A profile of the life and times of Jane Austen by the author of Courtiers tours the classic author's childhood home, schools, holiday accommodations and grand and small family estates to reveal lesser-known aspects of Austen's character and inspirations.
Many readers think they know Jane Austen from her books and that we understand the books because of what we think know about their author.
Romance, love, the quest to marry well.
For generations of readers, this is trademark Jane Austen, but in Jane Austen at Home, historian and author Lucy Worsley asks us to pause and reconsider Jane and her works as more than an author failed at love and novels that center around the chase for domestic bliss.
It’s true that many women of Jane’s day sought security through marriage. This was nothing novel. But for Jane, the quest for home entailed more.
“For Jane, home was a perennial problem,” writes Worsley. Where could she afford to live, and when, amid myriad domestic duties, could she find the time to write?
The search for a happy home and a comfortable situation was an issue for many women of Austen’s day who were often vulnerable to displacement from home for various reasons. Many of Jane’s female protagonists share similar concerns. As Worsley explains, Jane Austen was uniquely positioned to write about women’s tenuous relationships with home.
And Jane’s purported failings at love?
She was a spinster by choice, not chance.
In Jane Austen at Home, Worsley looks at Jane Austen not through the windows of the elegant country houses that serve as a backdrop for many of the author’s most famous novels and some of English literature’s most famous romances.
She takes a more thorough look at Jane Austen, examining her family life, her relationship to her homes, and to her relationships with others.
What she finds is a Jane Austen who is markedly similar to the women of her day in some respects, but extraordinarily different and much more than she sometimes gets credit for.
Jane Austen at Home is recommended for Austen fans or those who enjoy a bit of literary history.
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Rating: *** Stars (I liked it) Reviewer: Katina, Area Librarian
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DISCOVER MORE WITH NOVELIST APPEALS! Jane Austen at Home
GENRE: Biographies; History Writing; Life Stories PACE: Leisurely Paced TONE: Impassioned; Strong Sense of Place WRITING STYLE: Engaging; Scholarly
LOCATION: England
TIME PERIOD: Georgian Era (1714 - 1837)
SUBJECT: Jane Austen; Boarding Schools; Home; Houses; Influence; Women Authors
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