Reader’s Digest recommends Jane Austen in motion.
The Graphic Canon, Vol. 2, edited by Russ Kick, has just been released – Pride and Prejudice graces the cover!
Tag: Jane Austen
Guest Post: Janine Barchas ~ A Janecation in Yorkshire? ~ Jane Austen’s Real Wentworths
Gentle Readers: I welcome today, Janine Barchas, associate professor of English at the University of Texas, Austin, where she teaches, perfectly situated you might say, Austen in Austin. She has published a number of scholarly articles on Jane Austen and the just released Matters of Fact in Jane Austen: History, Location and Celebrity (Johns Hopkins UP, 2012). She has graciously offered to share a bit of one of the tales expounded on in her book, the Wentworth family of Yorkshire. I think you will want to know more about her very interesting findings – I highly recommend the book! – and see below for a contest offering from the publisher that starts this coming Friday October 26 [see the blog here: http://jhupressblog.com/ ] – and please comment or ask Janine a question!
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A Janecation in Yorkshire? Jane Austen’s Real Wentworths
Although South Yorkshire may seem an unlikely destination for a Janeite pilgrim, the research for my book Matters of Fact in Jane Austen: history, location, and celebrity (Johns Hopkins UP, 2012) led me to two breathtaking country estates with histories that connect to Austen’s fictions: Wentworth Castle and Wentworth Woodhouse.
I was not tracing Austen’s physical steps, but following some of her leading names—particularly Wentworth, Woodhouse, Fitzwilliam, Darcy, Watson, and Vernon. When Austen selected these surnames for her fictional protagonists, they hung on the real-world family trees of these two neighboring Yorkshire estates. Not unlike the Kennedy family in our own era, the Wentworth clan consisted of high-profile politicians and celebrities—with newspapers assiduously tracking all sightings and London shops selling reproductions of family portraits as cheap paper pinups. Jane Austen, too, seems to have been keenly aware of Wentworth celebrity.
Even a short summary of the history of Wentworth Woodhouse can make an Austen fan sit up with the surprise of recognition. After Robert Wentworth married a rich heiress named Emma Wodehouse, their Yorkshire family so prospered that in 1611 its senior line achieved a baronetcy, just as the owner’s sister married the heir of the wealthy D’Arcy family. The eldest son of that same first baronet was the hapless Thomas Wentworth, first Earl of Strafford and martyr to the royalist cause. With the Restoration, the estate was returned to Strafford’s eldest son, William Wentworth. But when William died without issue in 1695, it transferred to the children of his sister, Anne Wentworth, wife to the head of the Watson family. When in 1751, Charles Watson, heir to these princely estates, succeeded his father as the second Marquess of Rockingham, he became one of the wealthiest peers in England. Charles Watson Wentworth, having added his mother’s maiden name to his own, was twice elected Prime Minister of England. But he died unexpectedly and childless in 1782, just after his second election at age 52. Thus, when Austen was a mere girl, the combined fortunes of the Woodhouses, Wentworths, and Watsons transferred to their next of kin, the Fitzwilliams.
By then, a family feud between Wentworth cousins (Tory and Whig) had resulted in Wentworth Castle. Even the name of the rival estate deliberately taunted the mere “House” six miles away. Major renovations to Wentworth Castle were duly answered with elaborate improvements to nearby Wentworth Woodhouse, shaping English garden design through one family’s political rivalry. The competitive landscaping at these neighboring estates, the bulk of which took place between 1710 and 1790, was a prolonged endeavor that occurred on a grand scale and in the national spotlight. It was in 1791, when Austen was in her teens, that the Wentworth Castle estate and titles were inherited by an obscure gentleman from Dorset named (I’m not making this up!) Frederick Wentworth, making him the third and last Earl of Strafford. When Austen reached her late 20s, Wentworth Castle became the property of young Frederick Vernon after another heated Wentworth-family dispute. The historical circumstances surrounding this contested transfer of Wentworth wealth resemble those in Lady Susan, which features at least two characters named Frederic Vernon as well as a dispute over a family castle.
[Image from wikipedia]
After years of wily namedropping, and perhaps because her contemporary readers would have instantly connected the hero of Persuasion with this glamorous Wentworth family, Austen disclaims in her final novel. She has the sycophantic Sir Walter Elliot sneeringly dismiss any link between Capt. Frederick Wentworth, the story’s self-made naval officer, and the highborn Wentworths from Yorkshire, who held titles such as the Earl of Strafford: “Mr. Wentworth was nobody, I remember, quite unconnected; nothing to do with the Strafford family.” By placing the requisite disclaimer in the mouth of Sir Walter, Austen keeps her own tongue firmly in her cheek. Sir Walter is notoriously unreliable—a narcissistic fop who lacks judgment. Despite, or perhaps because of, Sir Walter’s dismissal, the name of Frederick Wentworth so flagrantly invites contemporary associations that the upending of those expectations (a landless sailor named after one of England’s most famous landowning families?) becomes part of the story’s piquancy and contemporary appeal.
[Image from wikipedia]
Today, both properties are being renovated and have opened their gardens to visitors. Privately owned Wentworth Woodhouse has plans for a spa and hotel by 2015, while the Wentworth Castle Trust (the house is a teacher training college) has already restored the castle folly for which the property is known. In both cases, the grounds and vistas are as stunning as eighteenth-century and regency guidebooks record. While enjoying the picturesque herds of deer that, according to the locals, have roamed there since 1066, I could not help smiling at how the popularity of Austen’s fictional characters—especially Fitzwilliam Darcy and Frederick Wentworth—have succeeded in eclipsing their historical namesakes, casting a Janeite shadow over the once-glittering owners of these estates.
If you’re an Austen enthusiast who has already been to Bath, Lyme Regis, and Chawton, then consider a visit to Wentworth Woodhouse and Wentworth Castle. Meanwhile, I hope that my book takes you partway there.
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For a few photos as well as more information about these and other glamorous places alluded to by Austen, see the JHU Press Blog post by Janine “Jane Austen on Location”: http://jhupressblog.com/2012/09/12/jane-austen-on-location/
Johns Hopkins UP is about to run a small contest that would give away copies of my book to the first few who answer correctly a historical question with an Austen twist. Look for the question on the JHU Press Blog, starting on 26 October.
