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School № 102 presents. The legend of English literature: Jane Austen. … and how we see her now . Chapter 1. Becoming a legend. Jane Austen (16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist.
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The legend of English literature: Jane Austen … and how we see her now.
Chapter 1 Becoming a legend
Jane Austen (16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature. Her realism and biting social commentary have gained her historical importance among scholars and critics. The steadfast support of her family was critical to her development as a professional writer.
Jane’s list of works Sense and Sensibility(1811) Pride and Prejudice(1813) Mansfield Park(1814) Emma(1816) She also wrote two additional novels, Northanger Abbeyand Persuasion, both published posthumously in 1818, and began a third, which was eventually titled Sanditon, but died before completing it.
Family Austen lived her entire life as part of a close-knit family located on the lower fringes of the English landed gentry.
Austen's parents, George Austen , and his wife Cassandra, were members of substantial gentry families.For much of Jane's life, George Austen served as the rector of the Anglicanparishesat Steventon, Hampshire, and a nearby village.
Siblings Austen‘s included: six brothers — James, George, Edward, Henry Thomas, Francis William (Frank), Charles John — and one sister, Cassandra Elizabeth, who, like Jane, died unmarried.
Cassandra was Austen's closest friend and confidante throughout her life.
Of her brothers, Austen felt closest to Henry, who was also Jane's literary agent.
George was sent to live with a local family at a young age because, as Austen biographer Le Faye describes it, he was "mentally abnormal and subject to fits". He may also have been deaf and mute. Charles and Frank served in the navy, both rising to the rank of admiral. Edward was adopted by his fourth cousin.
Early life and education Austen was born on 16 December 1775 at Steventon rectory and publicly christened on 5 April 1776. After a few months at home, her mother placed Austen with Elizabeth Littlewood, a woman living nearby, who nursed and raised Austen for eighteen months.
She was educated primarily by her father and older brothers as well as through her own reading. In 1783, according to family tradition, Jane and Cassandra were sent to Oxford.
Their curriculum probably included some French, spelling, needlework, dancing and music and, perhaps, drama.
Austen educated herself by reading books. George gave his daughters access to his large and varied library, was tolerant of Austen's sometimes risqué experiments in writing, and provided both sisters with expensive paper and other materials for their writing and drawing.
The Austen home was lived in "an open, amused, easy intellectual atmosphere" where the ideas of those with whom the Austens might disagree politically or socially were considered and discussed.
After returning home in 1786, Austen "never again lived anywhere beyond the bounds of her family environment“.
Private theatricals were also a part of Austen's education. When she was a child, the family and close friends used to stage a series of plays. Most of the plays were comedies, which suggests one way in which Austen's comedic and satirical gifts were cultivated.
Juvenilia -"fair copies" of 29 early works, which Austen compiled into three bound notebooks, containing pieces originally written between 1787 and 1793. Among these works are a satirical novel in letters titled Love and Friendship, The Beautiful Cassandra and The History of England, a manuscript of 34 pages accompanied by 13 watercolor miniatures by her sister Cassandra.
Early writing experiences In 1793, Austen began and then abandoned a short play, later entitled Sir Charles Grandison or the Happy Man, a comedy in 6 acts. This was a short parody of various school textbook .
Adulthood As Austen grew into adulthood, she continued to live at her parents' home: practiced the fortepiano, assisted her sister and mother with supervising servants, and attended female relatives during childbirth and older relatives on their deathbeds, attended church regularly, socialized frequently with friends and neighbors,and read novels aloud with her family in the evenings.
Socializing with the neighbors often meant dancing, either impromptu in someone's home after supper or at the balls held regularly at the assembly rooms in the town hall. Her brother Henry later said that "Jane was fond of dancing, and excelled in it".
Not long after writing Love and Friendship in 1789, Austen decided to "write for profit, to make stories her central effort", that is, to become a professional writer. Beginning in about 1793, she began to write longer, more sophisticated works.
First novels After finishing Lady Susan, Austen attempted her first full-length novel — Elinor and Marianne, which in 1811 was published as Sense and Sensibility.
