Jane Austen Influences

The life of Jane Austen is a very interesting story and many would say that Jane Austen wasn’t like the rest. She was an English novelist who was not only successful but also very quiet about her writings and publishments; most of her novels were not open to the public during her lifetime. She was born on December 16th of the year 1775, and she was the seventh child to a well known clergyman and wife. Jane was not educated like most would be; she was homeschooled by her father. Her father had huge libraries in their home and this is what created the school-like feeling of the Austen estate. Jane was a normal, and a quiet young lady but also had the opportunities to live life in the greater world, by the access

Jane Austen was born on December 16, 1775, in the small Hampshire town of Steventon, to George and Cassandra Austen. She had one sister, Cassandra, whom she was particularly close to. The Austens were often described as a close-knit family, often reading novels together and performing home theatre. The sisters were sent to Reading Ladies' Boarding School, to obtain a formal education. However, both girls contracted typhus, which nearly killed Jane. They soon returned home due to financial reasons. Austen’s education was said not to be as adequate as her brothers’, though the sisters developed their literacy through their father’s vast library.

When it comes to literature, many things affect a reader’s comprehension of the story that is being told. Memory, symbol, and pattern give works of literature a deeper, more insightful meaning rather than a superficial one. When one finds a pattern in literature, it is able to give an understanding to the motives or personalities of characters. The patterns found in a work could also be giving insight into an author’s personality. In Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth Bennett is a strong willed, opinionated female in a time where women were supposed to be docile beings. She is not the only female throughout the literary work that is more outspoken than what would have been common practice of the time. Mrs. Bennett, Caroline Bingley, and Lady Catherine were all women who had their own views on how their life should have been run throughout Pride and Prejudice. This says a lot about what Jane Austin was like. She, in her own right, was more ambitious than women of her time because she was an author. The pattern of a strong female portrayed in Austin’s books shows Austin’s own belief on how women should be.

In the 1800s, Jane Austen, who is an accomplished author wrote the satirical novel Pride and Prejudice. One of the main character,Elizabeth Bennet, is a 20 year old girl who has five unmarried sisters, a crazy mother and a very unique look on marriage.During this novel, two of Elizabeth’s sisters: Lydia and Jane get married after they both faced an abundance of drama, which makes their eager mother every happy. After an awkward proposal, Elizabeth finds an extremely wealthy man, Mr. Darcy, who she shows hatred for, but then falls in love with him in the end. In Pride and Prejudice, Austen creates a satirical novel by exaggerating the qualities of some of her stereotypical characters to welcome the reader’s ridicule of them thereby exposing

By 1890, Godwin Smith, in the Life of Jane Austen, argued that there was little more to say about Austen than what her family recorded and made an important argument for her role as an authoress of manners, not romance. With the Romantic Movement still fresh in mind, the legacy that Austen holds today reads like an insult by her biographers. Similarly, A C. Bradley's 1911 essay, Jane Austen: A Lecture, continues the same condescending tone and rejection of Jane’s similarities to her contemporaries. While remarking on the enjoyable nature of her novels, he opens by saying that does not bind him to “rank her with the greatest novel-writers”. Jane’s writing largely concerns itself with humor and at a distant second, morality. This means she, as a humorist and moralist, does not stand out in the period beyond her gender. In comparison, her contemporaries outweigh her by their writing of natural states, rather than

Jane Austen had recorded a dwindling health previous to her death, as far back as early 1816, but she reportedly ignored all the difficulties, and continued to be and create what she had wanted from herself. However, due to great dearths of scientific advancement or recording of this period of time in England, her specific cause of death is still debated and unknown. Originally, Jane Austen was affected by Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, due to her recorded symptoms and commonness of this illness during this time. On the other hand, due to recent research by English scientist Katherine White of Britain’s Addison’s Disease Self Help Group, it may be presumed that Jane Austen died because of another life threatening condition. Because of Katherine White’s study, she was able to conclude that Jane may have also been just as likely to have died from Bovine Tuberculosis which had been caused by consumption of non-pasteurized milk or dairy projects. Katherine has been able to support her hypothesis by her symptoms and historical research of where Jane lived, and her possible diets of her life as well. Ultimately, Jane Austen died at forty-one years old, and had created six best selling and influential novels that would continue to influence and affect the world for much longer than her physical

Although Jane Austen is not flawless in her works, she manages to write brilliantly and successfully connects with her audience. This pleases many critics like Susan Fraiman who explains how Jane “was praised as a brilliant stylist, but one whose work was divorced from the larger concerns of the day and recognized as a critic of gender and class hierarchies”(Steinbach). Austen was one of the only females during the 1800s who was willing to speak for women and portray society’s wrongdoings. She mostly had a connection with women and was a harsh observer for the cultural limitations men had upon women during her era. For instance, in Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth and her sisters are pressured to get married to inherit the father’s estate and