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About the author: Janine Barchas is the author of Graphic Design, Print Culture, and the Eighteenth-Century Novel (Cambridge UP, 2003), the editor of The Annotations in Lady Bradshaigh’s Copy of Clarissa (English Literary Studies, U of Victoria, 1998), and numerous scholarly works on Austen (search her name on the Jasna.org website here). Her research interests include eighteenth-century literature and culture, the British novel, book history, textual studies, Jane Austen, and early fiction by women. At the JASNA 2012 AGM, she spoke on “Austen Between the Covers: A Brief History of Book Cover Art”, and will be one of the plenary speakers at the JASNA 2013 AGM in Minneapolis, the AGM celebrating 200 years of Pride and Prejudice.
Further Reading:
Wentworth Castle:
- Wentworth Castle website
- Wentworth Castle, a virtual tour by Northern College
- Wentworth Castle Gardens on facebook:
- Wentworth Castle at wikipedia
- Wentworth Castle and Stainborough Park Estate: at Rotherham.co.uk
Wentworth Woodhouse:
And note that The Country House Revealed is a six part BBC series first aired on BBC Two in May 2011 in which British architectural historian Dan Cruickshank visits six houses never before open to public view, and examines the lives of the families who lived there. Wentworth Woodhouse s featured in Episode 4.
All photographs by Janine Barchas.
Please leave any comments or questions for Janine below – and don’t forget to check out the JHU Press blog on October 26, and see if you can answer the Jane Austen question!
c2012 Jane Austen in Vermont
The JASNA 2012 AGM in Brooklyn ~ Part I: My Jane Austen Book Stash
I have not gone missing, though it may seem that indeed I have fallen off the planet – not quite so dramatic though it does almost feel like that – we have sold our house and amidst the joys of house packing, packing up my book business – all gone to storage as we do not have a place to call home – concerns about my son’s surgery, a September 23rd JASNA-Vermont event of grandiose proportions [three speakers, a fabulous afternoon!], and then off to the JASNA AGM in Brooklyn – a lovely respite into the late 18th century from which I am still fighting re-entry! I was hoping to post about the AGM right away and fear I am slowly forgetting about all the fabulous events of Jane Austen Land in Brooklyn – but I shall start today with a booklist of new purchases – the Emporium filled with goodies as usual – and though the lack of a home and the memory of packing all those books forced me into more conservative behavior at the book stalls, I confess that book buying is my only true vice and I could not completely resist, so here are the latest additions to my Jane Austen library:!
Maggie Lane. Understanding Austen: Key Concepts in the Six Novels. London: Robert Hale, 2012. ISBN: 978-0-7090-9078-6
Lane has written a number of Austen-related texts and this book will be a most welcome addition to my collection of her other works. Her essays in Jane Austen’s Regency World magazine are always insightful, often just focusing on a single term and how Austen employs it [for example in the Mar / April 2011 issue, she takes on Austen’s concept of “home”] – in this book, Lane delineates Austen’s 18th century language, clarifying for the reader the meanings of such words as “elegance” and “openness” to “candour” and “gentility” and “mind” and “spirit” – a lively entry into Austen’s world that adds to our understanding and appreciation of what she was really saying to her readers…
Devoney Looser. British Women Writers and the Writing of History, 1670-1820. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2000. ISBN: 0-8018-6448-8
Ashamed to say I do not have this in my collection – so happy to remedy that with this discussion of Lady Hutchinson, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, Charlotte Lennox, Catharine Macaulay, Hester Lynch Piozzi, and Jane Austen and their historically-informed writings… perfect winter reading…
James Fordyce. Sermons to Young Women. Introduction by Susan Allen Ford. Chawton: Chawton House Press, 2012.
ISBN: 978-1-907254-07-9
One of the best-selling conduct books of Jane Austen’s day, Fordyce’s Sermons to Young Women we mostly know as the reading material of the odious Mr. Collins, the words of which Lydia Bennet patently ignored… This is a paperback facsimile of the 10th edition from the Chawton House Library collection, and necessary reading material if one is to understand the world that Jane Austen was writing in – we might laugh at some of the directives for female behavior now and think we indeed have “come a long way baby” – but read it we must to truly “get” Austen… purchase supports the Chawton House Library, and as Susan Allen Ford, JASNA’s intrepid Persuasions editor, has written the introduction, one should just add this to their shelves without further ado…
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Janine Barchas. Matters of Fact in Jane Austen: History, Location, and Celebrity. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2012. ISBN: 978-1-4214-0640-4
“Janine Barchas makes the bold assertion that Jane Austen’s novels allude to actual high-profile politicians and contemporary celebrities as well as to famous historical figures and landed estates…the first scholar to conduct extensive research into the names and locations in Austen’s fiction by taking full advantage of the explosion of archival materials now available online.” [from the jacket]
I had the pleasure of introducing Professor Barchas at her AGM presentation on “Jane Austen Between the Covers: A Brief History of Book Cover Art.” She took us through the last 200 years of marketing Jane Austen through the physical aspect of the book, a long-term project she is working on to create a visual bibliography of Austen’s works. Barchas has given a number of breakout sessions at the past AGMs, always incorporating the graphic and visual aspects of Austen’s world and tying them to her fiction. I am most anxious to read her newest work, and can heartily recommend it…
Claudia L. Johnson. Jane Austen’s Cults and Cultures. Chicago: U Chicago P, 2012. ISBN: 978-0-226-40203-1
Also another must-have for your Austen collection… Johnson “shows us how Jane Austen became ‘Jane Austen,’ an exalted yet seemingly ordinary figure… [by passing] through the four critical phases of Austen’s reception: the Victorian era, the First and Second World Wars, and the establishment of the Austen House and Museum in 1949…” [from the jacket]
Elizabeth Aldrich. From the Ballroom to Hell: Grace and Folly in Nineteenth-Century Dance. Evanston: Northwester UP, 1991. ISBN: 0-8101-0913-1
This book went into a second printing in 2000, so very happy to pick it up. It offers up “a collection of over 100 little-known excerpts from dance, etiquette, beauty , and fashion manuals from roughly 1800-1890, to include step-by-step instructions for performing the various dances, as well as musical scores, costume patterns, and the proper way to hold one’s posture, fork, gloves, and fan…”
Hazel Jones and Maggie Lane. Celebrating Pride and Prejudice: 200 Years of Jane Austen’s Darling Child. Bath: Lansdown Media, 2012. ISBN: 978-0-9573570-0-6
A compact, illustration-filled tribute to P&P, as Jones and Lane “investigate the reasons for its popularity and describe the extraordinary history, reception and afterlife of the phenomenon that is Pride and Prejudice.” [from the back cover]. I was fortunate enough to be purchasing this from publisher Tim Bullamore just as Maggie Lane was at the Jane Austen’s Regency World magazine table – so having it signed by both authors is an additional treat! – and Colin Firth graces the cover, so who could resist!
