Ok, I confess, I am NOT on Twitter, and I hope to stay that way [I figure that with Austenprose and Jane Austen’s World regularly twittering on Austen out there, that might be just about all that cyberspace can handle…] Since Facebook, which I am on, mostly as friends of my children’s friends, seems to now have been taken over by us BabyBoomers, Twitter has become the premier communication tool, at least until something else comes along, next week perhaps. My problem, as all my friends and cohorts will happily tell you, is that I have never been one to keep my sentences short, i.e. I babble endlessly on [often about Jane Austen] and though annoying, most of my friends seem to accept me as I am. Hence, the whole concept of Twitter leaves me, what can I say? –DUMBSTRUCK! Sort of like Haiku – I just don’t get it! Why say something in 20 words or less when you can go on and on so as not to risk being misunderstood?!
A number of years ago, a book called ShrinkLits, by Maurice Sagoff [Workman Publishing, 1980 rev. edition, originally c1970, and STILL in print] offered to the reading masses “seventy of the world’s towering classics cut down to size,” with cartoon-like illustrations by Roslyn Schwartz. Jane Austen does not appear [whatever was Sagoff thinking??!] – but he did reduce Bronte’s Jane Eyre to a few waxing poetic lines:
Jane Eyre Charlotte Bronte
My Love behaved
A bit erratic;
Our nuptial day
Brought truth dramatic:
He had a wife,
Mad, in an attic.
I fled! I roamed
O’er moor and ditch
When life had struck
Its lower pitch
An uncle died
And left me rich.
I sought my love
Again, to find
An awful fire
His home had mined,
Kippered his wife
And left him blind.
Reader, guess what?
I married him.
My cup is filled
Up to the brim
Now we are one,
We play, we swim.
The power we share
Defied all pain;
We soar above
Life’s tangled plain –
He Mr. Rochester,
Me Jane!
[ShrinkLits, pp 44-45]
Ok, so this is funny, as are the other sixty-nine…
Instant Lives by Howard Moss, wonderfully illustrated by Edward Gorey, published in 1974 [Saturday Review Press], is another such book, in which Moss “spins out elegant, erudite, irreverent descants on the lives of the great composers-painters-authors-poets-performers,” [from the jacket] – all lives summarized in no more than two pages. Moss had the good sense to include Austen [the Brontes are all lumped together] – but I have always found this little write-up quite sad, though Gorey’s illustration of Cassandra toasting a marshmallow over the fireplace grate and Jane wandering about the room with the galleys of Sense & Sensibility alone makes the book worth having ~ here is an excerpt:
‘You’re so wordy, Jane,” said her sister. ‘No wonder you have trouble with men.’
Smugness aside, the derogation the remark conveyed was not lost, of course, on Jane.
‘My dear Cassandra,’ she said. ‘Why don’t you polish off these mephitic sweetmeats – it would only make your figure the more bizarre. I have a deadline to meet, you know.’ And with that, Jane swept out of the room, the galleys trailing behind her like a bridal train devised by a couturier impaled upon typography,
But , in Life, there would be no bridal train for Jane Austen.
[Instant Lives, p 4-5]
This seems a tad nasty, don’t you think? And certainly irrelevant to the value of those galleys… but Cassandra does seem to be encouraging less wordiness – the mother of Twitter perhaps…
But I do bring this all up for a reason – there is a new book out called Twitterature [the title = Twitter + Literature] [Penguin, 2009] authored by two University of Chicago students, Alexander Aciman and Emmett Rensin, who obviously have way too much time on their hands – or perhaps not enough time to actually READ the classics they reduce to twenty tweets or fewer [though they do say that it helps to get the humor in the tweet if you have actually read the book, so hopefully they have done so]. They recently set up a Twitter page for the book, so you can follow their continuing adventure in literature reduction.
You can find it in one of two covers:
Penguin UK coverPenguin US cover
I’ve not yet seen the book but understand from reviews that Austen makes the grade – I am curious to know how the authors reduce Jane Austen in the tweeting universe – here is one example:
Elizabeth Bennet muses: It’s as if the less he seems to care about me, the more drawn to him I am. This seems the opposite of how it should be? Oh well.
And a few others to give you the idea:
Sherlock Holmes says: Continuing investigation. Made brilliant deductions on many snorts and very little evidence. Notice salt deposits on factory owner’s shoes?
On the Road has just the one: “For TWITTERATURE of On the Road by Jack Kerouac, please see On the Road by Jack Kerouac.” [Now I would say that for Pride & Prejudice, but I am “prejudiced” you might say…]
[comments from Guardian article]
So I will likely get this book, just for the fun of it and to add it to my collection of literature in short-takes, but I more likely agree with this reviewer from The Wall Street Journal who said:
“Do you hear that? It’s the sound of Shakespeare, rolling over in his grave.”
If adventures will not befall a young lady in her own village, she must seek them abroad….
[Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey]
The holidays and Jane Austen’s birthday! – lots going on – so I offer you a sampling of what’s happening in the New England area [to include New York and New Jersey!], starting with JASNA-Vermont’s very own Annual Birthday Tea next Sunday:
6 December 2009: 2-5 pm
Annual Jane Austen Birthday Tea!
Prof. Philip Baruth * (University of Vermont) “Badly Done Indeed: In Which Austen’s Mr. Knightley is Revealed to be a Whimsical and Emotional Teen Basket-Case”
Featuring ~
~ English Afternoon Tea ~ ~ Classical Harpist Rebecca Kauffman **~ ~ Gift Emporium with Local Artisan Crafts & Austen related Books ~
Place: Champlain College, Hauke Family Campus Center (375 Maple St.), Burlington $15./ person / $5. / student Please register by sending in the JASNA December 2009 dec tea reserve form or leave a comment below
JASNA December 2009 flyer– please let your friends know / post this in your place of work or anywhere else to encourage attendance!
Philip Baruth
* Philip Baruth is a Professor of English at the University of Vermont specializing in eighteenth-century British literature. He is also a novelist and an award-winning commentator for Vermont Public Radio. His most recent novel, The Brothers Boswell (Soho, 2009), is a literary thriller set in eighteenth-century London. It follows James Boswell and Samuel Johnson as they are stalked about the city by Boswell’s jealous and mad younger brother, John. And just recently, Philip stopped writing commentary in order to run for the State Senate from Chittenden County. His campaign website is Baruth2010.com; his blog is Vermont Daily Briefing.
**We are honored to have Rebecca Kauffman join us for this year’s Tea! She is currently principal harpist for the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra, Harrisburg, PA, a position she has held for 29 years. She is also the second harpist with the Reading Symphony Orchestra, Reading, PA, and the former principal harpist with the Lancaster and York Symphony Orchestras, both in Pennsylvania. Rebecca has appeared as the featured soloist on numerous occasions with the Harrisburg and York Symphonies, the Millersville University-Community Orchestra, the Hershey Symphony, the Cayuga Chamber Orchestra in Ithaca, NY, and the Lancaster Chamber Ensemble. She has also performed with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Delaware Symphony Orchestra, Kennett Square Orchestra, Vermont Symphony Orchestra and the Binghamton NY Philharmonic. She has appeared in concert with a wide variety of concert artists. For more information, please visit her website at RebeccaKauffman.com
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Coming in January to Hyde Park, Vermont:
Jane Austen Weekends The Governor’s House in Hyde Park
100 Main Street
Hyde Park, Vermont
Friday – Sunday, January 8 – 10, 2010 Pride and Prejudice Friday evening talk: The Naive Art of Georgiana Darcy
with Kelly McDonald
Friday – Sunday, January 29 – 31, 2010 Sense and Sensibility Friday evening talk: Making Sense of the Regency World
with Suzanne Boden & Deb Barnum
Jane Austen Society of North America- Massachusetts Region Sunday, Dec. 13th, 3 p.m. – 5 p.m. Wheelock College, Brookline Campus 43 Hawes Street, Brookline, Mass.
