Jane Austen Read Free

suffering yourselves to be meanly swayed by the follies and vices of others …
    However, her expectations are such that she says:
    I can have nothing to fear from you – and can chearfully conduct you to Mrs Cope’s without a fear of you being seduced by her Example or contaminated by her Follies.
    Such is the excitement that when they reach ‘Warleigh’ (the home of the Copes), ‘poor Augusta could scarcely breathe, while Margaret was all Life and Rapture … The long-expected Moment is now arrived (said she) and we shall soon be in the World.’ Here, Jane is obviously poking fun at the importance which parents attached to the prospect of their daughters’ ‘coming out’ (entering society), and equally, to the daughters’ exaggerated response to it.
    In the second letter, Jane informs her friend Sophia that her (Jane’s) husband had just been killed while fighting for his country in America, soon after which their three children had fallen sick and died. This was followed by the death of her father. To this Sophia replies:
    Oh! My dear Miss Jane [she called herself ‘Miss’ in order to keep her marriage a secret from her disapproving father], how infinitely I am obliged to you for so entertaining a story! You cannot think how it has diverted me! But have you quite done?
    To which the answer is no; for Jane goes on to say that her late husband Henry’s elder brother has also died. ‘Did you ever hear a story more pathetic?’ asks Sophia. ‘I never did’, repliesJane, ‘And it is for that reason it pleases me so much, for when one is unhappy nothing is so delightful to one’s sensations as to hear of equal misery’. Here is Jane, showing an insight into a common facet of human nature – being consoled in one’s misfortunes, by the misfortunes of others.
    The fourth letter deals with the subjects of friendship and happiness. When its young lady-writer asks Miss Grenville – who has recently arrived in Essex – whether she finds that county equal to the one which she has just left (Suffolk), the reply is: ‘Much superior, Ma’am, in point of Beauty’. To which the young lady retorts: ‘But the face of any Country however beautiful … can be but a poor consolation for the loss of one’s dearest Friends’. Miss Grenville then declares that, ‘Perfect Felicity is not the property of Mortals, and no one has a right to expect uninterrupted Happiness’.
    In the fifth letter Jane’s wit bubbles up to the surface again when Musgrove, cousin of Lady Scudamore, has harsh words to say against the laws of England, which allow uncles and aunts to remain in possession of their estates when their nephews and nieces are anxious to inherit them. If you were in the House of Commons [as a Member of Parliament], says he, ‘you might reform the Legislature and rectify all its abuses’.

    In her Juvenilia , Jane challenges existing conventions as any young person might, and brings the full power of her wit and invective to bear on that of which she disapproves; her humour even extending to serious topics such as death and bereavement.
    In 1787, when she was aged only 12, Jane did something which can only be described as precocious, by making the followingentries of her own in the Steventon Parish Register of Marriages. First, fantasising about her own future marriage, she proclaims:
    The banns of marriage between Henry Frederic Howard Fitzwilliam of London and Jane Austen of Steventon.
    Next, she records that two other marriages had taken place:
    Edmund Arthur William Mortimer of Liverpool and Jane Austen of Steventon were married in this Church.
     
    This marriage was solemnised between us, Jack Smith & Jane Smith late Austen, in the presence of Jack Smith, Jane Smith. 1
    It says a great deal about the forbearance and sense of humour of her father the Revd George Austen, that these entries were allowed to stand and were not expunged from the register.
    In December 1789 the 14-year-old Francis Austen, having