Sarah Emsley, ed. Jane Austen and the North Atlantic: Essays from the 2005 Jane Austen Society Conference in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Jane Austen Society, 2006. ISBN: 0-9538174-7-4
I had wanted to go to this conference but was alas! unable to, so happy to pick up this collection of four essays – have meant to since 2006 when it was first published…
The Jane Austen Companion to Love. Naperville: Sourcebooks, 2009. ISBN: 978-1-4022-4016-4
This was a lovely gift from Sourcebooks in our AGM bag of goodies…. Filled with quotes from the novels and illustrations by the two Brock brothers – a perfect bedside book…and gift for your favorite Austen-loving friend.
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Several books highlighted at the AGM I already have, so shall give them a mention here as well:
Ava Farmer, a.k.a. Sandy Lerner. Second Impressions. Chawton House Press, 2011. ISBN: 978-1-61364-750-9
Ms. Lerner was at the AGM as a plenary speaker – her talk “Money Now and Then: Has Anything Changed?” – was an interesting analysis of whether Jane Austen was knowledgeable about the issue of money in her novels – will write more about this in another post – but want to mention her book here – she will be coming to Vermont in December to speak at our annual birthday Tea! – and her book will be available for sale, all profits to support Chawton House Library. You can visit the book’s website here: http://www.secondimpressions.us/
Susannah Fullerton. A Dance with Jane Austen: How a Novelist and her Characters went to the Ball. London: Frances Lincoln, 2012. ISBN: 978-0-7112-3245-7
A delight to meet and chat with Susannah, the president of JASA, and author also of Jane Austen and Crime, one of my favorite books on Austen. Here Susannah takes on the Regency ballroom, filled with beautiful contemporary illustrations, and everything you wanted to know about Dance!
Juliette Wells. Everybody’s Jane: Austen in the Popular Imagination. New York: Continuum, 2011. ISBN: 9781441145543
Nearly done with this one – and another must-have for your Austen library: “An investigation of Jane Austen’s popular significance today – why Austen matters to readers, how they make use of her novels, what they gain from visiting places associated with her, and why they create works of fiction and nonfiction inspired by her novels and life.” [from the back cover]
William Deresiewicz. A Jane Austen Education: How Six Novels Taught Me About Love, Friendship, and the Things That Really Matter. New York: Penguin, 2011.
Deresiewicz spoke the evening of the Ball on “Becoming a Hero: Being a Man in Austen’s World” – his book is a delightful journey through the six novels and how his reading of them made him a better man…
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Used Books? – my real downfall, but I only bought two items from the used bookseller Traveler’s Tales, where I usually drop a bit more blunt – I didn’t get to the booth until a few days after the Emporium opened and most items of interest were already gone… but I did find this:
John Gloag. Georgian Grace: A Social History of Design from 1600 to 1830. London: Spring Books, 1967, c1956. – a must have for anyone interested in the architecture and decorative arts of the period – who can resist a book with chapters such as “‘A Dish of Tea’” and “Pray be seated” and “‘The toilet stands dispay’d’” and the like!
And this, a Rowlandson print – you must visit the Jane Austen’s World blog where Vic [my delightful roommate!] shares her purchase of FOUR of these Rowlandson prints!
Here is my one and only: “The Harvest Home” by Thomas Rowlandson (1821)
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…and last but not least, my favorite annual purchase at the AGMs is the Wisconsin Region’s “A Year with Jane Austen” Calender, this for 2013 a celebration of Pride and Prejudice: you can order your own copy here: http://www.jasna.org/merchandise/calendar-2013.html [I purchased a number to sell at our JASNA-Vermont Austen Boutique…]
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More to come about the AGM so stay tuned!
c2012 Jane Austen in Vermont
JASNA-Vermont’s “An Afternoon with Jane Austen” ~ The Perfect Visit by Stuart Bennett
Dear Readers:
Coming up this weekend [Sunday September 23, 2012] is JASNA-Vermont’s “An Afternoon with Jane Austen”: wherein we shall hear about ‘Channeling’, ‘Imagining’, and ‘Dressing’ Jane Austen’. Presentations by authors Elsa Solender (Jane Austen in Love: An Entertainment) and Stuart Bennett (The Perfect Visit) will take us back in time to meet our favorite author! These two sessions will be linked with a talk by our very own Hope Greenberg as she takes us through the stages of “Dressing Jane” in the proper Regency clothing of her day.
Yesterday I posted a review of Elsa Solender’s Jane Austen in Love by Diana Birchall; today I am headlining Stuart Bennett’s The Perfect Visit – Stuart will be talking about his foray into historical fantasy/fiction, where he follows his long career in the world of antiquarian bookselling and scholarly publications on bookbinders and publishers in Jacobean, Augustan, and Regency England. He will ask the audience to consider how much scholarship properly belongs in an historical novel, and what is the right balance between fact and fiction? “Imagining Jane Austen” will focus on these topics, illustrated by short passages from The Perfect Visit. Audience participation is invited.
I append here the various reviews of Stuart’s book that can be found on Amazon – links to my interview with Stuart are at the end of the post.
Hoping you can join us tomorrow to hear Stuart and Elsa each talk about their books!
