A Comprehensive Autobiography of Jane Austen - Getting Closer to God's Voice 1985

Jane Austen was born in the village of Steventon in Hampshire. She was one of eight children of a clergyman. In 1801, the family moved to Bath. They have moved around several times after her father’s in 1805. Her family finally settled down in Chawton ten years later. 

 

Jane Austen began writing when she was just 12. Jane even wrote a collection of textbook parodies when she was just 16. Jane’s father named George Austen, who had an immense library at home. Jane Austen was an avid reader. It is said that her father attempted to get Jane’s works published. Women were not allowed to sign contracts on their own. They have to earn permission from their father or husband.  Jane’s brother Henry helped her negotiate with a publisher about her first novel, ‘Sense and Sensibility.’

 

Significantly, Jane Austen published all her works anonymously. Her first novel was simply “A Lady,” and her later book Pride and Prejudice were credited to “the Author of Sense and Sensibility.” She didn’t reveal her true name until after her death! Her two novels, ‘Persuasion’ and ‘Northanger Abbey’ were published posthumously and her final novel was left unfinished. 

It is said that publishers refused her work when her father was alive. Mr. Austen took the first draft of Pride and Prejudice (originally called First Impressions) to the London publisher Thomas Cadell. Learning the book was written by George’s daughter, the publisher refused to read it. Austen ultimately paid a publisher to publish her work by paying a commission on any copies sold.

 

 

Austen is the author of 7 novels, including Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Emma, Northanger Abbey and  Persuasion. Only 4 of these novels were published while she was still alive, ranging from Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park to Emma. With the publication of Persuasion and Northanger Abbey in particular, her brother Henry wrote a “Biographical Note,”  identifying Austen as the author. Her second novel ‘Pride and Prejudice’ was described as her “own darling child,” which received highly favorable reviews from the mainstream public. It is said that ‘Emma’ was dedicated to the prince regent, an admirer of her book.

 

 

Jane Austen Never Get Married

In 1793, Austen and her sister Cassandra were sent to live with their aunt. She and her sisters attended Abbey School, which was a boarding school for females. 

 

She lived in a society where women married young. Being an astute observer of love relationship and marriage, Jane Austen got marriage proposals for more than once but she rejected the chances.  It is said one of her aunts warned her not to marry too hastily. 

 

Like her heroines, Austen was witty and pretty. Marriage was an economy-oriented affair that women got married looking for a  financially stable life. Women’s wealth level, social status and life quality were tied up in the marriage market. Most women was not allowed to marry for love but for economic considerations. 

 

It is said that Jane Austen had no dowry because her father had financial difficulties. In 1795, she met Tom Lefroy who turned out to an Irish nephew of a family friend. He piqued the 19-year-old Jane’s interest. She attended several parties with him and she wrote about him to her sister, Cassandra. They had visited several balls and she probably received an offer of marriage from Tom Lefroy. But the youthful romance was soon cut short. Lefroy came from an affluent family. If he married a woman who is situated in a lower social circle, he would lose his inheritance. Indeed, Lefroy moved back to Ireland and became Ireland’s most senior judge later in his life.

 

After Tom Lefroy, Austen had a summer romance with a clergyman in Devon in 1801.  He made plans to visit Austen family but he died before he could make it happen.  In 1802, 27-year-old Jane encountered Harris Bigg-Wither, a brother of her friends, when she visiting her friends. Bigg-Wither was six years junior to Jane Austen.  It is said that the day after accepting Bigg-Wither’s proposal, Jane broke the engagement. I suppose she wasn’t deeply in love with him and she initially accepted his proposal out of social pressure.  

 

Years later she told  her niece, “Nothing can be compared to the misery of being bound without Love.” 

 

Evidently, she didn’t want to rush into marriage. Or, she foresees the perils of marrying without solid intimacy and understanding.  I resonate with her idea that “happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance.” We can barely know much about a person if he/she attempts to hide something from you on purpose in the very first place. 

 

Her sister Cassandra loss her fiancé and death was the cause of separation. Jane and Cassandra were financially dependent on their families. Their life experience taught them that it might not a brilliant idea to be financially reliant on men.  It takes time and effort to maintain a marriage and motherhood for every woman.  Jane Austen never married herself.  In her novels, Jane unveils the risks and the rocky waters of love and marriage.  It’s tempting to think that She stayed single for her own good. 

 

Jane Austen was born in 1775 in Hampshire. Women were expected to be wives and mothers and women were not welcomed to pursue their own career. Thus, most women saught marriage for the sake of financial security. In her novels, Jane gives lots of clues about her attitudes toward love and marriage markets. For instance,  the leading ladies in her books experience bumbling proposals and the dilemma of the marriage market in eighteenth-century England. 

 

 

#Brewed Her Own Beer
In the 18th England, It is said that most people drank beer on a regular basis. Austen knew how to brew beer from scratch and her specialty was “spruce beer.” 

 

Illness and Death 

In 1816, her health condition deteriorates probably due to Addison’s disease. Addison’s disease is characterized by progressive anemia, low blood pressure and bronze discoloration of the skin, which is essentially caused by inadequate secretion of hormones by the adrenal cortex.She had begun feeling unwell in 1816. Her symptoms were skin discoloration and bad eyesight. There were suspicions about her illness that scholars at the British Library made a bold assumption that Austen had been poisoned using arsenic. 

 

Jane Austen died in 1817 and she was just 41 years old. It is alleged that she had been suffering from Addison’s disease or Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. 

 

It is said that her sister Cassandra burned the vast majority of Jane’s correspondence to protect her reputation and privacy as a legendary novelist.