Category: Biography

Jane’s Fame: How Jane Austen Conquered the World by Claire Harman – A Review

From the desk of Joanna Go:

The moment I opened Jane’s Fame, the catchy titles of certain chapters – Praise and Pewter, Canon and Canonisation, Jane AustenTM  hooked me and I knew I was in for a ride.  I was not disappointed.  Claire Harman’s new biography of Jane Austen is an engaging and brave account of the reluctant and evolving love story between Austen and her public as Harman holds our hands through the ebb and flow of Jane’s Continue reading “Jane’s Fame: How Jane Austen Conquered the World by Claire Harman – A Review” →

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Jane Austen Biographies – Guided by Reason

“I admire the activity of your benevolence,” observed Mary, “but every impulse of feeling should be guided by reason; and, in my opinion, exertion should always be in proportion to what is required.” Mary Bennet, Pride and Prejudice Ch 7 

Jane Austen 1775-1817It is not a surprise to me that there are so many biographies of Jane Austen in print today, only that they vary so greatly in tone and quality. Like Mary Bennet, I believe “impulse of feeling should be guided by reason” abhorring the biographer who takes liberties to spice up the story to make a sale. In the last century there have been hundreds of new biographies on Jane Austen. She has had her share of elaborators and equally honest presentations. The biggest challenge is to know who to believe! 

Interestingly, during her lifetime Austen’s public personae was an enigma. All of her novels were anonymously attributed to have been written ‘by a lady,’ a genteel practice to screen the identity of female authors from public scrutiny and family embarrassment. Until the posthumous publication of Northanger Abbey and Persuasion in December 1817, her identity, though known to a few well placed persons was unknown to the general public. When readers opened the title page of the first of four volumes they saw only “By the Author of Pride & Prejudice, Mansfield Park, etc.; With a Biographical Notice of the Author.” Discretion being the better part of valour her brother Henry kept with tradition by not listing her name on the title page, but revealing the identity of the author as his sister Jane in writing her first official biography included in the volume. The full e-text of a “Biographical Notice”  is available for your edification and enjoyment at Molland’s and is well worth your perusal. Don’t miss the bit about Jane “mouldering in the grave”! 

As her exalted novels are testament of her genius, our fascination with the mind behind such genius has resulted in some excellent and interestingly creative biographies. Here are a few of my favourites that I would like to share. They represent books that I have read in part or in whole, and include a range of reading levels, each bringing Jane Austen’s life and times in closer appreciation. 

Jane Austen: A Life, by Claire TomalingJane Austen: A Life, by Claire Tomalin (1999) 

Quite possibly my favourite Jane Austen biography that I have had the pleasure to read thus far, Tomalin blends dry facts and historical material with a lively and creative narrative resulting in one fascinating read. Well researched and copiously documented in prudent scholarly fashion, this honest and uplifting homage to Austen, her family, and her life is a delight, and may be the most entertaining biography of Austen ever written. ISBN: 978-0679766766

Jane Austen (Penguin Lives), by Carol ShieldJane Austen, by Carol Shields (2005) 

This little jewel written by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Carol Shields explores the life of a writer with both sensitivity and honest personal point of view from a fellow writer’s perspective. Shield’s style is fluid and enviable. It is no wonder she admires Austen’s ability to make characters leap off the page, as I can offer her the same complement. Her observations of the personalities in Austen’s life and later biographers follows Austen’s own talent for pulling out the wit and irony of life and raising a few eyebrows. ISBN: 978-0143035169

A Memoir of Jane Austen (Oxford World's Classics), by J. E. Austen-LeighA Memoir of Jane Austen, by J. E. Austen-Leigh (1870) 

The first official full length biography of Austen’s life, it was written from the reminiscences of her nieces and nephews. The second edition includes additional unpublished material: the novella Lady Susan, the cancelled chapter in Persuasion, fragments of Sandition and The Watsons. A must read for every Austen enthusiast, it offers us the Victorianalization of Austen’s character into the dutiful, kindly and obedient daughter who never thought ill of anyone. In today’s context, this is a bit amusing considering the wit and sometimes sarcastic comments in her letters, and the tone of some of the characterizations in her novels.  ISBN:  978-0199540778

Jane Austen: A Family Record, by Deirdre La FayeJane Austen: A Family Record, by William Austen-Leigh, Richard Austen-Leigh, and revised and enlarged by Deirdre Le Faye (2003) 

This biography combines the best of two worlds: a family recollection and a scholarly rewrite. Carrying on the Austen-Leigh family tradition of writing about their famous ancestor, William Austen-Leigh and Richard Austen-Leigh published Life and Letters of Jane Austen in 1913. Renowned Austen scholar Deirdre Le Faye has re-written and expanded their work, culminating in a definitive biography that may very well be the best source today of accurate information on Jane Austen’s family and literary career. ISBN: 978-0521534178

Jane Austen siblings banner

Gentle Reader: In honor of JASNA’s annual meeting in Philadelphia this week, this blog, Jane Austen’s World, and Jane Austen Today have devoted posts to Jane Austen and her siblings. This is my finale post in the series.