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*The Perfect Visit starts a little slowly, but I soon became absorbed in the characters and the plot. Who thought time travel would be so complicated? This novel is well written with close attention to detail. The characters are life-like, with clear motivations. One doesn’t have to love Shakespeare and Austen to make this a good read, but it helps. Hope there is a sequel, or another book by this fine author. (Esther Sisler)
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*Finished The Perfect Visit a few days ago. I found it a literate, well-written historical novel of time travel, romance, interesting content on book collecting (accurate for a welcome change), Shakespeare, Jane Austen, and a villain or two. I liked it and was sorry for it to end. But the author left Ned and Vanessa stranded in 1833 London so there can hopefully be a continuation of the story. Hope so… I have often dreamed of buying books in St. Pauls churchyard and Fleet Street in the 1570’s in London. Or visiting Lackington Allen and Co.’s Temple of the Muses in the early 1800s. Well researched; the historical accuracy gives the reader the feel of Shakespeare’s London or of Regency England. Stuart Bennett has been an auctioneer at Christie’s in London, and is the author of books on collecting photography and on English trade bookbindings. He is presently a dealer in rare books. (Richard Cady)
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*Bennett writes with an encyclopedic knowledge of English culture allowing the reader to ‘time travel’ with the wild abandon of a breathtaking game of ‘pretend.’ His expertise on the subject of English culture is dwarfed by his love of the same terrain. Among the many delights of this read are the great descriptions of faces, architecture, wine, meat, landscape and-love! The various dialects from the respective eras are astonishingly distinctive from one another. If you would like to remember how to be seven years old again and also gain enormous insights into these two eras of English history please read and enjoy ‘The Perfect Visit.’ (Sally Christian)
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*Earlier reviews have praised Bennett’s mastery with words, his exceptional evocation of the Elizabethan and Regency periods, his meticulous detailing of the limits both of time travel itself and his invented machine, his fast-moving plot with its ingenious twists. I agree wholeheartedly and will add only that I came away from my reading of The Perfect Visit thinking, “I’m going to miss Vanessa and Ned.” So, for me that’s exceptional character-building, too. But let me speak, very quietly, to the book collector among prospective readers: You are going to be astonished by the absolutely impeccable bibliographic details so casually introduced. For a few of us, Ned’s 1607 bookshop purchases may rival all the derring-do for pure, pure excitement. (Bee Thorpe)
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*I don’t think you have to like Jane Austin (sic), I don’t think you have to be enthralled with jolly old England. I think you will enjoy Stuart Bennett’s delightful time-travel novel if you like the way words can be bent into visions, the way descriptions can create feelings, the way unexpected plot twists can spank your imagination. Bennett is a master with words, and his novel is a perfect visit to a world of wonder, romance and friendship. (Michael Lester)
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*I spent a pleasurable weekend reading Stuart Bennett’s graceful, happy and imaginative THE PERFECT VISIT. For those of us who have daydreamed of finding ourselves walking through Elizabethan London or being in the same room with Jane Austen, this is a delightful means to make real those daydreams, or as real as a well written novel can devise. He gives vivid life to names which have been obscure and dusty and walks us through the streets of London and Bath better than Google maps. Jane Austen and William Shakespeare, of course, are admired for their shaping of the English language. Stuart Bennett meets the challenge of making them the centrifugal forces of his novel with prose that they would enjoy, and, occasionally, recognize. Dear Reader, enjoy! (Sarah Baldwin)
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*For anyone who has read each of Jane Austen’s novels a half dozen times or more, and is looking for something else to read before reading them all again, this is the book! The premise of time traveling turns out to be a marvelous platform on which to present an engaging tale, and to flesh out aspects of Jane Austen’s world which she had no need to describe in detail to her original readers. Stuart Bennett’s descriptions of art, music, popular literature, architecture, manners, the minutiae of apparel (especially feminine apparel), even of equestrian practices, paint a remarkably detailed picture of a particular time and place. As such it provides an valuable complement to Austen’s works. The Perfect Visit is also a worthwhile work of fiction. As the story unwound towards it’s inevitable conclusion, I found myself drawn into the situation of it’s principal characters, a 21st century couple, trapped in the 19th, and living out a scenario which could easily be a plot out of an Austen novel. (Alan Cate)
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*Historical novels provide a form of time travel allowing the reader to meet the characters, customs, costumes, cities and settings which have already created the foundations of our own time, and to imagine what it would be like now if things had turned out differently. Not only does “The Perfect Visit” encompass these traits with charm and depth, but also includes some thought-provoking aspects of the paradoxes of time travel. This is a captivating story, filled with rich historical details dovetailing with adventure and romance. We become embroiled in the world of rare early literary manuscripts and their authors, as the main characters, modern time travelers, learn to adapt to the customs of the past about which they know some things — but not everything. Tying it all together for this reviewer is a delightful musical thread masterfully weaving the present with the past and its future. (M. Woolf)
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*A Perfect Visit, Stuart Bennett’s entertaining new novel about two present-day sleuths who separately travel through time to collect books and manuscripts from the English Regency and Stuart eras, pays homage to readers’ never-ending fascination with Jane Austen and William Shakespeare. Bennett’s thorough appreciation of both authors and their milieu is evident on every page as his characters, Vanessa and Ned, seek out their literary heroes and, of course, run into grave complications that imperil not only their ability to return to “reality” but also their chances of living together happily ever after. Bennett gives his readers a fast-paced narrative filled with unexpected twists–while also perfectly reproducing the tone and quality of the best Regency-period novels. I highly recommend A Perfect Visit to anyone experiencing Jane Austin (sic) withdrawal symptoms. (Rockwell Stensrud)
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So reasons enough to pick up a copy of The Perfect Visit!
You can read more about Stuart Bennett here:
- Stuart Bennett Rare Books
- Longbourn Press
- An interview with Stuart Bennett at Jane Austen in Vermont: Part I and Part II
- You can read an interview with Stuart Bennett by Sheila Markham at ILAB here [and the source for the above photograph]
- You can view a video interview with Mr. Bennett on ILAB here
c2012, Jane Austen in Vermont
Jane Austen in Love by Elsa Solender ~ A Review by Diana Birchall ~ ‘A Light and Lovely Literary Biography’
Dear Readers:
Coming up this weekend [Sunday September 23, 2012] is JASNA-Vermont’s “An Afternoon with Jane Austen”: wherein we shall hear about ‘Channeling’, ‘Imagining’, and ‘Dressing’ Jane Austen’. Presentations by authors Elsa Solender (Jane Austen in Love: An Entertainment) and Stuart Bennett (The Perfect Visit) will take us back in time to meet our favorite author! These two sessions will be linked with a talk by our very own Hope Greenberg as she takes us through the stages of “Dressing Jane” in the proper Regency clothing of her day.
I had reviewed Elsa Solender’s book for the JASNA News [it shall be in the next issue] and so cannot post that review here until it is published, so I have asked Diana Birchall, who read and enjoyed the book very much, to share her thoughts on Jane Austen in Love: An Entertainement.
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A Light and Lovely Literary Biography
The Austenalia, Austenesque, Austen-related fiction field is now so rich and wide that there is something for every taste, passion, and level of knowledge. Jane Austen’s works have always left the reader wishing for more, and by now all her novels have been continued, extended, squeezed and sequelized, transmuted into every possible genre, and almost loved to death by writers and fans of every conceivable skill set and range of imagination and learning. The subject of Jane Austen’s own life and loves has not been neglected, but it is not as commonly treated as those of her fictional characters. Perhaps it is easier to picture to oneself the future lives of Darcy and Elizabeth than it is to write authoritatively and persuasively about the veritable Austen herself, the mysterious and hidden woman of two hundred odd years ago, whose life was never on display, whose relatives burned selected letters and presented a sweetened version of her to the world. A lifetime of study and scholarship leaves one only more deeply aware of just how enigmatic she was. For this reason most modern re-imaginings of her life cannot satisfy – too often they clash wincingly with our own vision, or try to pump up the almost incredibly scantily known romantic aspects of her life into a sensational love story. Only a precious few come close to presenting a plausible enough version to permit us to think that yes, maybe, just maybe, life was like that for Jane Austen.
