Deborah YaffeApr 5, 2021Austenian medical mysteryJane Austen’s death is tragic, because she died at only forty-one, at the height of her artistic powers. It’s also mysterious – the...
Deborah YaffeMay 28, 2020On this day in 1817. . .Fifty-fifth in an occasional series of excerpts from Jane Austen's letters. I recently finished reading my eighth biography of Jane...
Deborah YaffeMay 27, 2019On this day in 1817. . .Forty-fourth in an occasional series of excerpts from Jane Austen's letters. In May of 1817, the gravely ill Jane Austen left her home...
Deborah YaffeJan 24, 2019On this day in 1817. . .Forty-first in an occasional series of excerpts from Jane Austen's letters. Only hindsight makes anything remarkable out of the letter...
Deborah YaffeJul 23, 2018The price of Austen tourismLast summer, not long after the July 18 bicentenary of Jane Austen’s death, officials in the English town of Basingstoke announced that...
Deborah YaffeAug 24, 2017Benefits for BasingstokeJane Austen was never squeamish about money-making. In a November 1814 letter to her niece Fanny Knight (#114 in Deirdre Le Faye’s...
Deborah YaffeJul 17, 2017Six booksTomorrow marks the anniversary that we all – or, at least, all those of us who are Janeites – have been waiting for since 2017 dawned:...
Deborah YaffeJul 6, 2017Austen laurelsD-Day for Janeites – aka July 18, the bicentenary of Jane Austen’s untimely death – is approaching quickly, and a number of UK outlets...
Deborah YaffeJun 26, 2017Coins and benchesLast fall, you’ll recall, the English town of Basingstoke, located not far from Jane Austen’s final home at Chawton, decided to...
Deborah YaffeMay 18, 2017Tragic forty-oneForty-one is a tragic number for Janeites – the all-too-young age at which Jane Austen left this world exactly two centuries ago, at the...
Deborah YaffeMay 1, 2017Jane lies in WinchesterNow that this Austen bicentenary year is in full swing, the announcements of commemorative events pegged to the July 18 anniversary of...
Deborah YaffeApr 27, 2017Refighting the winning battleBarely is the metaphorical ink dry on my recent blog post lamenting all the great UK Jane Austen bicentenary events that we American...