by Alex Storey

Created on: December 30, 2010

Jane Austen was one of eight children born to an English clergyman in 1775 and Anne Hathaway played Austen in the 2007 film Becoming Jane.

Romantic fiction set among the gentry, the work of Jane Austen highlights women’s dependence on marriage for social hierarchy.

Largely taught at home and self studied, Jane was from a big family in Hampshire and is probably Bath‘s best loved resident from history who always read her work aloud to her family.

Jane Austen was part of a select few, famous for her juvenelia - that is children’s literature written when she was actually a child and did this to amuse her brothers and sisters which clearly paid off.

Like so many women, Austen was largely unrecognised for her achievements during her lifetime and it wasn’t until the 20th century that scholars really accepted her into academia as the great English writer she has become.

Now there is even Janeite - the term used by devotees of the ever expanding fan culture of Jane Austen. Janeiteism really only began after 1870, when the literary elite felt they had to separate the work of Jane Austen from the masses. Rudyard Kipling even published a short story entitled Janeites about a group of World War I soldiers who were fans of Austen's novels.

Sense and Sensibility (1811) was Jane's first novel and her brother Henry helped her negotiate with a publisher. The first draft was completed in1795 and originally entitled Eleanor and Marianne. It is about two sisters growing up and their journey through life and love in the 18th century. Eleanor is the practical/sensible one and Marianne the emotional/romantic sister.

Pride and Prejudice (1813) is about Elizabeth Bennett and Mr Darcy, one of the most famous couples anywhere in literature from early 19th century England, set among high society and landed gentry.

Mansfield Park (1814) is about Fanny Price who falls for Edmund Bertram.

Emma (1816) is about Emma Woodhouse, a rich, pretty and spoilt girl. This novel was dedicated to the Prince Regent who was an admirer of Jane Austen's work.

Mansfield Park and Emma were the last two novels published during Austen's lifetime, though she had two more published posthumously, Northanger Abbey which is a gothic romance and Persuasion. Both were published after her death in 1817 and brother Henry put in a eulogy identifying his sister for the first time, as the author of the novels. Sanditon was the unfinished novel.

Jane Austen's resting place is Winchester Cathedral having died in her sister's arms, possibly from Addison's disease, at just 41 years of age.

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