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Jane Austen Biographer: Mary Augusta Austen-Leigh

Portrait of Mary Augusta Austen-LeighWas Jane Austen a Moralist? No! many of her fervent admirers will exclaim – ‘Thank Heaven – that she was not!’ Her mission was to amuse, to delight, to refresh us – but neither to reprove nor to condemn us! Those who want ‘Moral Tales’ must seek them elsewhere; they are not to be found among Jane Austen’s writings! Mary Augusta Austen-Leigh, Personal Aspects of Jane Austen, Chapter 5
Mary Augusta Austen-Leigh (1838-1922) was the author of a biography of her great aunt, Personal Aspects of Jane Austen. She was the daughter of James Edward Austen-Leigh who wrote A Memoir of Jane Austen in 1870. Inheriting her family views, she firmly believed in protecting Jane Austen’s reputation. This slim biography had an interesting beginning as an article in the Quarterly Review of 1919 which became chapter five in the book published the next year. It firmly defends ‘Jane Austen’s earnest adherents’ [1] who were recently under attack by critics also bashing Austen with the same tired complaints; her ‘narrow experience, reclusiveness, her life lacking in incident and consolations of culture.'[1] The pettiness of this argument and Miss Austen’s hyperbole (she dedicated the book ‘To All True Lovers of Jane Austen and Her Works’) sparked two witty and now famous reviews by two authors that Jane Austen would have been happy to have tea with, Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield.

Portrait of author Katherine MansfieldKathleen Mansfield Murry (1888 – 1923) was a prominent New Zealand modernist writer of short fiction who wrote under the pen name of Katherine Mansfield. Her review of Personal Aspects of Jane Austen by Mary Austen-Leigh, was first published in the periodical The Athenaeum on December 3, 1920, and reprinted in the book Novels and Novelists, edited by her husband John Middleton Murry posthumously 1930. I was fortunate to find this except in my 1982 copy of Persuasions, the Journal of the Jane Austen Society of North America.

It seems almost unkind to criticize a little book which has thrown on bonnet and shawl and tipped across the fields of criticism at so round a pace to defend its dear Jane Austen. But even with the undesirable evidence before us of the stupidity, nay, the downright wickedness of certain reviewers, we cannot help doubting the need for such a journey. True, Jane Austen exists in the imagination as a writer who has remained wonderfully remote and apart and free from the flying burrs of this work-a-day world, and it does come as a surprise to learn that so-called friends of hers have said these dreadful things. But, begging Miss Austen-Leigh’s pardon – who cares? Can we picture Jane Austen caring – except in a delightfully wicked way which we are sure the author of this book would not allow – that people said she was no lady, was not found of children, hated animals, did not care a pin for the poor, could not have written about foreign parts if she tried, had no idea how a fox was killed, but rather thought it ran up a tree and hissed at the hound at the last – was, in short, cold, coarse, practically illiterate and without morality. Mightn’t her reply have been, ‘Ah, but what about my novels?’ Though the answer would seem to us more than sufficient, it would not satisfy Miss Austen-Leigh…

Each of these charges can be met – and they are met, though, to be quite candid, it is somewhat quaintly at times. Take, for instance, the ‘baseless accusation that she always turned away from whatever was sad.’ It cannot, says Miss Austen-Leigh, be allowed to pass unnoticed. And she cites a family letter written by Mr. Austen on the occasion of a young friend’s having been invited to their house to have her attack of measles there: ‘She wanted a great deal of nursing, and a great deal of nursing she had,’ the nurses being Jane, her sister Cassandra and their friend Martha Lloyd. Well, that may go to prove that Jane was willing to face an unpleasant ordeal and to play her part, but we should not like our belief in her tenderness to depend on it. Does it not sound just a little grim? Might not a timid mind picture patient and pillows being shaken together; and, as to escaping one’s medicine, Cassandra and Martha to hold one down, and Jane to administer something awfully black in a spoon? The, again, someone having said that sermons were wearisome to her, Miss Austen-Leigh contradicts him triumphantly with Jane Austen’s own words, ‘I am very fond of Sherlock’s Sermons, and prefer them to almost any.’ But stare at that sentence as we may, we cannot see an enthusiasm for sermons shining through it. It sounds indeed as though Sherlock’s Sermons were a special kind of biscuit – clerical Bath Olivers – oval and crisp and dry…

[‘Ah, but what about my novels?’]