Celebrating Jane Austen’s Birthday Join us as we celebrate the birthday of “our Jane”! We will enjoy light refreshments, including a birthday toast, and entertainment by the JASNA Massachusetts Players.
Cost is $20 per person ($15 for JASNA Massachusetts members*). Please R.S.V.P. by Tuesday, December 8th
Wheelock College’s Brookline campus is easily accessible. By subway, take the Green “C” line to Hawes Street or Green “D” line to Longwood. See reverse for driving directions. Additional driving and subway info: http://www.wheelock.edu/about/abodirections_brookline.asp
Gore Place, in Waltham, MA, announces its Annual Holiday Tea and Tour with a special theme The Art of Romance in the Austen Era on Dec. 4, 5, 11, 12 and 19. Seatings are at 1 and 3pm. Admission is $40/pp tour included. For details, please visit their website at: GorePlace.org
December 4, 5, 11, 12 & 19Seatings at 1 & 3pm$40 per person, $35 Gore Place members.
Advanced tickets required, call: (781) 894-2798includes special themed tour The Art of Romance in the Austen Era Join us for our annual Holiday Tea a wonderful way to ring in the season! Enjoy a traditional English tea of scones, savory tea sandwiches and assorted sweets all served in the Great Hall and Withdrawing Room of the beautiful 1806 Governor Gore Mansion. After your tea, enjoy a special tour entitled: The Art of Romance in the Austen EraLed by a guide in period dress, you will view sumptuous rooms and hear tales of romance in Austen’s time. The tour is included in your Holiday Tea & Tour admission.Tickets must be purchased at least one week in advance.
To purchase tickets, please call (781) 894-2798. Group rates available.
GORE PLACE
52 Gore Street
Waltham Massachusetts 02453-6866
voice: (781) 894-2798 • fax: (781) 894-5745 • E-mail: goreplace@goreplace.org
copyright 1999-2009 Gore Place Society
Gore Place is an historic house of the Federal period.
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NEW YORK: JASNA-New York Metropolitan Region
[Please note that this event is sold out – to be put on a waiting list, please go to their website at JASNANY.org for information]
Birthday Regional Meeting Saturday December 5, 2009 2:00 p.m. At the Midtown Executive Club 40 West 45th Street, NYC
Dr. Cheryl Kinney will explore the treatment of women’s illnesses in Regency England, including childbirth, infectious disease, and venereal disease. We will learn who provided health care in the early 1800s in England and the treatmentsavailable. Dr. Kinney will also discuss sickness and health in Austen’s novels.
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JASNA-NY is fortunate to have The Morgan Library & Museum right in their midst!
The JASNA-NY Metro Region has a number of special events coming up in conjunction with the Jane Austen exhibit at the Morgan. The Region has been working with the Morgan education department to develop some of these programs (see below for details). [In case you have been living in a bubble for the past few months, visit the Morgan Library & Museum website for information on this exhibit!]
In addition, JASNA-NY is co-sponsoring two events: A preview of the new Masterpiece Classic’s Emma and a panel discussion “From Gothic to Graphic” [see below]
All programs will be held at The Morgan Library & Museum
225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, NYC
At the Morgan: A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life & Legacy November 6, 2009 – March 14, 2010
Public Programs:you must register with The Morgan directly
Gallery Talks:
Friday, February 26, 7 pm
A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life and Legacy
Clara Drummond, Assistant Curator, Literary and Historical Manuscripts, The Morgan Library & Museum
Lectures and Discussions:
1. A preview of MASTERPIECE Classic’s Emma with Rebecca Eaton
January 20, 2010 [Wednesday] 6:30 PM*
Join MASTERPIECE executive producer Rebecca Eaton for a sneak preview of scenes from the new four-hour adaptation of Jane Austen’s Emma, starring Romola Garai, Jonny Lee Miller, and Michael Gambon. Emma will be broadcast on three Sundays beginning January 24, 2010 on PBS/Thirteen (www.pbs.org/masterpiece). This event is cosponsored by the Jane Austen Society of North America, New York (JASNA-NY).
Tickets: Tickets are free. For advance reservations call 212.685.0008, ext. 560, or email tickets@themorgan.org.
2. From Gothic to Graphic: Adapting Jane Austen Novels
January 26, 2010 [Tuesday] 6:30 PM*
Jane Austen’s works continue to inspire new generations of writers working in popular literary genres. In a lively presentation, authors of recently published books discuss their unique twist on Austen with Juliette Wells, Manhattanville College. Participants include Ben Winters and Jason Rekulak (Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters), Jane Rubino and Caitlen Rubino-Bradway (Lady Vernon and Her Daughter), and Nancy Butler (Pride and Prejudice graphic novel). This program is cosponsored by the Jane Austen Society of North America, New York ( JASNA-NY).
Tickets: $15 for Non-Members; $10 for Morgan and JASNA-NY Members
*The exhibition A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life and Legacy will be open at 5:30 pm especially for program attendees.
3. Reading Jane Austen, with Patrice Hannon
Wednesday, January 27, 3-4:30 pm: Pride and Prejudice
Wednesday, February 10, 3-4:30 pm: Emma
Wednesday, February 24, 3-4:30 pm: Persuasion
Patrice Hannon, author of Dear Jane Austen: A Heroine’s Guide to Life and Love and 101 Things You Didn’t Know About Jane Austen, leads a reading group on three of Austen’s most beloved novels. The group will closely examine the texts of Pride and Prejudice, Emma, and Persuasion, paying particular attention to matters of style. Sessions will take place in the historic family rooms of the nineteenth-century Morgan House. The group will be reading from the Penguin Classics edition of the novels. Light refreshments will be provided. Advance tickets are recommended as space is limited. Patrice is also a JASNA-NY member.
Tickets (3 sessions): $45 for Non-Members; $35 for Members
Films:
1. Jane Austen on Screen:
To coincide with the exhibition A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life and Legacy, the Morgan is screening two acclaimed cinematic adaptations of Austen’s literary masterpieces.
Sunday, January 24, 2 pm Pride and Prejudice (1940, 118 minutes)
Director: Robert Z. Leonard
All the wit and wisdom of Jane Austen’s popular comedy of manners is vibrantly brought to life in this classic film adaptation starring Greer Garson as the spirited Elizabeth Bennet and Laurence Olivier as the arrogant and dashing Mr. Darcy.
Friday, February 12, 7 pm Sense and Sensibility (1995, 135 minutes)
Director: Ang Lee
Emma Thompson received an Academy Award for the screenplay of Ang Lee’s feature adaptation of Jane Austen’s novel about two sisters-pragmatic, ironic, Elinor (Thompson) and passionate, willful Marianne (Kate Winslet)-and their struggle to find romantic happiness in a society obsessed with financial and social stature. Hugh Grant (Edward Ferrars), Alan Rickman (Col. Christopher Brandon), and Greg Wise (John Willoughby) round out the superb cast.
Films are free with museum admission. Tickets are available at the Admission Desk on the day of the screening. Advance reservations for Morgan Members only: 212.685.0008, ext. 560, or tickets@themorgan.org.
