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Jane Austen  in Perspective
 Introduction | Her family | Education | The Siblings & Cousin Eliza | After Steventon | What was she like? | Her illness and death | Her times: a brief background | Her works | Was she a legend in her lifetime? | In conclusion | Further reading

Read more about Jane Austen

Suggested Austen biographies ...

  • Jane Austen: A Life by Claire Tomalin, Viking, 1997

  • Jane Austen: A Life by David Nokes, 1997

  • Becoming Jane Austen by JASA’s Jon Spence, Hambledon 2003

The original biography...

  • A Memoir of Jane Austen by James Austen-Leigh (her nephew), originally published 1870

Explore the family history in greater depth ...

  • Jane Austen: A Family Record, by Deirdre Le Faye with William and Richard Austen-Leigh, descendants of James Austen. Revised edition 1989

  • Jane Austen’s Letters, collected and edited by Deirdre Le Faye, 1995

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James Austen-Leigh’s Memoir contains the chapter of Persuasion which Jane Austen re-wrote to be the two last chapters we now know. There are many critical assessments of the novels in the JASA library, invoking different perspectives on her works, such as Jane Austen on Screen, or Jane Austen: The World of her Novels, Deirdre Le Faye (2002), or Jane Austen and the Clergy, Irene Collins (1994). There are any number of sequels to the novels, and what we might call ‘expansions’: works which take one of Jane Austen’s novels and add to it (Pride and Prejudice is the favourite here). If you’d like help finding your way round the locations in her novels, Where’s Where in Jane Austen … and what happened there by JASA member, the late Patrick Wilson (2002) is invaluable.

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For an entertaining look at the customs and habits of 19th century England, try... 

  • What Jane Austen ATE and Charles Dickens KNEW, by Daniel Pool (1998) 

  • High Society in the Regency Period by Venetia Murray n Jane Austen & Food by Maggie Lane n Jane Austen Fashion, by Penelope Byrde (1999).

For the darker side of Georgian and Regency society...

  • Jane Austen and Crime by JASA president, Susannah Fullerton (2004).

And for the new standard, academic edition of the Austen novels – the first: 

  • The new Cambridge University Press publication of Mansfield Park, edited by JASA’s John Wiltshire (2005).

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13 July 2006