Jane Austen
(1775-1817)
Performer - Culture & Literature
Marina Spiazzi, Marina Tavella,
Margaret Layton © 2012
Jane Austen
1. Jane Austen’s life
• Born in Steventon in Hampshire in 1775.
• Her father was the rector of the local church.
• Spent her life within the circle of her affectionate
family.
• Her sister Cassandra was
her lifelong companion.
• Educated at home by her
father.
• Showed an interest in
literature at an early age.
The cottage in Chawton where Jane Austen lived the last
years of her life. Now it is Jane Austen’s House Museum
Performer - Culture & Literature
Jane Austen
1. Jane Austen’s life
• Her earliest writings date from 1787.
• After her father’s death the family settled in Chawton,
a small country village.
• There she produced her
most mature works.
• Died in Winchester
in 1817.
The cottage in Chawton where Jane Austen lived the last
years of her life. Now it is Jane Austen’s House Museum.
Performer - Culture & Literature
Jane Austen
2. Main works
• Northanger Abbey, written in
1798 but published
posthumously.
• Sense and Sensibility (1811).
• Pride and Prejudice (1813).
• Mansfield Park (1814).
• Emma (1816).
• Persuasion (1818, after her
death).
Portrait of Jane Austen
Performer - Culture & Literature
Jane Austen
3. The debt to the
18th-century novel
From the 18th-century novelists she learnt:
• the
insight
into
the
psychology
of the characters;
• the
subtleties
of
the
ordinary
events
of
life

balls,
walks,
tea-parties
and visits;
• the omniscient narrator;
• the technique of dialogue;
• the use of verbal and situational irony.
Performer - Culture & Literature
Jane Austen
4. The national marriage market
• Austen’s values: property, decorum, money and
marriage.
• Austen’s England: based on the possession of land,
parks and country houses.
• Marriage: result of the growing social mobility.
• The marriage market takes place in London, Bath and
some seaside resorts.
• Gossip, flirtations, seductions, adulteries happen in
these places.
• The marriage market produces a range of villains:
unscrupulous relatives, seducers and social climbers.
Performer - Culture & Literature
Jane Austen
5. The theme of love
In Austen’s novels
•No place for great passion.
•Concern
with
of character and conduct.
•Romantic element of happy
ending  marriage between
the hero and heroine.
•Focus on the steps through
which the hero / heroine
reaches this stage.
Performer - Culture & Literature
analysis
Jane Austen
6. Pride and Prejudice (1813)
• Set in Longbourn,
Hertfordshire.
• Mr and Mrs Bennet
and their five daughters
(Jane, Elizabeth, Mary,
Lydia and Kitty).
• Mr Bingley, a rich
bachelor, rents the large estate of Netherfield Park
nearby.
• Mr Bingley falls in love with Jane Bennet.
• His friend Mr Darcy, a proud aristocrat, feels attracted
to Elizabeth.
• Elizabeth cultivates a dislike of Mr Darcy.
Performer - Culture & Literature
Jane Austen
6. Pride and Prejudice (1813)
• Mr Darcy proposes to Elizabeth but she rejects him.
• She accuses him of separating Jane and Mr Bingley.
• She accuses him of ill-treating Mr Wickham, a young
officer.
• Darcy writes her a letter
to reveal that Wickham
is an adventurer without
scruples.
Performer - Culture & Literature
Jane Austen
6. Pride and Prejudice (1813)
•
•
•
•
Wickham elopes with Lydia.
Darcy finds them and organises their marriage.
Elizabeth accepts Darcy’s renewed proposal.
Bingley and Jane also get married.
Performer - Culture & Literature
Jane Austen
6. Pride and Prejudice (1813)
Themes
•The relationship between the individual and society.
•The conflict between the individual’s desires and the
individual’s responsibility to society.
•The use that the individual
makes of freedom and its
consequences.
•The contrast between
imagination and reason.
•Love, courtship, and
marriage.
Performer - Culture & Literature
Jane Austen
7. Elizabeth and Darcy
Elizabeth Bennet
• has a lively mind;
• is capable of complex
impressions and ideas;
• has a strong spirit of
independence;
• refuses to take on the
roles which her family
or society tries to
impose on her;
• accuses Darcy of pride.
Performer - Culture & Literature
Fitzwilliam Darcy
•knows the principles of
right conduct;
•is selfish and unsociable;
•accuses Elizabeth of
prejudice;
•is prejudiced by his
upbringing and disgusted
by the vulgar behaviour of
Elizabeth’s mother and
younger sisters.
Jane Austen
8. The message of the novel
The search for a
balance
through
the gradual change of
the main traits of the
characters’ personality
leads to
a reconciliation of the
themes that they
represent.
Performer - Culture & Literature
Jane Austen
9. The Novel of Manners
Jane Austen is the undisputed master of the
novel of manners.
Premise
Performer - Culture & Literature
there is a vital
relationship between
manners, social
behaviour and
character
Jane Austen
9. The Novel of Manners
Main features
•Set in upper- and middle-class society.
•Influence of class distinctions on character.
•Visits, balls, teas as occasions for joining up.
•Main themes: marriage, the complications of love and
friendship.
•Third-person narrator.
•Dialogue: the main narrative mode.
•Passions and emotions not expressed directly.
•Use of irony.
Performer - Culture & Literature