Music and Dance:
Friday, March 12, 7-8:30 pm Dancing with Darcy
To celebrate the final weekend of A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life and Legacy travel back to Regency England for an evening of period music and dancing in the Morgan’s elegant Gilbert Court. Join Beverly Francis and Country Dance * New York for an English country dance demonstration, audience participation, and live music. Free.
Family Programs:
1. Sunday, December 6, 2-5 pm Winter Family Day Celebration Join us for our annual family day celebrating the exhibitions A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life and Legacyand Charles Dickens’s Christmas Carol. Travel back to the days of the English Regency with art workshops that will bring Jane Austen’s fashion sense to life. Then move on to Victorian London to meet Charles Dickens and his famous characters through the original play Goblins, Ghosts, and Geezers: The Making of Scrooge*, improvisational skits, and other activities. Marianna Loosemore will be reading “My Beautiful Cassandra” while Nili and Jerry will be talking to children about life in J.A.’s time.
For a complete schedule, visit http://www.themorgan.org. All events are included with admission to the Morgan.
*There will be two performances of Goblins, Ghosts, and Geezers: The Making of Scrooge at 2:30 pm and 4 pm. Tickets will be distributed on a first-come, first-served basis on the day of the program.
2. Saturday, February 6, 2-4 pm Paper Dolls at the Ball: Jane’s Fashion for Kids
To coincide with A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life and Legacy educator Deborah Lutz leads a workshop that begins with a short tour of the exhibition that features a series of humoristic prints illustrating the extravagances of fashionable ladies and gentlemen of Austen’s time. Children will design evening costumes for women or men using paper doll templates, a wide variety of quality decorative papers, and colorful trimmings. Appropriate for ages 6-12.
Tickets: Adults: $6 for Non-Members; $4 for Members; children: $2
And finally, also note that the Morgan currently has the following noteworthy exhibits that will be closing in early January:
1.William Blake’s World: “A New Heaven Is Begun” September 11, 2009, through January 3, 2010
Drawn from the Morgan’s extensive holdings of works by William Blake (1757–1827), this exhibition is the museum’s first more than twenty years devoted to the breadth of his literary accomplishments and artistic influence. See online exhibition
2. Rococo and Revolution: Eighteenth-Century French Drawings October 2, 2009, through January 3, 2010
Rococo and Revolution: Eighteenth-Century French Drawings features more than eighty exceptional drawings almost exclusively from the Morgan’s renowned holdings. Artists represented in the exhibition include Antoine Watteau, Jacques-Louis David, François Boucher, and Jean-Honoré Fragonard, among others. See selected images from the exhibition
3. Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol November 20, 2009, through January 10, 2010
Dickens’s original manuscript of A Christmas Carol, on view in Mr. Morgan’s Library, serves as the centerpiece of the Morgan’s holiday programs.
CONNECTICUT: there are a few interesting exhibits at the Yale Center for British Art in New Haven of interest to fans of Jane Austen: [see the Center’s website for more information]
Mrs. Delany and her Circle 24 SEPTEMBER, 2009 — 3 JANUARY, 2010
This exhibition will explore the life, world and work of Mary Delany, née Mary Granville (1700 – 1788). Though best known for her almost one thousand botanical “paper mosaics” now housed in the British Museum, which she began at the age of 72, Mrs. Delany used her craft activities to cement bonds of friendship and negotiate complex, interlinked social networks throughout a long life passed in artistic, aristocratic, and court circles in Georgian England and Ireland.
Through landscape drawings, paper cuts and collages, textiles, and manuscript materials, the exhibition will show the range and variety of Mrs. Delany’s art. Among her most extraordinary efforts was a court dress embroidered with a cascade of naturalistic flowers, which united her interests in floriculture and fashion. Parts of this dress have recently been rediscovered and will form the center of a reconstruction of Mrs. Delany’s world. Her art work will be shown in the context of natural history, which informed and underpinned her productions. Shells, corals, botanical drawings, and publications related to the collections of the 2nd Duchess of Portland, with whom Mrs. Delany lived and worked alongside, will also form part of the exhibition, allowing viewers to reattach the vital threads connecting female accomplishment and the pursuit of science in the eighteenth century.
Mrs. Delany and Her Circle has been co-organized by the Yale Center for British Art and Sir John Soane’s Museum. It will be accompanied by a major publication that will serve as an exhibition catalogue, and will contain essays addressing many aspects of Mrs. Delany’s life, craftwork, and letters in the wider context of eighteenth-century culture. [The Center is the only U.S. venue for this exhibition.]
Horace Walpole (1717 – 1797) was the youngest son of Robert Walpole, first earl of Orford and prime minister under both George I and George II. Horace’s birthright placed him at the center of society and politics, and of literary, aesthetic, and intellectual circles. His brilliant letters and other writings have made him the best-known commentator on social, political, and cultural life in eighteenth-century England. In his own day, he was most famous for his personal collections, which were displayed at Strawberry Hill, his pioneering Gothic-revival house on the banks of the Thames at Twickenham, outside London, and through which he constructed narratives of English art and history.
This groundbreaking exhibition seeks to evoke the breadth and importance of Walpole’s collections at Strawberry Hill by reassembling an astonishing variety of his objects, including rare books and manuscripts, antiquities, paintings, prints and drawings, furniture, ceramics, arms and armor, and curiosities. These will be drawn from international public and private collections as well as those of the Center and Yale’s Lewis Walpole Library in Farmington, Connecticut.
Horace Walpole’s Strawberry Hill has been organized by the Center, The Lewis Walpole Library, and the Victoria and Albert Museum. The exhibition will be accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue with contributions by an array of distinguished international scholars. [The Center is the only U.S. venue. The exhibition has been generously supported by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. ]
Please join JASNA Central New Jersey for a birthday toast to Jane Austen at the Cranbury Inn, 21 South Main Street, Cranbury, New Jersey on Saturday, December 5, 2009 from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Celebrate Austen’s 234th birthday, plan and discuss the year’s upcoming programs, and share our love of all things Austen. Should you be so inclined, please feel free to bring a short reading selection of your choice to get us all in the spirit. [ See their website for more information.]
[For events in your area, visit the JASNA.org website for other regional news]
So here are a few random thoughts for holiday gift giving ~ either for yourself [forward this blog post as a subtle hint to your family and friends] or for your favorite Austen fan:
1. Jane Austen’s Regency World magazine ~
Every issue is a lovely gift in my mailbox! One can get all sorts of Regency / Austen data on the internet nowadays – but there is still nothing like a journal such as this, filled with glorious pictures, well-written articles, book reviews, etc. that you can HOLD and keep and shelve along-side all your other Austen titles…
A quick summary of the latest issue [Nov/Dec 2009, Issue 42] which sports Jonny Lee Miller and Romola Garai on the cover ~ stars of the new BBC Emma that we in the States are anxiously awaiting to be broadcast in January [sigh!]. Inside, there are many pictures of the show to keep us satiated until then, and a fine story by editor Tim Bullamore on various behind the scenes goings-on.
And lots of other goodies:
A guest essay by Sue Wilkes on “why we must not forget the real Regency” with our focus on the “glittering lifestyles of the elites of Bath and London” we too often lose sight of the majority lower classes and the very real issues of hunger and poverty [Ms. Wilkes is the author of Regency Cheshire, another item for your gift-giving -.]