This shows how influential her writing has become throughout the years. Austen’s writing opened the door for other writers to explore romantic literature. “J.K Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series, grew up reading Austen, who she described as ‘the pinnacle to which all other authors aspire’” (Redman). She inspires others, not only to write romance, but science fiction like Rowling has done. Her influence on the literature work is is astonishing considering she lived in the 1700’s. Many writers of that time are forgotten by most, but she has lived on way past her death. Austen is taught in high school and college English classes. She has been a huge inspiration for female writers as well. “Jane Austen is now thought of as one of the greatest English authors and considered by many as the first great woman novelist” (Jane Austen [b.1775-d. 1817]). Being considered as one of the first female novelist is a great accomplishment and a huge honor, it is a great shame the “creator” of romance did not get the recognition until after her death. She could have helped develop most extraordinary writers in her

JANE AUSTEN - Jane Austen was a reputed English novelist who was famous for writing romantic fiction and in the 19th century era earned an important place. She lived her whole life in the close knit family. She was not given very high education, was treated less by her father

The people around you are you biggest influences. Jane Austen had many men in her life that impacted her. The most influential were her brothers and suitors. Jane seemed to never be without a man, and she highly respected her brothers. She was said to be “a feminist before her time” (Hawkridge). She lived within her culture but did not let it define her. We see her family in many of the characters of her books, they have the same attributes and personalities. The men that influenced Jane, not only prompted her writings but have impacted many people through her stories.

She was apart of a “lower gentry” family, her parents, six brothers, and one sister (O'Connor, Kate). Her and her sister Cassandra were sent to Oxford to live with their cousin to be educated by a woman named Ann Cawley. “Neither Jane Austen, the creator of the brilliant stories of courtship, nor her sister ever married” (O’Connor, Kate). Two of her brothers were in the navy, one of her brothers was adopted by a fourth cousin, another became an Anglican clergyman, and one had a mental condition and was sent to live with a local family. Cassandra was Austen’s “closest friend and confidante throughout her life”(Wiki). Jane Austen read many books from their personal library and liked to draw and experiment in writing. At a young age, she was apart of private theatricals that were mostly comedies that were a part of her education. Jane wrote, at first, poems, plays, and stories for her family’s amusement. Eventually that lead to her famous books and works known by many today. “Her family's steadfast support was critical to Austen's development as a professional writer” (Wiki). Her writings rose above the restrictions that were placed on women of her

Pride and Prejudice is one of the most popular novels written by Jane Austen. This romantic novel, the story of which revolves around relationships and the difficulties of being in love, was not much of a success in Austen's own time. However, it has grown in its importance to literary critics and readerships over the last hundred years. There are many facets to the story that make reading it not only amusing but also highly interesting. The reader can learn much about the upper-class society of this age, and also gets an insight to the author's opinion about this society. Austen presents the high-society of her time from an observational point of view, ironically describing human behavior. She describes what she sees and adds her own

Jane Austen was a very talented author who wrote many interesting novels. She became very interested in writing when she was a little girl, because her older sister began taking a writing class. Jane is best known for her novels Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. Even though her books were not popular when she was a teenager, Jane decided that it was the job for her and continued to live her dream. Pride and Prejudice was one of the first books in the world to be published anonymously. She inspired people all around the world with her stories, because she put emotion, feelings, thoughts, and hidden secrets about her life in them. She made a big impact on society and the world we live in now.

The Austen children grew up extremely close to one another. In particular, Jane was extremely close to her only sister Cassandra, who was two years her senior. A classic Austen family story by the two girls’ mother included the line that “if Cassandra were to have her head chopped off, Jane would demand that privilege too” (Concise Dictionary of British Literary Biography 3). Growing up, the two girls were roommates and best friends. Many scholars and historians conclude that Austen’s literary themes between sisters in her novels parallel her own relationship with her sister Cassandra.

Many people know Jane Austen to be one of the most well known names in literature’s history. She is known for her classic romance novels. At home, she had much support on the creative front of writing. Her father and mother were supportive of any creative endeavors their children would go through. Jane was born on December sixteenth of 1775 to George Austen who married Cassandra of the Leigh family. Together they had eight children and only two of them were girls. Mr. Austen was a Reverend of Steventon rectory. During Jane’s childhood, her father did many things to help the growing family financially. He did his best to teach the family himself and tried farming as an alternative method to gain money.