Austen

“ George Austen's handsome, placid, dignified features were an index to his mind. Serene in temper, devoted to his religion and his family, a good father and a good scholar, he deserved the love and respect which every evidence that we have shows him to have gained from his family and his neighbours. His wife's was a somewhat more positive nature: shrewd and acute, high-minded and determined, with a strong sense of humour, and with an energy capable of triumphing over years of indifferent health, she was ardently attached to her children, and perhaps somewhat proud of her ancestors. ”

“ With the more common domestic and social feelings we are on surer ground. There is a universal concordance [62] of testimony as to Miss Austen’s sweetness in such relations, her tenderness, her charm. Guarded as her letters are, these qualities appear, in all the laughter, in all the mockery. She watches over her mother, she longs for every detail about her brothers, she cries for joy at their promotion, she exchanges with her sister a thousand little intimacies, all the more sincere for their daily triviality. ”

“ Miss Austen, setting down her thoughts of an evening in a copybook in her lap, interrupted by conversations and at the beck and call of household duties, does not seem as one who was acquiring the mastery of a difficult art-form. But the wind bloweth where it listeth—and the evidences of skill are there; we can but chronicle the fact, and welcome the result.
She was old-fashioned in her adherence to the "pleasant ending"; realist though she was, she could not go to the lengths either of theme or interpretation in the portrayal of life which later novelists have so sturdily ventured. ”

“ Jane Austen was the youngest of seven children, who dwelt together in that amity which the Bible recommends but which frail humanity infrequently realizes. She was a genius without eccentricities, egotisms or rebellions; never did a writer of immortal books live a more conventional life or have less to write about. ”

“ The unhesitating fashion in which women reveal themselves to their correspondents makes it seem treachery to read their printed pages. Those girlish confidences of Jane Austen to Cassandra, so frank and gay, so full of jokes and laughter, and country gossip, and sisterly affection, what a contrast they afford to the attitude of unbroken reserve which Miss Austen always presented to the world! Yet now the world is free to follow each foolish little jest, and to pass judgment on the wit it holds. ”

“ The life of Jane Austen, whose humour the author of the Plymley Letters, the father and uncle of a hundred diverting anecdotes, so greatly enjoyed, may serve to show the weakness of such unreserved generalization. Her subjects were found in the restful backwaters of life, not in the crowded centres where mankind is more and more bewildered by the failure of wisdom to keep pace with the advance of knowledge. ”

“ The great, the distinguishing gift of the English novelist was a homely simplicity combined with an observation at once keen and indulgent; good humour was the atmosphere and irony the flavour of this great school of observers, from Fielding to George Eliot.
Till the day of Jane Austen it had been possible to treat without apology of the mixed affair of living; but Jane Austen’s delicate genius flourished on the very edge of a tidal wave of prudery. ”

“ From the testimony of her nephew and the internal evidence of her books, we may conclude Jane Austen to have been a decorous English gentlewoman, conservative in temper, essentially feminine; a silent, humorous observer of the most minute details; an affectionate daughter and sister and a delightful aunt; at home “a still, sweet, placid moonlight face, and slightly nonchalant”—abroad, perhaps a trifle chilling. We may eke out the meagre record of her life with many praises, drawn from widely-differing sources. ”

“ If one may divide qualities which often overlap, one would be inclined to surmise that Jane Austen inherited from her father her serenity of mind, the refinement of her intellect, and her delicate appreciation of style, while her mother supplied the acute observation of character, and the wit and humour, for which she was equally distinguished.
Steventon was not the only preferment in the neighbourhood that George Austen was to hold. His kind uncle Francis, who had helped him in his schooling, was anxious to do something more for him. ”

“ Such people belong to all humankind by the very right of their wide and generous sympathies, of their gentle wisdom and loveableness. Jane Austen's life, as it is told by Mr. Austen Legh, is very touching, sweet, and peaceful. It is a country landscape, where the cattle are grazing, the boughs of the great elm-tree rocking in the wind: sometimes, as we read, they come falling with a crash into the sweep; birds are flying about the old house, homely in its simple rule. ”