Sheryl Craig, on “An Austen Christmas” – a picture-packed [all from The Lewis Walpole Library of Yale University] article on the festivities in Austen’s pre-Victorian England, complete with allusions to the holiday as mentioned in the novels and her letters
Maggie Lane, also a regular contributor, never disappoints and here is another thought-provoking article on widows in Austen, “Not the Only Widow in Bath.” Lane points out that the new book Jane Austen and Marriage by Hazel Jones [excellent book, and yet another gift idea!] has chapters on all aspects of female existence in the Regency period – all that is except widowhood – think Mrs. Norris, Lady Catherine, Mrs. Smith, Mrs. Clay, Lady Russell, Mrs. Bates, Mrs. Jennings, and others – all widows with a unique status in their world. Fabulous article…
A special in this holiday issue ~ author Carrie Bebris with “A Midwinter Night’s Dream, a Mr. and Mrs. Darcy Mystery” – “On the stillest eve of January, Pemberley was alive with merriment. So, too, was its master…” – and so it begins – I can tell no more…(!)
This month, the column “My Jane Austen” is by Eileen O’Higgins, the actress who plays Miss Martin [Robert Martin’s sister] in the new Emma – this is always fun to read – how someone started on the road to reading and loving Austen – we each of us has a great tale to tell!
The JASNA contribution by Elaine Bander [President of JASNA Canada] is about the tour “Houses of Jane Austen” she was fortunate to take when in England this year for the Chawton Conference. And Marilyn Joice of the JAS highlights the events of their annual conference in “Dancing in Kent”
Photographs and round-up of September’s annual Jane Austen Festival in Bath
The always insightful “Book Reviews” by Joceline Bury
And the usual pack of news on “all things Austen”, letters to the editor, “what made the news in 1801,” – even the ads are lovely!
Upcoming issue: Sex in the City; Bursting the Bubble; Figures of good in a difficult world; Meet Jane’s publisher, etc. – intrigued?
See the Jane Austen’s Regency World website, where you can subscribe [UK 33. / everywhere else 38.70, though there are discounts for JASNA members]
2. Oxford University Press has again put its 6-volume Oxford Illustrated Jane Austen on sale for $61.25. [regularly $175.] This is the 3rd edition based on collation of early editions by R.W. Chapman – all six hardcover volumes have dust jackets and feature early 19th-century illustrations and Chapman’s detailed explanatory notes. This set is still the definitive edition used for citation – [though likely to change at some point to the new Cambridge texts] – but this is a must-have for everyone’s Austen shelf.
There has of late been more interest in this early “novel” of Austen’s [helped perhaps by Laurel Ann at Austenprose and her efforts to get the entire Austen world reading / re-reading Lady Susan this past year! – if you haven’t followed this on her blog, you can do so at your leisure …] – why it has not made it into BBC’s bonnet brigade I don’t know – just playing Lady Susan would I think be every actress’s dream role! But as for a gift – a lovely and interesting “copy” of Austen’s seventh “novel” has appeared on the scene – a tad pricey at $139.99 [see the website for discount code], but you can certainly put it out there and beg for everyone you know to chip in together! ~ and a “novel” idea to create a box of actual letters for those works written in the epistolary format. See the website of London Publishing House for details.
4. The illusive BBC Sense & Sensibility from 1971 starring Sheila Ballantine, Joanna David, Robin Ellis, Clive Francis, Michael Aldridge and Patricia Routledge is now available at Collectables Direct [there are other Austen items here – mostly videos, but also a bookend, necklace and music]
5. Jane Austen, the Complete Novels from Naxos Audiobooks [also includes The Watsons and Sanditon ]– 69 cds and more than 80 hours of listening enjoyment – certainly enough for a long cold winter: [$270. / set; or $170. for the download – yikes!]
Sense and Sensibility (11 CDs), read by Juliet Stevenson
Pride and Prejudice (11 CDs), read by Emilia Fox
Mansfield Park (14 CDs), read by Juliet Stevenson
Emma (13 CDs), read by Juliet Stevenson
Northanger Abbey (7 CDs), read by Juliet Stevenson
Persuasion (7 CDs), read by Juliet Stevenson
Lady Susan (2 CDs), read by Harriet Walter, Kim Hicks, Carole Boyd and cast [how perfect does this sound?!]
The Watsons and Sanditon (4 CDs), read by Anna Bentinck
It comes in a handsome, durable 69-CD box-set (accompanied by a full set of notes)
-Go to the NAXOS Audiobooks website; and scroll down for a link to an 8 minute podcast of actress/reader Juliet Stevenson on Jane Austen
[as an aside: Naxos has announced the April release of Richard Armitage reading Georgette Heyer’s Venetia. You can pre-order this now. It is, sadly, like his reading of Sylvester, abridged, which usually makes me just cringe; but as one blogger so eloquently put, who, with Mr.Armitage reading, is really listening to the words anyway? – I loved hearing him read Sylvester – I just had to go out and buy the book to fill in the blanks…]
[available for pre-order on Amazon – or show a little patience, give a gift certificate and download it from NAXOS when it becomes available in April]
6. Merchandise from JASNA Regional Chapters: see the JASNA website for a listing of available Austen-themed gifts, from 2010 calendars with Brock prints, to puzzles, chocolate, and prints! And support a JASNA region at the same time!
2010 Calendar - Wisconsin Region
7. a Jane Austen Jigsaw Puzzle at Bas Bleu for $14.95 and quite the challenge with 500 pieces!
Ok, done shopping for one evening – my budget is sorely depleted and this is just a start on all the possibilities to fill your gift-lists ~ more to come!
A triple series of Janeite interest in the Pierport Morgan Library & Museum’s Austen Exhibit —
From Janeite Hope:
From now until March 14th the Morgan Library and Museum is exhibiting “A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life and Legacy.” According to the website, the exhibition “explores the life, work, and legacy of Jane Austen (1775–1817), regarded as one of the greatest English novelists. Offering a close-up portrait of the iconic British author, whose popularity has surged over the last two decades with numerous motion picture and television adaptations of her work, the show provides tangible intimacy with Austen through the presentation of more than 100 works, including her manuscripts, personal letters, and related materials, many of which the Morgan has not exhibited in over a quarter century.”
There is an online exhibition that includes images of pages from the manuscript of “Lady Susan” along with a short documentary film commissioned for the exhibit. The film contains brief interviews with several writers, scholars, and actors (you’ll recognize Harriet Walker – Fanny Dashwood in the Thompson Sense and Sensibility). Though the interviews are interesting, what I like best about the documentary is watching the participants handle Austen’s letters and manuscripts. Bit of a vicarious thrill, there.
I’d never been to the Morgan, so I’m glad to have discovered it. There was a little film showing downstairs in the theater to introduce the JA exhibit. It had a variety of people giving their thoughts about the letters. It was ok, but seemed like rather a stretch to pad the exhibit and not particularly valuable. And it bothered me a bit to see someone actually handling the letters. They were also playing the movie, none too quietly, in the actual exhibit room which I found annoying because at that point I wanted to enjoy looking at the letters undisturbed.
They were hard to read, of course, but one could read much of it, even with cross writing and that was nice. Seeing the actual “JA” was a thrill. I was surprised that one letter had the JA squished right down to the edge of the paper and the “a” was a large lowercase a, not the one we think of as her signature and which was on everything else.
There were period copies of the books she would have read and some delightful period satirical illustrations, but what I liked best was a letter she’d written to a youthful Cassy. It would have been better if the presenters hadn’t “translated” it for us because that was the fun. I felt that I gained some insight into J’s character from seeing how she wrote this to a child and also that she was able to form the words as smoothly as if they had been familiar letters sequences. I shall have to make up my own text, but it will give you the idea of her “code”.
