What to Read?

Jane was always reading. Her father, the reverend George Austen, had a library with over 500 volumes, and she often borrowed books from a circulating library. So, one step in my transformation to bring Jane to life must include reading what she read.

But where to begin?

Here letters are filled with references to books she was reading. Novels like Richardson's Sir Charles Grandison, or Fielding's Tom Jones, or Camilla, Evelina and Belinda by Fanny Burney and Maria Edgeworth, or The Mysteries of Udolpho and other of Mrs. Radcliffe's works, or Shakespeare's plays. Along with many other works of fiction. She seemed to find hours of amusement in laughing at the ill-written, or melodramatic novels - I should dedicate a post to that subject one day!

Synonymous with the Gothic novel!

She was not limited to fiction, and was familiar with writings such as Dr. Samuel Johnson's Dictionary, Sherlock's Sermons, the writer on the "picturesque"* movement, William Gilpin, and his travel essays (*this was looking at scenery from the mindset of how it would look in a picture), Robert Henry's History of Great Britain, An Essay on the Military Policy and Institutions of the British Empire by Captain Pasley, Henry Boswell's Life of Johnson and Tour to the Hebrides, Goldsmith's History of England, and on and on! So, she was quite well-informed.

A "picturesque" drawing by William Gilpin

She had some amusing thoughts on large history books which Northanger Abbey's Catherine seems to reveal when she says of historians that "to be at so much trouble in filling great volumes, which, as I used to think, nobody would willingly ever look into, to be labouring only for the torment of little boys and girls, always struck me as a hard fate."

Jane could always appreciate the good, but she could always see the ridiculous!

 

A book of Cowper's poems

She enjoyed poems by Alexander Pope, William Cowper (pronounced "Cooper"), George Crabbe, Sir Walter Scott, William Wordsworth, and the like. It seems she most enjoyed Cowper, for she quoted him often in her novels and letters. He loved nature, and in his poems I've read he many times praises the Creator for it. Someday I think I'll make a post sometime focusing on Jane and William Cowper, since she was definitely influenced by him.

So, "Where to begin," indeed!

I suppose a bit of each will do for a start.

 In a letter to her sister Cassandra she wrote of a book she was reading: Fitz-Albini by Thomas Egerton. In her typical amused tone, she said:

"...my father has bought it against my private wishes, for it does not quite satisfy my feelings that we should purchase the only one of Edgerton's works of which his family are ashamed. That the scruples, however, do not at all interfere with my reading it, you will easily believe. We have neither of us yet finished the first volume. My father is disappointed--I  am not, for I expected nothing better. Never did any book carry more internal evidence of its author. Every sentiment is completely Egerton's. There is very little story, and what is there is told in a strange, unconnected way. There are many characters introduced, apparently merely to be delineated. We have not been able to recognise any of them hitherto, except Dr and Mrs Hey and Mr Oxenden, who is not very tenderly treated."

She was twenty two years old when she wrote this! What a mind. She could see through everyone, including herself.

So I suppose I should immediately sit down and make some definite progress in Tom Jones and William Cowper's The Task. Alas, if only time would stop when I'm reading. Then I could read them all!

To further elaborate...

So what is going on, exactly?

I, Anna, have been cast as Jane Austen in the stage adaptation of 'Emma' by Sandra Fenichel Asher. Jane's role in this play is to tell the story of Emma to the audience, while she directs her characters with glee, affection and delight. As our director says, "Jane is the beat of this play." She begins and ends each important scene.

I had hoped to have the role of a character in the story, in order to bring their emotions and interactions with fellow characters to life. But now, I cannot imagine getting a better part than the creator of all these complex and true-to-life people! I have the privilege to be the woman who created my favorite hero, Mr. Knightley,  Emma, "faultless in spite of all her faults," the hysterically mistaken Mr. Elton, Miss Bates, who chats away in the same way as our next door neighbor might do, and all the rest: Mr. Woodhouse, John Knightley, Mr. Weston, Mrs. Elton, Jane Fairfax, Harriet Smith.

Now to the point of this blog: This is my journey to, through studying Jane Austen's life and her mind, portray her to an audience who has been exposed to (in my humble opinion) incorrect portrayals of what she was really like. I'm going to share my discoveries here. What I find, where I find it, and any purely inspiring words of the lady herself.

This is a serious responsibility. Who was Jane Austen, exactly? Some people think her a saint, some consider her to be concealing inappropriate descriptions in her writings left and right, some don't know anything about her! I want to show the world who Jane Austen was.