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Jane Austen Outtakes

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Character and personality

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What kind of a person was Jane Austen? Her brother Frank described Austen as generally "cheerful and not easily irritated," reserved with strangers but open and kindly to those with whom she felt close and comfortable.[1] Henry Austen, in his Biographical Notice of the Author published with Northanger Abbey and Persuasion in 1817, said that "[o]f personal attractions she possessed a considerable share. Her stature was that of true elegance....Her carriage and deportment were quiet, yet graceful. Her features....produced an unrivalled expression of that cheerfulness, sensibility, and benevolence, which were her real characteristics....She never uttered either a hasty, a silly, or a severe expression. In short, her temper was as polished as her wit....She was tranquil without reserve or stiffness; and communicative without intrusion or self-sufficiency."[2]

Her nephew James Edward Austen-Leigh portrayed Austen as a quiet, domesticated, middle-aged maiden aunt in his book A Memoir of Jane Austen, which he published in 1870 based on his own memories and those of his sisters Anna and Caroline. Looking back, they remembered her gentleness and good humor, and her ability to entertain younger children with stories and conversation.[3]

Based on accumulated family papers and family tradition, William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh, grandson and great grandnephew of her brother James, gave a more rounded picture of her in 1913. They noted that the Memoirs reflected the experiences of her nephew and nieces, who had known her only in her later years. They felt that the uneventful nature of Jane Austen's life had been exaggerated. "Quiet it certainly was; but the quiet life of a member of a large family in England of that date was compatible with a good deal of stirring incident, happening, if not to herself, at all events to those who were nearest to her, and who commanded her deepest sympathies....the emotional and romantic side of her nature—a very real one—has not been dwelt upon."[4] The Austen-Leighs compared Jane Austen to her sister Cassandra as having a sunnier temperament and being more open with her feelings.[5] They wrote of Austen's "inveterate playfulness" and of her willingness in private to "pass criticism, impute motives, and imagine circumstances which would have been very far from her nature" when discussing others.[6] The Austen-Leighs devoted a chapter to Jane Austen's special qualities as an aunt to her nieces Anna and Fanny, a role that Austen apparently took quite seriously. They quoted extensively letters from Austen to her nieces providing advice as to relationships and constructive criticism of their writings.[7]

Claire Tomalin agrees with much of this but adds complexity and contours to this picture. Tomalin describes Austen as attractive, intelligent, active, tough and unsentimental with " a ferocious style of humor," but also reports the opinion of her cousin Philadelphia that Jane Austen as a thirteen year old child was "whimsical and affected," "not at all pretty" and "very prim." To Tomalin, this "suggest[s] that Jane did not conform to the conventional pattern of girlhood." One of the neighbors who had known her from childhood said that Austen was "certainly pretty . . . very lively & full of humor." As an adolescent and an adult, Austen was not much concerned with style in clothes.[8] Her niece Fanny, late in life, described Jane Austen in unflattering terms: she "was not so refined as she ought to have been from her talent....[the Austens] were not rich & the people around with whom they chiefly mixed, were not at all high bred, or in short anything more than mediocre & they of course tho' superior in mental powers & cultivation were on the same level as refinement goes....[Jane and Cassandra] were very much below par as to good Society & its ways."[9] Beginning late in 1798, Austen learned to enjoy walking alone in the countryside and, later, sea bathing. Tomalin describes Austen as an adult as cautious with strangers, enamoured of routine and suspicious of change, ready to laugh at herself and at others, and almost always well-defended against displaying her feelings.[10]

Park Honan also describes Austen as a very private person with strong psychological defenses, dependent on her sister Cassandra and her family and with a strong preference for "quiet places and simple and sane routines." To her family, Honan says, Austen could appear all "fun and charm" but with people she did not know, she often appeared stiff and forbidding.[11] Honan also points out that behind Austen's reserve with strangers lay strong and sometimes darker feelings and opinions about others. "There is no greater contrast in Jane Austen's writings than between her sharp, comically malicious letters and the Christian prayers she composed." In Chawton, in private with Cassandra, she was critical of her neighbors "and turned a number of them 'into ridicule.'"[12]

According to Austen's family, she practiced an unostentatious but consistent and mainstream Anglican faith. Austen attended services regularly, composed prayers and read sermons devotedly. Her letters show someone who valued holy communion, disapproved of religiosity, took a relatively liberal view of standards of religious conduct and tended later in life to view Evangelicals with more warmth than before. They also suggest that Austen's religious seriousness increased as she grew older, particularly in the last ten years of her life. [13] Austen took seriously her Christian duty of charity, making donations to families in the village from her own very limited funds.[14]