Read Yssac,
Ew Era ta emoh yadot dna ti si gniniar. Spahrep ew lliw eb elba ot og rof a egairrac edir siht noonretfa. I ylniatrec epoh os esuaceb ereht era ynam sgniht ew dluohs tisiv erofeb ew evael Thab.
Rouy gnivol tnua, Enaj
Now, wasn’t that fun! It’s much harder than simply writing backwards, especially the capitalization. Now I have to wonder if she thought it up herself.
from Janeite Bonnie:
JUST WANTED TO LET YOU KNOW:
Last night, I went to the Morgan Library and Museum’s exhibition “A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life and Legacy”, and, oh, what I saw!! I didn’t know that the Morgan holds the world’s largest collection of Austen’s letters, 51 of the 160 known ones. The curators trotted out many of the more well-known letters, and it was thrilling to see them in the original hand. Among the Austenalia I got to examine:
–cross-hatched letters and letters with lines excised by Cassandra
–the backwards letter to her niece Cassy
–the letter in which she writes of the gentleman on which she “once doated”
–the letter in which she writes of having a shaking hand from having drunk so much wine, and mentions the woman with the diamond bandeau, pink husband, and fat neck, and James Digweed having made a gallant remark about the two elms falling down in grief over the absence of Cassandra (a particularly enjoyable letter, and dated November 20–serendipitously read by me 209 years to the day later)
–the letter in which she drew the pattern of the lace for her new cloak
–the letter in which she asks Cassandra to tell Fanny that she has found a portrait that looks “excessively like” how she pictures Mrs. Bingley
–the page on which she sums up her expenditures for a year
–her satirical “Plan of a Novel” (very difficult to read)
–Cassandra’s letter to Fanny describing Austen’s last days and her death
–some pages of the manuscript of “The Watsons” with much editing
–some pages of the manuscript of “Lady Susan” (of which the Morgan holds the entire manuscript)
–James Stanier Clarke’s letter to Austen, in which he tells her that it is not *incumbent* on her to dedicate her next novel to His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, but…
–first editions of all six novels, including the spines of a three-volume set of “Emma” with the price on the original labels
–one of the books that Austen owned, “The Spectator”, with her signature and “Steventon” inscribed inside
There was other material on display related to Jane Austen, such as books by Richardson and Cowper, a copy of “Camilla” open to the page of subscribers where “Miss J. Austen, Steventon” is listed (believed to be the only time her name was in print before her death), Walter Scott’s original journal open to the page of his comment about Austen’s “exquisite touch” versus his “Big Bow-wow strain”, material by Yeats, Nabokov, and Kipling, an edition of Pride and Prejudice with a preface by George Saintsbury (he who coined the term “Janite”, now “Janeite”), and, to top it off, original prints by James Gillray interspersed among Austen’s letters to punctuate some of the trenchant comments she made in them.
As a little bonus, on the way out I stopped by Mr. Morgan’s library and took a peep at the original 1843 manuscript of “A Christmas Carol” and one of the three Gutenberg Bibles (1455) in the Morgan collection.
All I can say is, I’m so thankful for the Morgans’ use of their money in this manner.
in a second email, the following wonderful & exciting tidbit was added:
I have one more thing to tell. It happened during the question-taking portion of the gallery talk. One of the enthusiasts in the crowd questioned Declan Kiely, the curator of the exhibition, about the attribution of one of the documents — a scrap attributed to Jane Austen, with the titles of all her novels. The woman questioned whether it was actually Jane Austen who had written it, as the title “Persuasion” was listed, and she thought that that was the title Henry had given it after Jane’s death, and that she had always called it “The Elliots”. I had read that too, but I wasn’t sure that it had not been settled on before her death, as there are other theories out there.
Afterwards, a few of us compared it with the note that she wrote summing up some profits from her books, which was in the same frame, and we saw that the capital P’s didn’t match. However, now that I see the “Profits” scrap close up on the Morgan website, I do see two different ways that Austen wrote capital P on the same scrap
(See the P in “Mansfield Park”, then compare it to the P in “Profits from Emma” quite near the blot of ink.)
If it is the case that Jane Austen habitually wrote her capital P two ways, then the scrap with all the titles of her novels that is attributed to her would confirm that she intended the title of her last novel to be “Persuasion”, and all the speculation should be laid to rest.
I think it will require another trip to take a closer look and see if there are similarities of script in Cassandra’s letter to Fanny, and look for capital P’s in all of Jane Austen’s other letters…
I don’t know if people are aware of this, but the Morgan has no entrance fee from 7:00 PM and 9:00 PM on Fridays.
Ever wonder what happens to all those books and manuscripts that show up at auction and then disappear somewhere into the ether, briefly looked at wistfully in the catalogue and then only something you file away in your bibliographic memory chip?? I know I do this with all the Jane Austen materials [see the post my Bygone Books blog for the latest Austen titles on the block ]
The recent Bloomsbury Auction, The Paula Peyraud Collections: Samuel Johnson and Women Writers in Georgian Society [New York City, 6 May 2009] [click here for the catalogue and auction results] was of great interest to collectors and readers of 18th and early 19th century women writers. A recent article by Dr. Maureen E. Mulvihill (Princeton Research Forum, Princeton, NJ), titled “Literary Property Changing Hands: The Peyraud Auction (New York City, 6 May 2009)” [Eighteenth-Century Studies, vol 43, no. 1 (2009) pp. 151-63…..] sheds light on this world of auctions and book collecting, and tells us who bought many of the lots and where they are now to be found. As Dr. Mulvihill writes, “the sale was a dramatic validation of continuing interest and commercial investment in cultural property of the Georgian period, especially its women writers.” [p.152]
The sale consisted of 483 lots, mostly books, manuscripts and letters, but also many visual works of art somehow relating to the authors Ms. Peyraud collected. [The dominant figures in the collection were the women writers of the era: Frances Burney, Hester Thrale Piozzi, the Bluestockings, Maria Edgeworth, Jane Austen and the Brontes; but also several male writers: Samuel Johnson, Alexander Pope, Edmund Burke, David Garrick, Horace Walpole, and Lord Byron.]
The article also gives some history of Paula Peyraud [1947-2008] and the depth of her collection [the auction barely scratched the surface it seems…], and this alone is a compelling story of the habits of a woman collector.
My interest here is largely with the Jane Austen lots in the auction [see my post on this auction here], and unfortunately, although the results of the auction are available online [see below as well as my previous post], the five lots of Austen works seem to have been purchased by private collectors and are undisclosed. And the one Austen-related piece of art, a miniature of Elizabeth Bridges, Austen’s sister-in-law, remained unsold.
Pride and Prejudice-1813- 3 volumes Carysfort copy: [$20,000-30,000] – $26,000.
Sense and Sensibility-1811- 3 volumes: [$25,000-35,000] – $38,000. [or $46,360. with premium]
Austen aside, it is fascinating to see how many of the other lots are now in Library collections, and thus available for research purposes: The British Library, Dr. Johnson’s House, the University of Manchester, McGill University [10 lots of Frances Burney materials], the Houghton Library at Harvard [Johnson and Hester Thrale], the Morgan Library, New York Public Library, the University of Pennsylvania Rare Book Library, Princeton University [Maria Edgeworth], Vassar Library [Burney], and Yale University Beinecke Library [Yale acquired the “star of the show” for $140,300. – 8 volumes of Hester Thrale Piozzi’s heavily annotated copy of The Spectator.] Harvard purchased the most lots, and a Zoffany full-length portrait of Hester Thrale [lot 379] was the second highest sale at $58,560.