Austen began work on a second novel, First Impressions (which later became Pride and Prejudice), in 1796. She completed it in August 1797 at the age of 21; as with all of her novels, Austen read the work aloud to her family as she was working on it and it became an "established favorite".
Published author First successfully published four novels were generally well-received. Through her brother Henry, she publish Sense and Sensibility, which appeared in October 1811 and was sold out by mid-1813.Austen's earnings from it provided her with some financial and psychological independence.
Jane kept publishing her works the rest of her life. The new edition of Mansfield Parkand Emma were the last of Austen's novels to be published during her lifetime.
Almost married In 1802, Austen received her only proposal of marriage. Visiting old friends with her sister, Jane met their younger brother, Harris Bigg-Wither, who proposed and Austen accepted. Harris was described as a non-attractive — he was a large, plain-looking man who spoke little, was aggressive and almost completely tactless. However, Austen had known him since early childhood and the marriage offered many advantages to Austens family. But suddenly, by the next morning, Jane realised she had made a mistake and called off her acceptance.
Illness and death Early in 1816, Jane Austen began to feel unwell. She ignored the illness at first and continued to work, however, by the middle of that year, Austen's physical condition began a long, slow, and irregular deterioration. Her disease is still unknown, but some scientists claim that it was Hodgkin's lymphoma. By mid-April, Austen was confined to her bed. Austen died in Winchester on 18 July 1817, at the age of 41.
Chapter 2 Modern Jane
Austen today Despite her having lived centuries ago, fans around the world number in the millions today. Her timeless works –including just six novels – have been turned into a significant number of motion pictures and modern retellings at an almost regular pace and translated into multiple languages surpassing cultural boundaries in the process.
You won’t even be able to count them!!! But there are at least about 60 films and TV series based on Austen’s novels! The very first of which was completed in 1938, named “Pride and Prejudice” and lasted only 55 minutes.
… and the most famous are: Mansfield Park (1983) TV Mini-Series Impoverished Fanny Price is sent to live with her more affluent uncle and aunt. The arrival of new neighbors brings a chance for romance to Fanny and her cousins.
Sense and Sensibility (1995) Directed by Ang Lee Starring Emma Thompson, Kate Winslet, James Fleet, Hugh Grant “Rich Mr. Dashwood dies, leaving his second wife and her three daughters poor by the rules of inheritance. The two eldest daughters are the titular opposites.”
Emma (1996) Directed by Douglas McGrath Starring Gwyneth Paltrow, James Cosmo “In rural 1800s England things go bad for a young matchmaker after she finds a man for another woman.”
Pride & Prejudice (2005) Directed by Joe Wright Starring KeiraKnightley, Matthew Macfadyen, Brenda Blethyn “Sparks fly when spirited Elizabeth Bennet meets single, rich, and proud Mr. Darcy. But Mr. Darcy reluctantly finds himself falling in love with a woman beneath his class. Can each overcome their own pride and prejudice?”
Becoming Jane (2007) Directed by Julian Jarrold Starring Anne Hathaway, James McAvoy, Julie Walters “A biographical portrait of a pre-fame Jane Austen and her romance with a young Irishman.”
Bath Nowadays, The Centre, located at 40 Gay Street in Bath is a permanent exhibition dedicated to Austen. It tells the story of Jane’s Bath experience – the effect that living here had on her and her writing. Jane Austen is perhaps the best known and best loved of Bath’s many famous residents and visitors.
What do we know about Jane now? Have you ever heard about Jane Austen?
Horror Jane While doing the research on “Today’s Jane” we came across some quite surprising interpretations of Austen’s novels …
Jane and…sea monsters? ”The follow-up to Quirk Books' best seller, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is ... Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. The book expands the original text of the beloved Jane Austen novel with all-new scenes of giant lobsters, rampaging octopi, two-headed sea serpents, and other biological monstrosities. As the story opens, the Dashwood sisters are evicted from their childhood home and sent to live on a mysterious island full of savage creatures and dark secrets.”
While the world is going slightly mad…Jane Austen remains as popular as ever and is revered as much as any literary figure in the history of the English language. The Jane’s festivals, that are held in Bath, help people to enter the past and feel the magical atmosphere of Austen’s days.