Works

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For Salvage

Jane Austen's works fall into two categories: work intended for publication and work she intended to share only with her immediate family and close friends. In the former category are Austen's six published novels -- Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Emma, Persuasion, Northanger Abbey -- an uncompleted novel fragment entitled The Watsons, and the first twelve chapters of a final novel, tentatively titled The Brothers and known now as Sanditon, left uncompleted at her death. In the latter category fall Austen's letters, the collection of early writings now known as the Juvenalia, a short play entitled Sir Charles Grandison or the happy Man, the earliest versions of Elinor and Marianne (published later as Sense and Sensibility) and First Impressions (published later as Pride and Prejudice), Austen's Plan of a Novel, According to Hints From Various Quarters, and Lady Susan, a short epistolary novel.[15]

Determined to publish, Austen began to revise Sense and Sensibility and prepare it for publication shortly after settling at Chawton. She approached a London publisher, Thomas Egerton, with the manuscript through her brother Henry, who had prior dealings with Egerton. Egerton agreed to publish the book "on commission"[16] and began setting type. By March 1811, Jane was correcting proofs. The process of publication took much longer than Jane expected—publishing "on commission" meant that the publisher had less incentive to produce a book for sale quickly. Sense and Sensibility was published on 30 October 1811, in an edition of about 750 copies,[17] anonymously.[18] Reviews were favorable (there were two) and the novel became fashionable among opinion-makers; it sold out by the middle of 1813. Austen cleared a profit of £140, which provided her with some financial and psychological independence.[19]

In the last quarter of 1812, Austen sold the copyright for Pride and Prejudice to Egerton for £110, and that book was published on 28 January 1813 in an edition of about 1,000 copies. Egerton advertised it widely and it was an immediate success, garnering three favorable reviews and selling well, so that by October 1813, Egerton was able to begin selling a second edition of about 750 copies. [20]

Facsimile title page of Northanger Abbey and Persuasion, published together after Jane Austen's death, which still did not bear her name (1817-18).

In the meantime, based on the acceptance of Sense and Sensibility for publication, Austen began work on the manuscript of Mansfield Park in 1811. By the time Pride and Prejudice was published on 28 January 1813, Mansfield Park was more than half completed. Austen submitted the final manuscript to Egerton for publication on commission late in 1813 or early in 1814[21] and the book was published on 9 May 1814 in an edition of about 1,250 copies. While Mansfield Park was ignored by reviewers, it was a great success with the public; all copies were sold within six months, and Austen's profit was about £310, larger than for any of her other books.[22] While Austen worked on the proofs of Mansfield Park to ready it for publication, she began work on Emma in January 1814, finishing writing it in March 1815. Austen's publisher, Thomas Egerton, advised against publishing a second edition of Mansfield Park and evidently failed to make a satisfactory offer for Emma; Austen decided to move to another better known publisher, John Murray. Murray offered to publish Emma and a second edition of Mansfield Park and to purchase the copyrights for Emma, Mansfield Park and Sense and Sensibility outright for £450. Based on her brother Henry's advice, Austen refused this offer and agreed to publish "on commission" in the usual way. Murray published Emma at the end of December 1815 in an edition of 2,000 copies; the second edition of Mansfield Park appeared on 19 February 1816. Emma sold reasonably well (although it did not sell out) and made profits of about £221 but the new edition of Mansfield Park did not and the costs associated with this failure (about £182) offset most of the profits Austen would otherwise have received from Emma. Unsold copies of both novels were remaindered in January 1821.[23]

On 8 August 1815, during the period in which Emma was "in the press," Austen began to write The Elliots (published after her death as Persuasion). She completed the first draft on 18 July 1816, after the first signs of her illness appeared. In addition, shortly after the publication of Emma in December 1815, Henry reclaimed the manuscript of Susan (later published as Northanger Abbey) from B. Crosby & Company, repaying the £10 which Crosby had paid for publishing rights in 1803. Austen was forced to postpone publishing either of these completed novels by the family financial troubles discussed above.[24] Austen became dissatisfied with the ending of The Elliots and, in spite of her illness, rewrote the two final chapters, finishing them on 6 August 1816. The manuscript of the revised final chapters is the only manuscript for any of Austen's published novels in her own handwriting that survived. On 27 January 1817, Austen began work on a new novel (later titled Sanditon upon its first publication in 1925) and completed twelve chapters before stopping work on 18 March 1817, probably because her illness prevented her from continuing. None of these works could be published during her lifetime.[25]

Northanger/Persuasion published by Murray in 1,750 sets.[26]