[from the Bloomsbury Auction Catalogue]
See the full article at this link at Bloomsbury Auctions: [prices in the article reflect hammer prices and premium]
Just added: Dr. Mulvihill’s February 2010 article “Captured by Jane” on the Morgan Library’s Jane Austen exhibition is in the online magazine of the Jane Austen Centre. If you did not get to see this wonderful exhibition last year, this is the next best thing to being there… you can view the article here.
JASNA-Vermont will be giving away a copy of Dancing with Mr. Darcy, the short story anthology from Chawton House Library, published by Honno Press ~ please post a comment by Saturday November 14, 2009 to qualify. Author Lane Ashfeldt will send the book to the winner directly ~ see the following posts to comment:
Dancing with Mr Darcy: Stories inspired by Jane Austen and Chawton House Library
Selected and introduced by Sarah Waters
Honno Modern Fiction, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-906784-08-9
UK £7.99 [paperback]
[I made mention of this book in another post in which Lane Ashfeldt, author of one of the short stories in this anthology [titled Snowmelt ] did an interview for this blog. Ms. Ashfeldt has graciously offered to send a copy of the book to anyone who comments on this or the previous post – please comment by Saturday, November 14, 2009 – I will announce the winner on November 15th – see below for full details.]
My reading over the years has not tended to short stories. But I do remember when my children were little, I spent my scattered reading allowance doing just that – it was the need to finish something, the escape perhaps for a few moments at least to another place that widened my world – a time to re-read the short novels of John Steinbeck, to discover Alice Munro, Flannery O’Connor, short detective works, etc… anything to keep the mind at work! But short stories never held much interest for me – I wanted a bigger canvas, a longer immersion – but it was perhaps really an understanding of my own inability to appreciate the short story in its best incarnation.
I picked up Dancing with Mr. Darcy at the Chawton House Library table at the JASNA AGM more as the need to add it to my Jane Austen collection with thoughts of at least reading Ms. Ashfeldt’s story… so it is with great delight that I found I could not put this book down! Sarah Waters, in her introduction, outlines the criteria for the competition: it must be well-written, be a self-contained short story that stands on its own, and must have a connection to Jane Austen, her life, her work, her Chawton home, or the Chawton House Library. The author of each of the twenty stories in this anthology appends a paragraph explaining how Jane Austen inspired their writing – these alone are worth the reading!
I read Snowmelt first – and this tribute to reading and libraries and books seems to have come from my very own thoughts, my concerns with the future of same. Miss Campbell, who fears the end of the world is at hand, is a librarian at a library that is closing its old building and reopening in a new space with far more computers than books – she visits Chawton House Library to research an early nineteenth century author*, and realizes that life it too short to not be doing what she truly loves and makes drastic changes to her life as a result.
She rang the bell, signed in, climbed the uneven wooden steps and knocked at the library door. A simple room. Books, wooden desks, lamps. A concentrated silence that she longed to bottle and unleash in her own library.
This is a lovely story – and as I said, it conveyed so many thoughts of my own – the future of libraries, the technological changes that are on the one hand absolutely amazing and on the other frightening – what will the future be for the book in this world of kindles and Google books and the like. I was right there along with Miss Campbell, with the aching longing to be working in a library that houses all the works of human accomplishment that one can touch!
[* the previous post asked the question of who the author might be that Miss Campbell is researching and the book she requests at the library…. If you can guess this, please post it in your comment…I will announce the name of the book and author at the end of the giveaway; see below for a few hints…]
The winner of the competition is the first story in the anthology: Jane Austen Over the Styx by Victoria Owens, where we find Austen in Hades, before the “court of the dead” expecting to address her “faults” in life [think her wicked tongue, her accepting-rejecting Bigg-Wither, etc], and instead facing the likes of Mrs. Bennet, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, Mrs. Ferrars, Mrs. Churchill, Lady Russell and Mrs. Norris! – her creations all – the crime? “her willful portrayal of female characters of advanced years, as a snob, a scold, or a harpy who selfishly or manipulatively interferes with the happiness of an innocent third party” [p. 11] – and invoking the words of the great Austen critic DW Harding himself with his theories of “regulated hatred”, Jane is brought to task – an inspired story and great fun! [and you must read it to find if Jane is deemed guilty or not, and how she indeed defends herself! – and of course, it is such a delight to see and hear Mrs. Norris again!]]
JASNA’s own Elsa Solender shared runner- up status with her Second Thoughts – which in Austen’s own voice, following her accepting the marriage proposal of Harris Bigg-Wither, tells of the agonizing decision to tell him the next morning “we should not suit” – it is beautifully conveyed and one feels that Ms. Solender captures exactly what happened that night.
Jayne, by Kirsty Mitchell, also a runner-up, tells of a young woman of a literary bent, struggling to survive at all costs, working as a soft-porn nude model, all the while quoting Shakespeare and knowing full well she must “if she have the misfortune of knowing anything, [should] conceal it as well as she can” [p. 39, quoting Northanger Abbey] – conveying the 21st-century version of the economic struggles of single females of a certain class…
The twenty stories offer the gamut – some use Austen’s characters in new situations, as Elinor Dashwood Ferrars as a detective [she does after all in Sense & Sensibility hear everyone else’s secrets!] [The Delaford Ladies’ Detective Agency by Elizabeth Hopkinson]; or in Somewhere by Kelly Brendel, where Mrs. Grant of Mansfield Park is given a voice of her own. There are re-tellings of a particular story in a contemporary setting, as in Second Fruits by Stephanie Tillotson, where, as in Persuasion, her characters “experience separation, maturation and second chance.” [p. 201] And likewise in Eight Years Later by Elaine Grotefeld, where a young man visiting Chawton House with his mother plans to reunite with his teenage crush from eight years before – he is, like Captain Wentworth, “half agony, half hope.” [p. 75]
There are several stories with teenage protagonists where Austen either inspires, as in The Watershed by Stephanie Shields, where a found used copy of Pride & Prejudice alleviates family and school stresses, and the young bookworm in Hilary Spiers’s Cleverclogs, who finds that her grandmother’s favorite book Sense & Sensibility is also hers. Or the story that mirrors Austen as in The Oxfam Dress, by Penelope Randall, where a 21st-century Lydia Bennet goes on a shopping spree. Bina, by Andrea Watsmore, tells of a teenage girl who finds that her true love was right there all along [an Emma of sorts]; and in The School Trip [Jacqui Hazell], a young woman finds on visiting Chawton that all ones needs to write is “a little space, a tiny desk and a creaky door.” [p. 212]
And there are a few stories that resonate but don’t fit a category: An older, lonely spinster in We Need to Talk About Mr. Collins by Mary Howell finds that perhaps she didn’t let romance into her life…; an amateur play group putting on a Pride & Prejudice theatrical during a bombing raid in Miss Austen Victorious [Esther Bellamy]; a bridesmaids’ weekend gone completely awry in The Jane Austen Hen Weekend by Claire Humphries; and one of my favorites, One Character in Search of her Love Story Role by Felicity Cowie, where a fictional character in the making pays a call on Jane Bennet and Jane Eyre for some insightful conversation about love and choices!
We seem of late to be surrounded in Austen sequels and prequels and spin-offs and re-tellings with zombies and vampires and sea monsters and all manner of creatures, and while I have often sounded off on these largely because I just want to read Austen “as she was wrote” I do also admit to liking some of them! – but these stories in Dancing with Mr. Darcy are so much more – they take the Jane Austen that we all love and admire and cannot get enough of, and create something new and lovely in her wake – be it a character, an idea, a storyline, or just a feeling – here is Austen as she inspires 21st century writers and it is a gift to all of us. I very much hope that Chawton House Library will offer such a competition every year – this is the true legacy of Jane Austen and such writing should be heartily encouraged.