“ Notwithstanding a certain reticence and self-control which seems to belong to their age, and with all their quaint dresses, and ceremonies, and manners, the ladies and gentlemen in 'Pride and Prejudice' and its companion novels seem like living people out of our own acquaintance transported bodily into a bygone age, represented in the half-dozen books that contain Jane Austen's works. Dear books! bright, sparkling with wit and animation, in which the homely heroines charm, the dull hours fly, and the very bores are enchanting. ”

“ Miss Austen's genius was but slowly recognised. Her first books were published in 1811, only three years before Waverley, and her last novels were published after it. Who will linger over the teacups while knights in armour are riding the streets without? It is not until the cavalcade has passed that home seems again a quiet, refreshing spot. So the public, tired of the brilliant scenes and conflicting passions of other novels, has in the last few years turned back to the simple, wholesome stories of Jane Austen. ”

“ No scheme could have been more agreeable to Elizabeth, and her acceptance of the invitation was most ready and grateful. "My dear, dear aunt," she rapturously cried, "what delight! what felicity! You give me fresh life and vigour. Adieu to disappointment and spleen. What are men to rocks and mountains? Oh! what hours of transport we shall spend! And when we do return, it shall not be like other travellers, without being able to give one accurate idea of any thing. We will know where we have gone—we will recollect what we have seen. ”

“ She might not wonder, but she must sigh that her father should feel no degradation in his change; should see nothing to regret in the duties and dignity of the resident land-holder; should find so much to be vain of in the littlenesses of a town; and she must sigh, and smile, and wonder too, as Elizabeth threw open the folding-doors, and walked with exultation from one drawing-room to the other, boasting of their space, at the possibility of that woman, who had been mistress of Kellynch Hall, finding extent to be proud of between two walls, perhaps thirty feet asunder. ”

“ No man can ever understand Miss Austen’s taste in heroes, and her creations in this line are the worst of her mockeries, all the more so because unintentional. But if she was blind to the faults of the type, she may have been equally blind to them in some real Edward or Knightley. We all are. I should even like to believe, with her adoring relative, that that shadowy lover who died unnamed to posterity blighted her literary effort and accounted for the singular gap between her earlier and later work. ”

“ Simple as it seemed, that camp of Austen's was perhaps the most remarkable thing I came across in the crater. Austen was a wonderful man. Having not only an exhaustive knowledge of a half dozen fields of science—and he had not mere theories, but a practical, working knowledge—he had also courage and determination, patience and manual skill, and a great deal of resourcefulness and invention. While the average man would hardly have been able to keep alive in the jungle, Austen was able to do such things as smelt and refine ore, and set up complicated and workable electrical machinery. ”

“ Jane Austen was the clear-sighted girl with the sharp pen, if not the sharp tongue, who found in the Steventon visiting-list materials for the dramatis personæ of ‘Pride and Prejudice.’ It would have been little short of a miracle, if she could have conducted herself with such meekness, in her remote rural world, or during the visits she paid to the great English watering-place—while she was all the time laughing in her sleeve—so as not to provoke any suspicion of her satire, or any resentment at what might easily be held her presumption.... ”

“ Austen wrote a very cheerful and friendly letter to her daughter-in-law elect, expressing the 'most heartfelt satisfaction at the prospect.' She adds: 'Had the selection been mine, you, my dear Mary, are the person I should have chosen for James's wife, Anna's mother and my daughter, being as certain as I can be of anything in this uncertain [74] world, that you will greatly increase and promote the happiness of each of the three. . . . I look forward to you as a real comfort to me in my old age when Cassandra is gone into Shropshire, [56] and Jane—the Lord knows where. ”

“ As we look back on the scanty records of Jane Austen's career, or turn from these to criticise the writings which were, in fact, her life, we cannot but feel that it was a life prematurely ended as regarded her fame, and that in the future she might have even surpassed the works we already have from her. ”