Elsa Solender’s Jane Austen in Love accomplishes this, and is one of the most valid and satisfying attempted imaginings of Austen’s emotions and interior life – and that of her sister Cassandra, who serves as a natural, if somewhat somber, narrator. Solender has the advantage of lifelong study of Austen, for as writer, editor, and former President of JASNA, she has clearly never branched far away from the Austen tree of knowledge, but has kept it twining around her mind and heart, evergreen. She is also a felicitous, unobtrusive, graceful writer, who wears her great scholarship lightly and is never prosy or dry, but modest and elegant, just as Austen would surely approve. She keeps her fertile imagination closely reined in to the probable, and therefore the reader who wants to see a little more of “what Jane Austen was like,” is given the gift of a delicate and wholly believable version of reality.
Solender has a light touch and a sensitive ability to catch and recreate a tone, a mood, and she displays this winningly throughout. The sober sadness of the older Cassandra is piquantly contrasted with the bright, high spirited portrait of the young Jane in the bosom of her family, each of her brothers lively and inimitable, especially the clever but unstable Henry. Solender artfully intersperses nuggets of literary biography with her sketches, giving us the pleasure of seeing Jane Austen’s family at home, in the act of being themselves. The cast of characters comes to life and disports itself with almost Austenian variety and vivacity: Eliza, Mrs Lefroy, uncles and aunts, are all impressively yet endearingly recalled to life. The light-yet-probable touch is equally imparted to all the romances that touched Austen: the disappointing flirtation with Tom Lefroy, the deeper love for the Sidmouth gentleman, the abortive Bigg-Wither experiment. They are all smoothly stitched into the sampler.
Jane Austen in Love is a charmingly, effectively dramatized literary biography, a lovely book to add to the Austen collection. The only pity is that thus far it is only available as an e-book, when it so well deserves to be on the best shelves and in the best hands. It is a book that you cannot call a labor of love, for it is not laborious. An entertaining effusion of affection, home brewed honey wine for the reader who loves drinking drafts that are sweet and pure, wholesome and sparkling.
About Diana:
Diana Birchall is a story analyst who reads novels for Warner Bros Studios. She is the author of the Jane Austen-related novels Mrs. Darcy’s Dilemma and Mrs. Elton in America, and also a scholarly biography of her grandmother, Onoto Watanna, the first Asian American novelist. Her story “Jane Austen’s Cat” appears in the anthology Jane Austen Made Me Do It, and her several Austen-related plays have had staged readings around the country and in Canada. She has also given many talks on Jane Austen, at such venues as Yale, Oxford, and the Chawton House Library in England.
Thank you Diana! – wish you could be here on Sunday!
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You can read more about Elsa’s book here:
Another review at Austenprose by Aia A. Hussein here:
http://austenprose.com/2012/04/25/jane-austen-in-love-an-entertainment-by-elsa-a-solender-a-review/
Come prepared on Sunday to hear Elsa “channel Jane Austen” – she would sign books available for purchase but alas! as Diana notes the book is only in ebook format at present – but there will be a door prize, so bring your kindle so you can download it right there and then if you are the lucky winner!
More information on Sunday’s event here:
Up later this week: Stuart Bennett’s The Perfect Visit – Mr. Bennett [no relation to that esteemed gentleman Mr. Bennet] will also be speaking at our Sunday event, on “Imagining Jane Austen”… a full afternoon of Jane Austen indeed!
c2012, Jane Austen in Vermont
Winner of the Audiobooks – Austen!…
…is Felicia! – Please email me and I will put you in touch with Elizabeth Rodgers on how to get the free app [if you do not have an iPhone, please let me know and I will draw another name]
Thanks all for responding – I recommend you buy the app for 99c and start listening right away! Visit Audiobook Pop! to order. [Also note that the app will be free on the opening day of the JASNA AGM in Brooklyn – available on October 5, 2012]
[Risa, I will have Ms. Rodgers answer your question.]
Copyright c2012 Jane Austen in Vermont
Jane Austen Audiobooks ~ the iPhone app from Audiobooks Pop! ~ Guest Post by Elizabeth Rodgers
Gentle Readers: I welcome today Elizabeth Rodgers, one of the creators of the “Audiobooks –Austen” app for the iPhone, a veritable Jane Austen anthology just a tap away, as she explains how the app works and what is included, all for a mere 99c!
I have my Jane Austen in every format available to man – multiple hard copies of each novel [remember those space-taking, dust-collecting things?], audiobooks [originally on cassette tapes!, then CDs, then iPod, now iPhone], now on my kindle [I confess shamefaced], and of course the movies, most adaptations to re-view annually… there is no end!
It has been interesting to see the various apps for the iPhone – the books, the games, the audiobooks – all slightly different, just to confuse the user and turn the selection process into a nightmare of choices… audiobooks especially – the narrator being the selling point. I mean who can compare to Patrick Tull reading Patrick O’Brian, or Frank Muller his Great Expectations? – or Jenny Sterlin reading Laurie R. King’s Mary Russell mysteries, and Richard Armitage Georgette Heyer [and though his readings of Sylvester and Venetia, are alas! abridged, they are still worth the price of admission…]. As for Austen, there are any number of options to choose from – some are free, some quite costly – so how to decide?? Well, here is an option that takes some of the confusion and decision-making out of the equation, as you shall see – I highly recommend it! And Ms. Rodgers has graciously offered Jane Austen in Vermont readers a chance for a free giveaway of the new app! – so any questions or comments will make you eligible for the random drawing – see below for details!