[I should also add that along with Miss Campbell, I react strongly to the physical tactile nature of a book – and Dancing with Mr. Darcy does not disappoint – it is just physically lovely, very nicely put together, and just one more reason to add this to your Jane Austen collection!]
5 of 5 full inkwells – Highly recommended!
Book Giveaway: Please post a comment or a question to me or author Lane Ashfeldt by November 14, 2009 and you will be entered in a book giveaway contest. Please also try to guess the title of the book and its author that Ms. Ashfeldt’s character Miss Campbell has requested at the library [HINT: written in the early 19th century, the novel takes as its theme the wiping out of the entire human race by the year 2073.]
I will announce the winner on November 15, 2009. All are welcome to enter. Ms. Ashfeldt will send a copy of the book directly to the winner.
Thank you for all your comments…and many thanks to Ms. Ashfeldt for her offer of the book…!
Jane Odiwe has just announced the publication of her latest novel: Willoughby’s Return.
“I’m writing to everyone about my new book Willoughby’s Return, which is about to be published on November 1st and I’m hoping you will help me spread the word by mentioning its release to anyone you think might be interested.
Here’s a bit of blurb from the publisher Sourcebooks:
A lost love returns, rekindling forgotten passions…
In Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility, when Marianne Dashwood marries Colonel Brandon, she puts her heartbreak over dashing scoundrel John Willoughby in the past. Three years later, Willoughby’s return throws Marianne into a tizzy of painful memories and exquisite feelings of uncertainty. Willoughby is as charming, as roguish, and as much in love with her as ever. And the timing couldn’t be worse, with Colonel Brandon away and Willoughby determined to win her back, will Marianne find the strength to save her marriage, or will the temptation of a previous love be too powerful to resist?”
Jane is also doing a blog tour, and to celebrate publication there will be giveaways, competitions to win books and paintings, plus interviews over the next couple of weeks.
One of my favorite websites is the book ‘repository’ A Celebration of Women Writers. Mary Mark Ockerbloom, our hostess who has been busy ‘rescuing’ books from Geocities (before that site closes down), has announced many additions to Celebrating Women’s website, but one in particular will interest Austen enthusiasts:
The Castle of Wolfenbach
by Eliza Parsons (1739-1811)
London : printed for William Lane, at the Minerva Press, and sold by
E. Harlow, 1793.
Writes Mary in her email introduction about the latest additions: “My personal favorite of the new titles, however, is Eliza Parsons’ “The Castle of Wolfenbach”. One of the seven “horrid novels” recommended with delightful anticipation by Isabella Thorpe in Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey, The Castle of Wolfenbach is important as an early Gothic novel, predating both Ann Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho and Monk Lewis’s The Monk.
A virtuous young woman in peril, a wicked uncle, a mysterious castle, a noble lover, what more could one ask?
Read and enjoy”
We’d love to post a ‘review’, should anyone be interested in reading then writing…
* * *
And last – Google’s book site has *finally* given us some (note the word!) volumes of Austen’s 1811 Sense and Sensibility!!
Only volumes I and II have been found – though Google books is notorious for making it difficult to find all volumes of a title (anyone listening to this complaint, Google?). I have not yet gone through the two volumes, for Google books is also notorious for skipping pages, missing pages, popping in pages twice, mis-scanning, etc etc. Though where can most of us see an Austen first edition, except through such a site! Now if only they will give us volume III as well as finish off Pride and Prejudice by supplying volume I for that trio.
Well, here are a few pictures finally from the Philadelphia AGM – too many shots from far away, too many with not enough light, too many with too much movement – but I hope they will at least convey some of the fun had by all!
A few shots at Winterthur [I was amazed that you were allowed to take photographs! – but I bought the guidebook anyway…]]
The dining room at Winterthur
The winding stairwell at Winterthur
My buddy and great birder Sara in the Winterthur conservatory,
with an eagle…
A lovely harp at Winterthur [no Mary Crawford in sight!]
Martha Washington’s very own mirror
And now on to the first evening…
The lovely Elizabeth Garvie [a.k.a. Elizabeth Bennet] reading from Austen’s “The Three Sisters” [and way too far way…]
A runway full of Lisa Brown’s “Dressing Mr. Darcy” very accommodating models:
William Phillips of Chicago
Ray Skelly of Valley Forge, PA
’tis a lady, methinks! Karen Noske of Rochester NY
The pack of Regency gentlemen and soldiers…
The handsome fellows, William Phillips and Jeff Nigro
Some fashionistas and the Regency Ball Promenade ~
The always beautifully adorned Baronda Bradley in her day dress…
our very own Lorraine and William Hanaway
[though we have to share them with Pennsylvania…]
And lovely Baronda again, this year with her Regency Beau!
Two couples who come to our Vermont gatherings ~
kudos to them for the fabulous fashions!
The Promenade returning for the Ball
Capt. Michael Green, Lorna Green, and Nick Wells [as General Tilney! yikes! I disinvited him to the party!] – all from the London, Ontario Chapter
The Jane Austen Books family!
Greg holding Colin, Amy, Jennifer, Beth & Adam
and finally, the cutest Darcy of all…
Colin Frederick Patterson!
Thank you one and all for making this another
such memorable Jane Austen event!
Ok, here I go again…. [please note that due to a computer / camera glitch, all my pictures of the AGM which I was to include in this post, i.e the “Darcy” models, the Regency Ball fashionistas, etc. will not be on here at present – still working on this, but lack the time and patience to be honest! – will post them separately when I can…]
Day 3: Up for a continental breakfast, another Regency Emporium visit… then on to the next Plenary speaker, the always delightful Maggie Lane ~ “Brothers of the more Famous Jane: the Literary Aspirations, Achievements and Influences of James and Henry Austen”. As the emphasis is often on Austen’s brothers Francis and Charles and their naval world, Lane spoke only here on the professional and literary brothers, Henry, often considered Jane’s favorite brother, and James, who she thinks is in need of a reassessment. It is James, she says, who wrote the majority of the essays in his and Henry’s publication “The Loiterer” [Lane also posits here that the “Sofia Sentiment” letter is NOT by Jane – more on this in another post…] – and James who wrote plays and poetry throughout his life, and it was James with whom Jane shared a similar taste in literature. Austen’s one negative comment about him [and the only negative comment about a family member] has perhaps been over-credited as her general view. Lane goes on to compare James to Austen’s characters: in youth, like Edmund Bertram; in later life, Dr. Grant!, and the use of the name “James” in two of her characters, James Morland and James Benwick, both young men who fell in love easily, a trait attributed to James Austen in his youth.
Henry Austen, [Oh! what a Henry!] the brother who had a lot of enthusiasm [but often of the short-term variety!], is credited with being the chief negotiator with Austen’s first publisher Thomas Egerton, and likely helped to fund her publications. He was the “interesting” brother, the one who married his “outlandish” cousin Eliza de Feuillide, the one who is likely the model for Henry Tilney, as well as Henry Crawford! But Lane also gave us the side of Henry that resulted in the Biographical notice of Austen that began the “Dear Jane” view that persists today – Henry puffed up their social standing, and in the second edition added more religious references and removed the literary mentions of Burney and Edgeworth. Lane also believes it was Henry’s ambition that resulted in Austen being buried in Winchester Cathedral rather than her beloved Steventon. In the end however, the immortality of both brothers “is only due to Austen’s genius.”