…For the truth is that every true admirer of the novels cherishes the happy thought that he alone – reading between the lines – has become the secret friends of their author.

Virginia Woolf had pretty much the same thing to say in response to the book, which leads me to believe that they influenced each other.

Ever since Jane Austen became famous they [critics] have been hissing inanities in chorus ….  [D]ebating whether she was a lady, whether she told the truth, whether she could read, and whether she had personal experience of hunting a fox is positively upsetting.  We remember that Jane Austen wrote novels.  It might be worth while for her critics to read them.

Even though I agree with Mansfield and Woolf, ‘Who cares? – What about my novels?‘ we should be thankful that Miss Austen-Leigh got up on her soapbox and passionately defended her ancestor. In addition to her denunciation of Austen’s critics, she actually revealed some new information not previously included in other family biographies. I do confess to cringing when I read the introduction and came upon her statement that Jane Austen died in her forty-second year. Ok, I’m not good at math either.

Frontispiece and title page of Personal Aspects of Jane Austen (1920)

The biography is a quick read at 129 pages and happily available online through Canadian Libraries Internet Archive. Go to the ‘View Book’ on the left sidebar and then check out the “Flip Book” reader. Quite impressive software that I wish Google Books would adapt. Just to be contentious, I could not pass up including the title page for your amusement. Notice the comments by previous readers scribbled near the center of the page! They are tough critics those Canadians, and great Austen scholars I might add. I would not have been so severe on poor Miss Austen-Leigh. She was just defending her turf. Flip through the pages and you will notice additional marginal notes which I always feel are a bonus. This was timely for me as Janeite Deb of Jane Austen in Vermont Blog and I were just chatting about marking up good books with marginal notes and underlining. I know it is a personal thing, but books are so sacred to me that I just can not do it. Though, I confess I encourage others to leave their brilliant thoughts for posterity. Jane Austen did, and people are still talking about it!

A Secret Life, by Claire Tomalin (1988)And finally, the last serendipitous connection to this post is with Jane Austen’s biographer Claire Tomalin who wrote Jane Austen: A Life. She also wrote a biography of Katherine Mansfield. Now that I know Mansfield is a friend of Jane, and Tomalin thinks highly enough of her to write a biography, it is worth a gander.

1. Southam, B.C. (editor) Jane Austen, Volume 2, 1870-1940 The Critical Heritage, Published by Routledge, (1999) Introduction pp. 96-97

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101 Things You Didn’t Know About Jane Austen, by Patrice Hannon – A Review

THE TRUTH ABOUT THE WORLD’S MOST

 INTRIGUING LITERARY HEROINE

 

Knowledge is power. Sir Francis Bacon, Religious Meditations, Of Heresies, 1597

Everything united in him; good understanding, correct opinions, knowledge of the world, and a warm heart. The Narrator on William Elliot, Persuasion, Chapter 16

Image of cover of 101 Things You Didn’t Know About Jane Austen, (2008)Most biographies of Jane Austen will reveal the quiet life of maiden Aunt Jane, who scribbled in secret, loved to dance, and lived her entire life in the country removed from the chaos of the world. Did you also know that she was also romantic, tragic and mysterious?

Barnes & Noble has just released a reprint of Patrice Hannon’s 101 Things You Didn’t Know About Jane Austen: The Truth About The World’s Most Intriguing Literary Heroine, in an attractive hardcover edition with a very handsome new cover design quite suitable for gift giving.

Despite having one of the longest and most misleading titles of any book about Jane Austen of recent memory, the contents are as appealing as the newly designed format. In Jane Austen’s 18th-century world, acquired knowledge was considered one of the most powerful and important skills of a polished society. Today we recognize the same benefits, but want our education to be forthright and expeditious. For anyone interested in the knowledge of Jane Austen’s life and works in a compact and fact driven format, this book can serve as a great resource and quick reference.

Categorized into seven parts; Birth of a Heroine, Brilliant Beginnings, Silence and Disappointed Love, The Glorious Years, Heroes and Heroines, Untimely Death, and Austen and Popular Culture: From Eighteenth Century to the Twenty-First, this illuminating guide takes you through all aspects of  Jane Austen’s life journey and writing experience, revealing common facts, new insights, and minutia.

If you are interested, as I was, to know which heroine most resembles the author herself, who were the real Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy and why Jane never married, you will not be disappointed in this bright little book that is well researched, engaging, and incredibly practical. You also might be happy to know that it is offered at the amazingly reasonable price of only $7.98.

