top of page
Journalist and author
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
Search
Cat person
A cheerful story with a political angle—and a Jane Austen twist! On the eve of Election Day here in the stressed-out, locked-down,...
Deborah Yaffe
Nov 2, 2020
Yum
Twenty-five years ago today, the BBC’s beloved adaptation of Pride and Prejudice began airing on UK TV. By the time the show made its way...
Deborah Yaffe
Sep 23, 2020
Cock-a-doodle-doo
In vain have I struggled. It will not do. Even though it bears no relation to anything else going on in Jane Austen World, you must allow...
Deborah Yaffe
Sep 16, 2020
Mr. Darcy, harasser?
Jane Austen has been used and abused in so many different ways by now, pressed into service to sell everything from perfume to romance...
Deborah Yaffe
Aug 5, 2020
Greatest Hits, Part II
As I have pointed out rather often, most recently earlier this week, the Internet is filled with quotes from filmed adaptations of Jane...
Deborah Yaffe
Jul 31, 2019
What's your name again?
It’s always enjoyable when the mass media provide opportunities for us Janeites to snark about everyone else’s Austen ignorance. Today’s...
Deborah Yaffe
Feb 18, 2019
On this day in 1813. . .
Thirty-third in an occasional series of excerpts from Jane Austen's letters. Although Jane Austen was, famously, not a big fan of Bath,...
Deborah Yaffe
May 23, 2018
Jane Austen, romance novels, and a chihuahua
Jane Austen’s relationship to the romance novel is a vexed topic. For every article calling her the founding mother of the genre (or...
Deborah Yaffe
Jan 25, 2018
Mr. Darcy, eating out of your hand
Some years ago, I attended a picnic sponsored by my local branch of the Jane Austen Society of North America, to which a fellow JASNA...
Deborah Yaffe
Jan 11, 2018
Darcy in D.C.
“The new Darcy Hotel. . . is named for that taciturn hero of Jane Austen’s,” the Washington Times wrote earlier this month, at the outset...
Deborah Yaffe
Jun 18, 2017
Book covers
Jane Austen and sex: By now, you’ve heard all the arguments. 1. She’s a sex-free zone, where female modesty and male decorum are prized...
Deborah Yaffe
May 7, 2017
Context is everything
Once or twice in the past, I have mentioned my aversion to lists of Jane Austen quotes – or mugs with Jane Austen quotes, or, indeed, any...
Deborah Yaffe
Feb 27, 2017
bottom of page