: Jane Austen's House
: A Jane Austen Year Celebrating 250 years of Jane Austen
: Pitkin
: 9781837330317
: 1
: CHF 16.20
:
: Biographien, Autobiographien
: English
: 208
: Wasserzeichen
: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
: ePUB
This beautifully illustrated book charts the life, works and legacy of one of the world's most beloved authors, offering a seasonal guide to Jane Austen's life through the objects that surrounded her, the personal letters and manuscripts that she created, and the events that shaped her life and understanding. It is created by Jane Austen's House - the enchanting Hampshire cottage where her genius flourished, now a museum that attracts tens of thousands of visitors every year - and reveals highlights from the museum's collection. Arranged over the course of a calendar year, from snowy scenes in January to festive recipes in December, specially commissioned photography of Austen's home and possessions are brought together with extracts from her books, reproductions of her letters, and stories of her life throughout the seasons. Highlights include affectionate letters to her sister Cassandra, the story of the publication of the first edition of Pride and Prejudice, and the 'topaze crosses' that inspired Mansfield Park. Read this book for a unique and intimate insight into Jane Austen's world. Dip into it as you will, or visit each month, and enjoy a full year of Austen - her life, works and letters, people and objects she knew, and of course her idyllic, inspiring home.

Jane Austen's House is the inspiring Hampshire cottage where the beloved author lived for the last eight years of her life. It houses an unparalleled collection of Austen treasures. Highlights include Jane's jewellery, letters, first editions of her novels and the table at which she wrote her much-loved books. Visitors can step back in time to 1816 and follow in Jane's footsteps as they explore the rooms where she lived and wrote. It has been open to the public as a museum since 1949.

In January 1776, when Jane was just a few weeks old, the Hampshire naturalist Gilbert White described the winter weather in his diary:

‘January 7th. — Snow driving all day, which was followed by frost, sleet, and some snow, till the 12th, when a prodigious mass overwhelmed all the works of men, drifting over the tops of the gates and filling the hollow lanes.’

A TRIP TO LONDON


Jane Austen is famously precise about dates in her novels. In Sense and Sensibility,the Dashwood sisters’ trip to London takes place ‘in the first week in January’ – just at the start of the London Season.

They were three days on their journey, and Marianne’s behaviour as they travelled was a happy specimen of what future complaisance and companionableness to Mrs. Jennings might be expected to be. She sat in silence almost all the way, wrapt in her own meditations, and scarcely ever voluntarily speaking, except when any object of picturesque beauty within their view drew from her an exclamation of delight exclusively addressed to her sister. To atone for this conduct therefore, Elinor took immediate possession of the post of civility which she had assigned herself, behaved with the greatest attention to Mrs. Jennings, talked with her, laughed with her, and listened to her whenever she could; and Mrs. Jennings on her side treated them both with all possible kindness, was solicitous on every occasion for their ease and enjoyment, and only disturbed that she could not make them choose their own dinners at the inn, nor extort a confession of their preferring salmon to cod, or boiled fowls to veal cutlets. They reached town by three o’clock the third day, glad to be released, after such a journey, from the confinement of a carriage, and ready to enjoy all the luxury of a good fire.

The house was handsome, and handsomely fitted up, and the young ladies were immediately put in possession of a very comfortable apartment. It had formerly been Charlotte’s, and over the mantelpiece still hung a landscape in coloured silks of her performance, in proof of her having spent seven years at a great school in town to some effect.

As dinner was not to be ready in less than two hours from their arrival, Elinor determined to employ the interval in writing to her mother, and sat down for that purpose. In a few moments Marianne did the same. ‘I am writing home, Marianne,’ said Elinor; ‘had not you better defer your letter for a day or two?’

‘I am not going to write to my mother,’ replied Marianne, hastily, and as if wishing to avoid any farther inquiry. Elinor said no more; it immediately struck her tha