Rating: 3½ out of 5 Regency Stars

101 Things You Didn’t Know About Jane Austen
by Patrice Hannon
Fall River Press (2007)
ISBN: 9781435103368

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Jane Austen for Dummies, by Joan Klingel Ray – A Review

JANE AUSTEN FOR DUMMIES, OR SMARTIES?  

Image of cover of Jane Austen for Dummies, (2006)Ok, who wants to be called a dummy, or heaven forbid, admit that you are a dummy? Show of hands please. Well, not me, and certainly not any of those accomplished, well educated, and urbane literati who call themselves Janeites! Right? So, Jane Austen for Dummies? Let’s be kind folks. Would Jane approve?

As a bookseller, I have seen the amazing rise in popularity of the Dummies book series over the last decade that has fueled Wiley Publishing into a mighty empire. There are now Dummies books available on every imaginable subject from Beekeeping for Dummies to Napoleon for Dummies; the list of titles is staggering.

When Jane Austen for Dummies hit the book stores in 2006, I was repulsed. The words in the title are a diametric polar vertex; complete opposites to my feelings of what MY Jane Austen stood for. As Lizzy Bennet said when she heard that Charlotte Lucas was engaged to Mr. Collins, “impossible”.

Among my merry Internet travels, I ran across this great article entitled, Jane Austen, Yadda, Yadda, Yadda, in which the book Jane Austen for Dummies is sandwiched in as an example of how the recent Austen mania has teetered off the edge of decorum.

“In addition, when constructing our soundbites, we ought not to forget the sheer breadth of today’s Austen craze; it’s more than just films and television adaptations we’re in for. New books have appeared, too, like Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict (2007) and Jane Austen for Dummies (2006). Though I worry that these books make reading her fiction sound like something done at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting for slow learners, surely it’s not too late for some well-placed damage control?”

Ouch. I was a bit suspicious as the author, Prof. Devoney Looser, had lumped Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict into the mix. I had read it. In my opinion, it was not insulting to the memory of Miss Austen. Quite the contrary. Pastiche’s can be the closest form of a complement around. So was my first impression of Jane Austen for Dummies correct?

As I finished reading the article, I noticed that the author of Jane Austen for Dummies, Joan Klingel Ray, PhD, had posted a comment responding to the mention of her book in such an unprudential light, – and she was really going after the slight full force.

“But as the author of JANE AUSTEN FOR DUMMIES, I take issue with her grouping my book with CONFESSIONS OF A JANE AUSTEN ADDICT, which like other books of that ilk tap into Austen’s name recognition to sell fiction, dating guides, courtesy guides, etc.”

Ok Dr. Klingel Ray. I know that you are a past president of The Jane Austen Society of North America (2000-2006), and I curtsy reverently, but that condescension of another author’s work, and the genre in general was just mean, and not worthy of your rank and education. This seems to be turning into a kicking match that Caroline Bingley would be pleased to join in.

“Had Professor Looser even skimmed JANE AUSTEN FOR DUMMIES, she would have seen that, like other books in the “Dummies” series, JANE AUSTEN FOR DUMMIES is written to introduce interested persons to a subject-in this case, Jane Austen-in a straightforward, accessible way. Specifically, JANE AUSTEN FOR DUMMIES explains to today’s readers of Austen’s fiction the cultural background of the novels that Austen, of course, assumed, her original readers-her contemporaries-would have immediately understood, but which may baffle today’s readers.”

She continues, at length, to elaborate the charms and practicalities of Jane Austen for Dummies, and concludes…

“So rather than preciously worrying about damage control, Professor Looser might read and then give the university employee a copy of JANE AUSTEN FOR DUMMIES, designed for those who wish to be Austen-Smarties, but need just a little extra information about Austen and her times to become so. In fact, if Professor Looser sends me the university employee’s name and school address, I will send him an autographed copy of the book.”

Ooo, Jane Austen academic cat fight!

The next day at work, intrigued by the brouhaha, I track down Jane Austen for Dummies, and you know, Dr. Klingel Ray was right. Anyone who reads this book will become a Jane Austen Smarty, which is much more agreeable to my sensibilities than being a dummy any day! It is a fun and fact filled volume, great for an introduction to Jane Austen, a brush up, or further research sources. Deeply readable, it truly demystifies our authoress, and adds to her charms. Thanks Dr. Klingel Ray. Now if you could sallie forth and gently nod to all of those Austenesque writers who did not intend to rip-off Jane Austen, there could be harmony and plenty in the Jane Austen community.

Rating: 4 out of 5 Regency Stars

  • Listen to a podcast interview of Dr. Klingel Ray as she speaks further on Jane Austen, her works and society.

Here is an excerpt from the book that I felt quite apt for the temper of this post.

Image of excerpt from Jane Austen for Dummies, (2006)
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