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Audiobooks – Austen is a Jane Austen audiobook anthology. For the Jane Austen enthusiast, this is an easy purchase. Not only do you get Emma, Pride and Prejudice and Northanger Abbey, but you also get lesser known stories like Lady Susan, The History of England as well as a biography of Jane Austen by her nephew. Once you buy the app for $0.99 in iTunes, the audiobooks are free. No more CDs, no more paying for each new audiobook download. The narrators in the app are great and you can stream or download audiobooks on the go. And Android users: we’re so close to the Android version — it will be available Fall 2012. The audiobooks included in the app are: –
- Pride and Prejudice
- Emma
- Sense and Sensibility
- Mansfield Park
- Northanger Abbey
- Persuasion
- Jane Austen’s Juvenilia
- Lady Susan
- Love and Friendship
- The History of England
- The Watsons
- Plan of a Novel, According to Hints from Various Quarters
- Memoir of Jane Austen (by her nephew, James Edward Austen-Leigh)
About Audiobook Pop! Audiobook Pop! was founded in 2010 to provide a solution to the following three points of pain:
- buying audiobooks is expensive,
- owning, renting and borrowing CDs can be a hassle,
- being offered thousands of books by other apps is overwhelming.
Audiobook Pop! curates its content and carefully selects only the best narrators so that there is minimal decision-making, ease of use and affordability. Too much choice is not a good thing. I first had the vision for an audiobook app when I took a road trip with my family, including my two young children. There’s nothing wrong with watching DVDs on the road, but I’m determined to raise them as readers. A non-technical person, I partnered with Boisean designer and developer, Mazal Simantov. Together we architected the simplicity and intuitiveness of the app and Simantov created the elegantly simple design. The keys to success were threefold: ease of use, great content, efficient user choice. In February 2011, the first app, Audiobooks For Your Kids, was launched.
Once the original app had been established, we received feedback from users that similar apps with different themes would be well received. To meet that demand, in Spring 2012, we released Audiobooks – Sci-Fi, Summer 2012, Audiobooks – Austen, and up next is an app with global fairy tales and folk tales and then, a Bronte Sisters anthology — Anne, Emily and Charlotte. Users can learn more about Audiobook Pop! and Audiobooks – Austen by following the company on Twitter @audiobookpop and on Facebook for news on current releases and to suggest themes for new apps. We donate a portion of our sales to Librivox.org.
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Thank you Elizabeth for sharing this with us and offering the free giveaway! – I can add that the app is very easy to use and it is quite delightful to have all these works at one’s fingertips!
Please leave a question or comment for Elizabeth by next Sunday September 16, 2012, 11:59 PM – the winner will be announced on Monday September 17th …
Everyone is eligible, or at least all of you with an iPhone, iPad or iTouch, and the Android, the app for which will be available shortly.
c2012, Jane Austen in Vermont
A Jane Austen Weekend! ~ Guest Post by Tess Quinn
Dear Readers,
As many of you as Jane Austen in Vermont blog readers know, The Governor’s House in Hyde Park, Vermont offers Jane Austen weekends throughout the year (you can visit their website to see upcoming events). This past August Innkeeper Suzanne B. held another of her annual Character Weekends, wherein participants are to choose an Austen character from any of her works [alas! only one of each character allowed – who could take an entire weekend with not only one but perhaps FIVE of a fawning Mr. Collins! And one chatty Miss Bates is certainly enough ….] and play the role all weekend, through all the various activities of reading, chatting, needlework, writing, eating, dancing, horse adventures, and sport [the likes of archery and fencing!] – perhaps only giving up the role for a few hours of contented sleep!
This year a full-weekend I could not do, so I went for several hours on the Saturday and had the pleasure of chatting with the various characters, practicing a bit of archery, watching fencing matches, eating a sumptuous Regency-era meal, and dancing the night away with Val and Tom of the Burlington Country Dancers. I came home well-satisfied indeed, and in Jane’s own words, “[I] smiled & whispered to [myself] ‘This [was] a day well spent.'”
One of the guests was Tess Quinn, who recently wrote a post on this blog about her experience at the Jane Austen Festival in Louisville – Tess has kindly offered to write another post about her weekend here in Vermont, along with many fine pictures! Thank you Tess for sharing this with us! [and it was great to see you again!]
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How often have Jane Austen readers wished they could experience Regency life as her protagonists do – at least the romanticized notion of it we derive from her books? I can’t be the only one, or there would not be such a market for the myriad books published that deal with Austen fans, disillusioned with modern society, who suddenly find themselves transplanted in time and place to inhabit the body of an Elizabeth Bennet (e.g. Lost in Austen) or some other early 19th century character – for a day, a month or an eternity. These books and films appeal because, for a little while, they take us away from mortgage payments and term papers and our children’s math homework; they sweep us off into a world our imaginations sketch as more genteel, more polite, less frenetic – more romantic.
Yes, literary time travel has huge appeal, no matter the book genre or historical era in question. Readers well versed in Jane Austen’s society as depicted in her books must ‘experience’ the Regency in their imaginations; for as far as I know, a working time travel machine has not yet been perfected. We cannot practically turn the clock back two hundred years… or can we?
I recently vacationed in Vermont where we came close to doing just that! The Governor’s House at Hyde Park formed a distinguished setting for a gathering of ladies to come together and experience Jane Austen’s era for themselves—or rather, by adopting the personas of her characters for a few days. The Governor’s House (formerly belonging to the gentleman who provided its name, and now a bed and breakfast inn) was built in the Victorian era but as a reproduction of a Colonial house. As such, it reflects both periods in its ambience, yet gives one enough of the ‘feel’ of bygone days to transport one’s mindset to Regency England.
Governor’s House in Hyde Park, Vermont,
the setting for a Jane Austen Character Weekend,
and the whole of the experience was delightful.
We gathered first on Friday evening for introductions, each participant in turn describing something of her background until correctly identified. Most of the books were represented. Present were Elizabeth Bennet and her aunt Mrs Gardiner, along with Miss Charlotte Lucas. Anne Elliot attended in the company of her sister, Mary Musgrove and her friend, Lady Russell; as well as a recently-arrived tenant of Kellynch Hall, Mrs Croft. Eleanor Tilney appeared quite affable in the absence of her father the General. And Emma Woodhouse came, being in company with both her former governess, Mrs Weston and her nemesis, Mrs Elton; as well as a most entertaining trio – Miss Jane Fairfax, Miss Bates and the elder Mrs Bates, the latter making her presence felt all the weekend though she uttered not a word.
Introductions accomplished, we became friends over refreshments, followed by moving to the card tables for an evening of Whist. I was grateful to find myself at one of the less competitive tables; we did not play deep, but we laughed deeply.
As most of us had travelled long that day, we retired after a few rounds, but gathered early on Saturday for breakfast in order to make the most of the day’s activities. We began with a most excellent fencing master, Vivica Fox, who after providing us some historical information on the sport, led the group through the proper positions and stretching exercises.
