Life 12/13

The Line of Thought

. . . to dream over books and loiter at street corners and let the line of thought dip deep into the stream.

--Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own

The Austen Catch-Up Project: John Halperin

Work on Jane Austen, whether biography or literary criticism, arrays itself along a spectrum whose poles might be labeled Jolly Jane and...

Deborah Yaffe

Apr 17, 2016

The Austen Catch-Up Project: Elizabeth Jenkins

For someone who led such a short, uneventful life, and one about which comparatively little is known, Jane Austen has inspired a...

Deborah Yaffe

Mar 30, 2016

On this day in 1814. . .

Eleventh in an occasional series of excerpts from Jane Austen’s letters Henry Austen, the fourth-oldest of Jane Austen’s seven siblings,...

Deborah Yaffe

Mar 3, 2016

A big anniversary, one year early

This past weekend saw the kickoff of Jane Austen 200, the Hampshire, England, commemoration of the bicentennial of Jane Austen’s death....

Deborah Yaffe

Jan 11, 2016

On this day in 1814. . .

Ninth in an occasional series of excerpts from Jane Austen’s letters. We know so little of Jane Austen’s views on nearly everything that...

Deborah Yaffe

Nov 30, 2015

On this day in 1805. . .

Seventh in an occasional series of excerpts from Jane Austen’s letters. One of the pleasures of reading Jane Austen’s letters to her...

Deborah Yaffe

Aug 23, 2015

Recapturing Austen's physicality

Janeites never tire of speculating about Austen’s appearance (see here and here for examples), despite – or perhaps because of – the...

Deborah Yaffe

Jul 12, 2015

On this day in 1816. . .

Sixth in an occasional series of excerpts from Jane Austen’s letters By all accounts, Jane Austen was an exceptional aunt, and she had a...

Deborah Yaffe

Jul 8, 2015

On this day in 1801. . .

Fifth in an occasional series of excerpts from Jane Austen’s letters. Reading Jane Austen’s letters – as I do for this occasional blog...

Deborah Yaffe

May 20, 2015

Cassandra's grief

Cassandra Austen gets a bad rap from Janeites. As I’ve noted before, many of us just can’t forgive her for burning who-knows-how-many of...

Deborah Yaffe

May 3, 2015

On this day in 1817. . .

Fourth in an occasional series of excerpts from Jane Austen’s letters The letter-like document that Jane Austen addressed to her sister,...

Deborah Yaffe

Apr 26, 2015

A promising cache

We Janeites are starved for material about Jane Austen’s sadly underdocumented life. We’re not unreasonably demanding! Doesn’t have to be...

Deborah Yaffe

Jan 29, 2015