Footnotes

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  1. ^ Quoted in Honan, p. 209.
  2. ^ Henry Austen, Biographical Notice of the Author, in Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey (Susan Fraiman, editor), W. W. Norton & Company (New York, 2004) [ISBN 0-393-97850-8], pp. 190-196.
  3. ^ Le Fay, "Memoirs and Biographies," p. 53; Lascelles, pp. 27-28.
  4. ^ Austen-Leigh and Austen-Leigh, pp. vi-vii.
  5. ^ Austen-Leigh and Austen-Leigh, p. 51.
  6. ^ Austen-Leigh and Austen-Leigh, p. 83.
  7. ^ Austen-Leigh and Austen-Leigh, pp. 341-368.
  8. ^ Tomalin, pp. 30-31, 39-40, 60, 108-111.
  9. ^ Quoted in Tomalin, pp. 134-135.
  10. ^ Tomalin, pp. 145-146, 173-174, 177-178.
  11. ^ Honan, p. 184-185, 354-355. Honan points out that during the last year or two at Chawton, some of this may have been a side-effect of Austen's illness. Honan, p. 355.
  12. ^ Honan, pp. 124-126, 255, 265-266.
  13. ^ Gary Kelly, "Religion and Politics," in The Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen, pp. 152-153; MacDonagh, pp. 4-7; Honan, pp. 27, 255; Tomalin, pp. 139-140.
  14. ^ Tomalin, p. 98, 143; Honan, p. 267.
  15. ^ Sutherland, pp. 12-15, 18; Honan, p. 91-92.
  16. ^ That is, at Austen's financial risk. During this period, novelists had four options for publication: (1) by subscription, (2) by profit-sharing, (3) by selling the copyright, and (4) on commission. Publication by subscription, an older method, was declining at this time, because it was cumbersome and didn't always reward authors, although it reduced the economic risks to the author and publisher associated with publication by assuring the existence of market demand before expenses of publication were incurred. Profit-sharing was a new practice in the early 19th Century—the publisher covered the costs of publication and repaid himself for costs as books were sold, splitting profits with the author and absorbing losses himself. Selling the copyright to a novel was the most prestigious and desirable option for authors, who would be paid the agreed amount a year after publication whether the novel was a success or not, but was offered by publishers only where they were certain a work would be successful with the public. When publishing on commission, publishers would advance the costs of publication, repay themselves as books were sold and then charge a commission for each book sold, paying the rest to the author. If a novel did not recover its costs through sales, the author was responsible for them. For a successful novel, this option was the most remunerative for authors, but also the riskiest for them, and probably relatively uncommon. Fergus, "The Professional Woman Writer," pp. 15-17; James Raven, "Book Production," in Jane Austen in Context, p. 198; Honan, pp. 285-286.
  17. ^ Jane Austen's novels were published in larger editions than was normal for this period. The small size of the novel-reading public and the large costs associated with hand production (particularly the cost of hand-made paper) meant that most novels were published in editions of 500 copies or less, in order to reduce the risks to the publisher and the novelist. Even some of the most successful titles during this period were issued in editions of not more than 750 or 800 copies and later reprinted if demand continued. It is not clear whether the decision to print more copies than usual of Jane Austen's novels was driven by the publishers or the author. Since all but one of Jane Austen's books were originally published "on commission," the risks of overproduction were largely hers (or Cassandra's after her death) and publishers may have been more willing to produce larger editions than was normal practice when their own funds were at risk. Editions of popular works of non-fiction were often much larger. For more information and a discussion of the economics of book publishing during this period, see Fergus, "The Professional Woman Writer," p. 18, and Raven, "Book Production," pp. 196-203.
  18. ^ In advertising, the author was identified as "A Lady," "Lady —" or "Lady A—". Honan, p. 287.
  19. ^ Honan, pp. 289-290, Tomalin, p. 218.
  20. ^ This was the second and last time that Jane Austen sold the copyright to one of her works outright rather than publishing on commission. She previously sold the copyright to Susan to Richard Crosby, but that novel was not published (and then on commission) until Austen repurchased the copyright from him. Sutherland, pp. 16-17, 21; Le Fay, "Chronology," pp. 8-9; Fergus, "The Professional Woman Writer," pp. 19-23; Tomalin, pp. 210-212, 216-220; Honan, p. 287.
  21. ^ Le Fay in "Chronology," p. 9, suggests November 1813 during a trip back through London from her brother Edward's Kent estates, while Fergus in "The Professional Woman Writer," p. 23, estimates January 1814.
  22. ^ Le Fay, "Chronology," p. 9; Fergus, "The Professional Woman Writer," pp. 22-24; Sutherland, pp. 18-19; Tomalin, pp. 236, 240-241, 315 (footnote 5).
  23. ^ Le Fay, "Chronology," pp. 8-9; Sutherland, pp. 16-21; Fergus, "The Professional Woman Writer," pp. 23-27, 30 (Footnote 29), 31 (Footnote 33); Fergus, "Biography," p. 10; Tomalin, p. 256.
  24. ^ Le Fay, "Chronology," pp. 6, 10; Fergus, "The Professional Woman Writer," pp. 26-27; Tomalin, pp. 252-254.
  25. ^ Le Fay, "Chronology," pp. 10-11; Fergus, "The Professional Woman Writer," pp. 26-28; Sutherland, p. 19, 22; Tomalin, pp. 255-256, 261.
  26. ^ Tomalin, p. 272, 321 (Footnotes 1 and 3); David Gilson, "Editions and Publishing History," in The Jane Austen Companion, pp. 136-137.
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