Jane Austen
Writing, Society, Politics
Published on 23. July 2020
Book
Hardback
192 pages
978-0-19-886190-4 (ISBN)
Description
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. So runs one of the most famous opening lines in English literature. Setting the scene in Pride and Prejudice, it deftly introduces the novel's core themes of marriage, money, and social convention, themes that continue to resonate with readers over 200 years later.
Jane Austen wrote six of the best-loved novels in the English language, as well as a smaller corpus of unpublished works. Her books pioneered new techniques for representing voices, minds, and hearts in narrative prose, and, despite some accusations of a blinkered domestic and romantic focus, they represent the world of their characters with unsparing clarity. Here, Tom Keymer explores the major themes throughout Austen's novels, setting them in the literary, social, and political backgrounds from which they emerge, and showing how they engage with social tensions in an era dominated by the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars. The Jane Austen who emerges is a writer shaped by the literary experiments and socio-political debates of her time, increasingly drawn to a fundamentally conservative vision of social harmony, yet forever complicating this vision through her disruptive ironies and satirical energy.
Jane Austen wrote six of the best-loved novels in the English language, as well as a smaller corpus of unpublished works. Her books pioneered new techniques for representing voices, minds, and hearts in narrative prose, and, despite some accusations of a blinkered domestic and romantic focus, they represent the world of their characters with unsparing clarity. Here, Tom Keymer explores the major themes throughout Austen's novels, setting them in the literary, social, and political backgrounds from which they emerge, and showing how they engage with social tensions in an era dominated by the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars. The Jane Austen who emerges is a writer shaped by the literary experiments and socio-political debates of her time, increasingly drawn to a fundamentally conservative vision of social harmony, yet forever complicating this vision through her disruptive ironies and satirical energy.
Reviews / Votes
The book offers some valuable lessons for those first meeting Austen. It clarifies well how her free indirect discourse grew from her recognizing the limits of epistolary style; how sentimental histrionics can function as indirect social critique; how her overlooked biting wit hearkens back to Fielding and ahead to Waugh... * John Morillo, NC State University, Eighteenth-Century Fiction * The work is an engaging and timely introduction to the ingenious, inexhaustible Jane Austen. * Janet Todd, Times Literary Supplement * To wish this book longer is not to cast any kind of shadow on what it does achieve. Writing with an economy and lucidity of style befitting his subject, Keymer packs in the thought-provoking insights, not just about Austen's writing and the social and political world in which it moved, but also about the way in which has subsequently been received. * Joe Bray, Cercles * A light, sure-footed guide [...] Keymer has insightful things to say about all Austen's fiction, from the pitilessness of the hilarious early sketches to the intensity and passion of Persuasion. It is great fun to follow him as he nails Austen's effects in delightful phrases. * Jane Spencer, The Review of English Studies * Janeites of all stripes should take note of this critically robust account. * Everett Jones, Publishers Weekly * Highly recommended. * Emily Bowles, Library Journal * Tom Keymer reminds us, in timely fashion, of the delights and the unexpected rewards in reading Jane Austen with close attention. He presents a writer whose output is unified and varied, who offers us puzzles and problems and who prefers exploration to polemic and eloquent silences to explanations. She questions all she sees: the novel, society, and politics. Nothing escapes her teasing, critical gaze. This is an assured and witty introduction to a subtle and complex genius and a welcome invitation to look and think again. * Kathryn Sutherland, editor of Jane Austen: Teenage Writings * To illuminate literary greatness in a short book is a tall order. Tom Keymer's Jane Austen: Writing, Society, and Politics delivers precisely that, with admirable clarity and characteristic brilliance, in a captivating style that's worthy of the author herself. * Devoney Looser, author of The Making of Jane Austen * Keymer's introduction to Jane Austen is a delight to read, and every chapter offers something I hadn't known or considered before ... One might even claim that, though deep, its clear; though informed, yet not dull; strong but not kneejerk; without o're-flowing, full. * Cynthia Wall, University of Virginia *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Oxford
United Kingdom
Illustrations
9 black and white illustrations
Dimensions
Height: 180 mm
Width: 131 mm
Thickness: 19 mm
Weight
292 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-19-886190-4 (9780198861904)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
07/2020
1st Edition
OUP eBook
€6.99
Available for download
E-Book
07/2020
1st Edition
OUP eBook
€6.99
Available for download
Person
Tom Keymer is Chancellor Henry N. R. Jackman University Professor of English at the University of Toronto. He has published numerous books about Restoration, eighteenth-century, and Romantic-period literature and culture, including Poetics of the Pillory: English Literature and Seditious Libel 1660-1820 (OUP, 2019), Sterne, the Moderns, and the Novel (OUP, 2002), and, as editor, The Oxford History of the Novel in English, Volume 1: Prose Fiction in English from the Origins of Print to 1750 (OUP, 2017). He has also edited works by Daniel Defoe, Henry Fielding, Samuel Johnson, and others in the Oxford World's Classics series. He is General Editor of the Review of English Studies and co-General Editor of The Cambridge Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Samuel Richardson.
Content
Note on editions
Introduction
1: Jane Austen practising
2: The terrors of Northanger Abbey
3: Sense, sensibility, society
4: The voices of Pride and Prejudice
5: The silence at Mansfield Park
6: Emma and Englishness
7: Passion and Persuasion
Afterword
Timeline
References
Further reading
Index
Introduction
1: Jane Austen practising
2: The terrors of Northanger Abbey
3: Sense, sensibility, society
4: The voices of Pride and Prejudice
5: The silence at Mansfield Park
6: Emma and Englishness
7: Passion and Persuasion
Afterword
Timeline
References
Further reading
Index