Throughout the morning, then, Miss Fox gave private lessons to each of us who ventured so boldly. The moves appear so graceful and natural when one observes accomplished fencers; but after many attempts to combine form, technique and strategy all at once in lunges, parries and ripostes, my best accomplishment was a greater appreciation for the skill and difficulty involved. I was highly intrigued by my session, however, and would love to continue my training.
While several took advantage of the individualized fencing lessons, others of us moved to the back garden to take up bows for archery.
I am delighted (relieved) to report that a grand time was had by all, the target often was struck, and no dogs were dispatched.
The morning had begun with a fine hot sun which continued throughout our activities; fans and parasols were employed assiduously. A number of our party, after archery, chose to retire to the shade of a large porch with their books or embroidery, rather than be kept in a continual state of inelegance.
But for some, a short journey to a horse farm brought the next adventure: learning to drive a gig!
The head groom very graciously allowed us to assist in harnessing Judge, an extraordinarily gentle animal (one could hardly call him a beast) – although of course, as ladies we would never perform this task for ourselves in the usual manner of things. We then began by walking Judge around the paddock. This was to become accustomed to working with him, especially for any of us who were no horsewomen. Once each had achieved some comfort with the reins, a lovely small carriage was attached and off we went through a park land of varied prospects. (I must confess that I saw little but the posterior of the horse in my turn, so concerned was I lest I steer poorly and hit a post which might have overturned us.)
Just as we bid adieu to our mount and made to leave, another group from our party arrived for a carriage ride. We bade them a lovely tour and made our way back to the Governor’s House. There we enjoyed a light fare set out by our hostess – since we had breakfasted so early – to tide us over until the dinner hour.
The last hours of our morning were passed again in satisfying retirement on the back porch; for as we all know, to sit in the shade on a fine day, and look upon verdure is the most perfect refreshment. Some ventured to trundle a hoop, or play the Graces. Most found contentment in a cool libation and the company of clever, well-informed people who had a great deal of conversation – the best company!
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Quite soon, it seemed, the time came to dress for dinner and we dispersed to don our fashions.
Our repast for the evening was a full course, enlivened by so much entertaining discourse and laughter that we all remained at the table right up until the arrival of visitors who had been invited to join us for the hour of tea! Mr and Mrs Bennet with their daughter Lydia were presented, the latter immediately pronouncing that what the party required for success was… dancing!
Of course, all were amenable to this particular proposal! Immediately, furniture was shifted and carpets rolled and removed, the music struck up and Mrs Bennet, an accomplished English Country Dance caller (sometimes peculiarly addressed as Val Medve), led us through an evening of dances with only a short ‘supper break’ to regain our breath. Most invigorating, indeed!
When finally the night ended, few I think did not drift into sleep the moment they fell into their beds.
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Sunday dawned as bright and promising as had the previous day. Following our breakfast, some of the party went off to ride, others for a lengthy turn about the estate (such prospects to enjoy) and still others preferred the sedentary nature of their work in the elegant parlour. But soon activity called once more.
Since letters are the lifeblood of communication in the world we were visiting, we learned to cut our own quill pens and then practice our hand, writing letters on parchment. No blotting here! And following this, we employed our fingers in an alternative manner – in learning to tat with yet another master of the art. I should like to boast of having made the sample you see below; but in truth I had not the talent. My fingers did not fly through the string with anything like accomplishment. This is indeed one art in which no excellence can be achieved without constant practice.
Sunday noon found us gathering around the dining table for the last time together. A lovely luncheon may have passed serenely but for the introduction of one final pastime, one perhaps not quite of the Regency period but relating to it. It was a Quiz! Questions to test our newly-experienced knowledge of Regency life. Our hostess had gone to some effort to challenge us and had risen admirably to the occasion. I would like to say we responded in kind; and so I will. Our answers as a rule, when we discussed them collectively, were creative, humorous, clever and entertaining. What matter if they were seldom correct?
This capstone event marked the end of our journey to Jane Austen’s time. When we had laughed our fill, ladies slowly drifted off to supervise the packing of their trunks by their maids. All ventured fare wells to friends old and new amid the exchange of addresses and promises to post pictures at facebook. (Whatever can they have meant by such strange speech?)
I retired to my room as I would not leave until the following morning. There my mind was most agreeably engaged in meditating on the very great pleasure which a gathering of fine characters from the pages of Miss Austen’s novels can bestow.
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About the Author: Tess Quinn (a nom de plume) read Pride and Prejudice years ago at the age of thirteen, and has been hooked on Jane Austen – and Mr Darcy, unsurprisingly – ever since. She has read all the novels multiple times and doesn’t plan to stop any time soon. Some time ago she was introduced to Austen-based fan fiction and, unsatisfied with some of the depictions and approaches, took up her own pen to try to carry on beloved characters in a manner consistent with Miss Austen’s originals. In 2011, her first short story was published in an anthology called A Road to Pemberley. With that encouraging milestone she is hoping shortly to publish another anthology, all her own stories, tentatively titled Pride Revisited. She has two completed P&P based novels (awaiting final edits and a willing publisher); and is nearing completion on her own darling child, a retelling of P&P from Georgiana Darcy’s perspective.
Tess, in her lovely evening dress, is on the left; do you agree that Mrs. Elton is looking rather miffed?? – perhaps we have caught her unawares displaying her displeasure at not being first into the dining room …
c2012 Jane Austen in Vermont
JASNA-Vermont ~ An Afternoon with Jane Austen! ~ September 23, 2012
You are Cordially Invited to JASNA-Vermont’s September Meeting
~ An Afternoon with Jane Austen! ~
~ Former JASNA President Elsa Solender ~
“Channeling Jane Austen”
in Jane Austen in Love: An Entertainment
~ Rare bookseller Stuart Bennett ~
“Imagining Jane Austen”
in The Perfect Visit
~ JASNA-VT’s Hope Greenberg ~
“Dressing Jane Austen”
in the proper Regency fashion of her day
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Sunday, 23 September 2012, 1 – 5 p.m.
Champlain College, Hauke Conference Center, 375 Maple St Burlington VT
~Free & Open to the Public~
Details? Visit our blog at: http://JaneAustenInVermont.wordpress.com
Email: JASNAVermont [at] gmail ]dot] com
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We are pleased to welcome our two Distinguished Authors and one Regency Fashionista for a
full Afternoon with Jane Austen!
The event is co-sponsored by JASNA-Vermont and Bygone Books as part of the Burlington Book Festival.
