on the subject…

So you see how Jane Austen widens your world?! and can save you 20 cents in the bargain?

Copyright @ 2011, by Deb Barnum at Jane Austen in Vermont