“ And yet, a few minutes afterwards, she felt as if their being in company with each other, under their present circumstances, could only be exposing them to inadvertencies and misconstructions of the most mischievous kind.
"Anne," cried Mary, still at her window, "there is Mrs. Clay, I am sure, standing under the colonnade, and a gentleman with her. I saw them turn the corner from Bath-street just now. They seem deep in talk. Who is it?—Come, and tell me. Good heavens! I recollect.—It is Mr. Elliot himself."
"No," cried Anne quickly, "it cannot be Mr. Elliot, I assure you. ”

“ Austen Leigh, who wrote the fullest and most admirable account of Jane Austen, was still in his teens when she died. Apart from these sparse reminiscences we know practically nothing about her except from her own novels and letters, but from them we may learn almost as much of the mind of this delightful woman as any loving relation could have told us. It may be possible for an author to write an artificial novel without betraying his own nature to any positive extent, but such novels as Jane Austen's cannot so be produced ”

“ For thirteen years had she been doing the honours, and laying down the domestic law at home, and leading the way to the chaise and four, and walking immediately after Lady Russell out of all the drawing-rooms and dining-rooms in the country. Thirteen winters' revolving frosts had seen her opening every ball of credit which a scanty neighbourhood afforded, and thirteen springs shewn their blossoms, as she travelled up to London with her father, for a few weeks' annual enjoyment of the great world. ”

“ Jane Austen was now between thirty-three and thirty-four years old. She was absolutely free from any artistic self-consciousness, from any eccentricity of either temper or manner. 'Hers was a mind well balanced on a basis of good sense, sweetened by an affectionate heart, and regulated by fixed principles; so that she was to be distinguished from many other amiable and sensible women only by that peculiar genius which shines out clearly . ”

“ In this book, though by means so alien to Miss Austen’s delicate procedure that one balks at the comparison, the fantastic novelist, whose antics too often make one forget his insight, discarding most of his fatiguing follies, gives a rich and deliberate study of a real human being. But he does not quite achieve Jane Austen’s success. ”

“ Elizabeth, feeling really anxious, was determined to go to her, though the carriage was not to be had; and as she was no horse-woman, walking was her only alternative. She declared her resolution.
"How can you be so silly," cried her mother, "as to think of such a thing, in all this dirt! You will not be fit to be seen when you get there."
"I shall be very fit to see Jane—which is all I want."
"Is this a hint to me, Lizzy," said her father, "to send for the horses?"
"No, indeed. I do not wish to avoid the walk. The distance is nothing, when one has a motive; only three miles. ”

“ Perhaps Miss Austen enjoyed making Elizabeth undergo a mauvais quart d'heure in hearing her own unfounded prejudices retorted upon her by her father, but both he and her sister are so warmly and tenderly anxious for her happiness that her pain would soon be forgotten. It is very different when she has to break the news to her mother, whose behaviour throughout the story gives additional force to her husband's remarks about respecting one's partner is life. ”

“ Lady Austen, waving all forms, has paid us the first visit; and, not content with showing us that proof of her respect, made handsome apologies for her intrusion. We returned the visit yesterday. She is a lively, agreeable woman; has seen much of the world, and accounts it a great simpleton, as it is. She laughs and makes laugh, and keeps up a conversation without seeming to labour at it. ”

“ No “padding” for Miss Austen! in fact, madam, as you were born before Analysis came in, or Passion, or Realism, or Naturalism, or Irreverence, or Religious Open-mindedness, you really cannot hope to rival your literary sisters in the minds of a perplexed generation. Your heroines are not passionate, we do not see their red wet cheeks, and tresses dishevelled in the manner of our frank young Mænads. What says your best successor, a lady who adds fresh lustre to a name that in fiction equals yours? She says of Miss Austen: “Her heroines have a stamp of their own. ”