There will be Door Prizes!
Books will be available for purchase and signing!
Light Refreshments will be served!
Regency dress encouraged!
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Join us for an afternoon of ‘Channeling’, ‘Imagining’, and ‘Dressing Jane Austen’. Presentations by authors Elsa Solender (Jane Austen in Love: An Entertainment) and Stuart Bennett* (The Perfect Visit) will take us back in time to meet our favorite author! These two sessions will be linked with a talk by our very own Hope Greenberg as she takes us through the stages of “Dressing Jane” in the proper Regency clothing of her day.
[*no relation to the esteemed Mr. Bennet…]
We will meet at the Hauke Conference Center of Champlain College on Sunday 23 September, 2012, from 1-5 pm; the visiting authors’ books will be available for purchase and signing; other books relating to Jane Austen and her times will also be offered for sale; and light refreshments will be served. Regency dress is encouraged!
1-2 pm: Elsa Solender: “Channeling Jane Austen”
Who was Jane Austen – really? Was she the chaste, unworldly spinster, mild and religious, who miraculously created six of the world’s most beloved love stories? Or a sharp-eyed ironist whose engaging plot and characters disguise the splinter of ice in her heart that transformed what she saw and heard into subversive criticism of her world that resonates to this day? In her novel, Jane Austen in Love: An Entertainment, Elsa Solender retells the novelist’s own life story, blending missing aspects of her “romantic career” with the sparse known facts. She will describe her search for a voice and style not unlike Austen’s to explore Jane’s inner life as the heroine of her own bright tale.
About the author:
Elsa A. Solender, a New Yorker, was president of the Jane Austen Society of North America from 1996-2000. Educated at Barnard College and the University of Chicago, she has worked as a journalist, editor, and college teacher in Chicago, Baltimore and New York. She represented an international non-governmental women’s organization at the United Nations during a six-year residency in Geneva. She wrote and delivered to the United Nations Social Council the first-ever joint statement by the Women’s International Non-Governmental Organizations (WINGO) on the right of women and girls to participate in the development of their country. She has published articles and reviews in a variety of American magazines and newspapers and has won three awards for journalism. Her short story, “Second Thoughts,” was named one of three prizewinners in the 2009 Chawton House Library Short Story Competition, chosen from over 300 writers who submitted stories inspired by Jane Austen or the village of Chawton. The story was published in Dancing with Mr. Darcy, an anthology of the twenty top-rated stories of the contest, and is part of her new work Jane Austen in Love.
Ms. Solender’s story “A Special Calling” was a finalist in the Glimmer Train Short Short Story Competition, and of more than 1,000 stories submitted, was ranked among the top fifty and was granted Honorable Mention. She has served on the boards of a non-profit theater, a private library and various literary and alumnae associations. Ms. Solender is married, has two married sons and seven grandchildren, and lives in Manhattan.
More information:
- An Interview with Elsa Solender at Jane Austen in Vermont
- Jane Austen in Love: An Entertainment – an ebook at Amazon.com
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2:30 – 3:30 pm: Stuart Bennett: “Imagining Jane Austen”
Stuart Bennett’s foray into historical fantasy/fiction, The Perfect Visit, follows his long career in the world of antiquarian bookselling and scholarly publications on bookbinders and publishers in Jacobean, Augustan, and Regency England. He will ask the audience to consider how much scholarship properly belongs in an historical novel, and what is the right balance between fact and fiction? “Imagining Jane Austen” will focus on these topics, illustrated by short passages from The Perfect Visit. Audience participation is invited.
About the Author:
Stuart Bennett was an auctioneer at Christie’s in London before starting his own rare book business. He is the author of the Christie’s Collectors Guide How to Buy Photographs (1987), Trade Binding in the British Isles (2004) which the London Times Literary Supplement called “a bold and welcome step forward” in the history of bookbinding, and many publications on early photography, auctions and auctioneers, and rare books. He currently lives and works near Boston, Massachusetts.
The Perfect Visit, Longbourn Press, 2011
For more information:
- Stuart Bennett Rare Books
- Longbourn Press
- An interview with Stuart Bennett at Jane Austen in Vermont: Part I and Part II
- You can read an interview with Stuart Bennett by Sheila Markham at ILAB here [and the source for the above photograph]
- You can view a video interview with Mr. Bennett on ILAB here
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4:00- 5:00: Hope Greenberg: “Dressing Jane Austen”
Can one dance comfortably in a corset? Is it true that some ladies dampen their gowns to make them cling revealingly? Must one wear white all the time? Jane Austen’s novels and letters contain many fashion tidbits. Modern films offer their own take on the fashions of the period, but do they get it right? Through a collection of over 400 fashion images we will explore the revolutionary changes in fashion during Austen’s lifetime. Shifts, trains, petticoats, apron gowns, pelisses, spencers, narrow backs, high waists–we’ll see them all. Then together, we will try to solve a fashion mystery.
About the Speaker:
Hope Greenberg holds an MA in History from the University of Vermont where she is currently an Information Technology Specialist in the Center for Teaching and Learning, promoting and supporting the use of technology to further research and education. She is also an avid English Country Dancer. Her fascination with the creation and wearing of historic clothing as a way of gaining insight into the past predates all of these. Her absolute joy at the willingness of historic clothiers to share their insights is matched only by her gratitude to the museums and collectors that increasingly publish examples of extant clothing and fashion plates online so that we may continue to develop our understanding of clothing of all periods.
Hope you can join us for this Afternoon of All Things Austen!
c2012 Jane Austen in Vermont
Hot off the Press! ~ Jane Austen’s Regency World Magazine No. 59
In the new issue of Jane Austen’s Regency World
(September/October 2012, No 59):
- Mansfield Park on tour: a new stage adaptation tours the UK – we speak to the director Colin Blumenau
- Prime Minister killed: marking the bicentenary of the assassination of Spencer Perceval
- Enigma of the Orient: the remarkable tale of Marian Hastings, wife of the British ruler of India
- Brooklyn preview what’s coming up at the JASNA AGM in New York
- Festival experience: regular visitors to the Bath Jane Austen Festival describe their time in the city
Plus … all the latest news from the world of Jane Austen, your letters, round-ups from the Jane Austen Society of the UK and the Jane Austen Society of North America, book reviews and quiz.
To subscribe visit here.
STOP PRESS… Watch out for our new book to mark the bicentenary of the first publication of Pride & Prejudice. Full details will be revealed next week!
[Text and image courtesy of JARW Magazine]
Jane Austen in Vermont 