On to the next two breakouts, and again a struggle to choose, but I decided on Peter Sabor’s “Brothers and Sisters for Brothers and Sisters: Jane Austen’s Juvenilia”, a wonderful discussion of the various dedications written by Austen to her siblings in her juvenile works. This was very informative and enjoyable, Dr. Sabor being an energetic and engaging speaker, with all sorts of tidbits about Austen’s early works [he is the editor of the Cambridge edition of the Juvenilia]. As I have been reading through these works over the past few months [with much laughing out loud in the process!], this offered a different approach to the works based on her dedications, what Sabor feels were very thoughtful choices on Austen’s part. As most readers of Austen know, none of her novels bear dedications, excepting of course Emma, where her over-wrought dedication to the Prince Regent was not of her own choosing!
After lunch, a quick pop-in to Lisa Brown’s fun fashion demonstration “Dressing Mr. Darcy” ~ with most excellent and accommodating models, walking the “runway” in all manner of Regency fashions for the men of consequence and their military counterparts. [pictures forthcoming…]
The third Plenary session with Dr. Ruth Perry who eloquently spoke on the topic of the weekend, “Brotherly Love.” The author of Novel Relations: the History of the Novel and the Family in English Society 1750-1810, [and speaker at the Boston 2000 AGM on “Sleeping with Mr. Collins” for those who recall that!], Dr. Perry summarized how the changes in English society changed the view and treatment of women within the family: as Susan Allen Ford in her session [as mentioned above] suggested, class mobility and geographical movement, changes in marriage choices, the inheritance laws, the increase in population, all led to changes in what was considered the immediate family – emphasis shifted to the conjugal family rather than the biological. This is apparent in Austen’s own life with her dependence on her brothers’ voluntary support and provision of means of travel, when their priority was their own families. Perry also emphasizes the literary / historical as well as the biological influences on Austen in her writings, and how good brothers = good husbands: in Northanger Abbey, Henry Tilney as affectionate brother and lover of muslin; John Thorpe shows his character by the way he talks to his sister and mother; Captain Tilney chafes at family responsibility; James Morland a good brother and friend to Catherine; the various brother and sister ties in Mansfield Park – Edmund combines the conjugal and fraternal but is inattentive to his sisters [perhaps because there are two of them? – this is a good question…]; the selfish Henry Crawford, fond of Mary, but does not write to her or provide her with a home; Mr. Knightley who speaks of Mr. Martin as an excellent son and brother; Charles Musgrove, who tellingly supports his sisters over his wife; the housekeeper’s praise of Mr. Darcy as a good brother… etc. … lots to mine here as you can see – the need to re-read each book to just look at the brothers and what they do and say and what they don’t!
Last breakout session – Jan Fergus on “My Dear Charlotte” the new book by mystery writer Hazel Holt. I wanted to hear Dr. Fergus’s talk because I had just read the book and was intrigued by it – it is a novel set in the early 19th century written in letters, like Austen’s Lady Susan, but Holtuses selected words or sentences or ideas from the text of Austen’s actual letters and weaves in Austen’s words with her own story. It is a fun read [I will review it in another post] – and what Fergus calls the “only successful imitation of Austen” on the market today. The plot does not come from Austen, only those words taken out of context that fit into Holt’s story – at once a mystery and a romance. Fergus is a friend of Holt, and after her talk she graciously made herself available in the Regency Emporium to offer the book with signed bookplates for sale. I highly recommend it – the most fun is the ferreting out Austen’s words from Holt’s – it helps to be very familiar with Austen’s letters!
The Banquet and Regency Ball: after a few moments at the author’s book signing table, on to a delicious dinner to meet old and new friends at our table, watched the promenade of those regally dressed, and took some pictures for your viewing enjoyment [all photographs shown with permission of the subjects! – and will be forthcoming…]
And after watching the dancers for a bit, I wandered into the evening talk I unfortunately only heard the last two-thirds: Dr. Janine Barchas on “The Sister Arts and Jane Austen”, a fascinating visual exploration of the surnames and places that Austen uses in her novels and the possible connection to contemporary artists: Reynolds, William Hodges, William Larkin, and Charles Hayter’s miniatures. It was a packed, standing room only crowd for those non-English Country Dancers among us [though I do so love to dance!] – and all were entranced with this take on names in Austen. [Dr. Barchas will be presenting an address titled “A Big Name: Jane Austen and the Wentworths” at the August 2010 conference Jacobites and Tories, Whigs and True Whigs: Political Gardening in Britain c.1700 – c.1760, to be held at Wentworth Castle, given by the Wentworth Castle Trust and The Garden History Society.]
[Charles Hayter miniature – from Wikipedia]
Day 4: After some housekeeping duties for the Regional Coordinators [a great meeting for sharing ideas, as always…but alas! missed the Episcopal Church Service at the historic Christ Church], we all gathered for the final Plenary session with John Mullan as he addressed us all on “Sisterly Chat” – a wonderfully engaging and humorous talk that will yet again send one back to all the novels for a re-read with a view to all the goings-on between sisters! The sister relationship was paramount in Austen’s own life and thus in the novels; there is indeed more “chat” between sisters than between lovers. Mullan is talking about the intimate talk between sisters when they are alone in a special place – the films show this visually, but in the books you have to look for it closely. He reviewed the controversy from a few years back – “Was Jane Austen Gay?” complete with the newspaper articles and letters, the question hinging on the sleeping arrangements between she and Cassandra – Mullan quoted the final letter in the months-long submissions of raging letters which referenced the furniture company records that proved that Jane and Cassandra did indeed have separate beds! But all this led to the many examples of the various sisters in the novels and how and where they do or do NOT share confidences. And after quoting Keats’s “unheard talk”, Mullan runs through the examples of the talk that takes place off-stage, where the reader is “invited to infer what has been said”, with nods to Fanny [his favorite parts of Mansfield Park are when Fanny is not there!], the sisters Steele in what he calls their “mutual espionage” and of course can you imagine the chat between the Bingley sisters who are “always together, almost ganging up” on all around them! This was fabulous – I hope it will be published in Persuasions, so all may enjoy this fresh approach!
The Bingleys in P&P
So another AGM is done – I have skimmed over a lot – there were the essays by high school and college students, and the winning short story in that contest [see the JASNA site to read these – very inspiring to see another generation making room for Austen’s books in their lives!]; Steve Lawrence, the Director of Chawton House Library quickly summarized all the goings-on and handed out hearty thanks to all of JASNA for the generosity of so many members.
The JASNA banner was then dutifully passed on to the coordinators in the Oregon / Southwest Washington Chapter who will be hosting next year’s AGM: Jane Austen and the Abbey: Mystery, Mayhem and Muslin in Portland on the Halloween weekend of October 29-31. We were also given a delightful treat by the North Texas Region, who will be hosting us in October 14-16, 2011 in Fort Worth, Texas for 200 Sense & Sensibility, celebrating the 200th anniversary of its publication – two very cute cowboys [and they could sing too!], who to the tune of “Home on the Range” gave us a good sampling of how terrific this 2011 AGM will be [“chatting with Deirdre Le Faye” brought the house down!]
Final thanks to Elizabeth Jane Steele and her team at the Eastern Pennsylvania JASNA Chapter, who put on a lovely weekend – no words really to thank all the volunteers who have spent countless hours in preparation, just so a very appreciative crowd of Austen-obsessed souls could spend four days in the early nineteenth century! – I know this Janeite is still having troubling re-entering the 21st!
Dancing with Mr Darcy: Stories inspired by Jane Austen and Chawton House Library
Jane Austen in Vermont 