The Jane Austen Collection Ebook

Jane Austen (December 16, 1775 - July 18, 1817) was an English novelist whose work is considered part of the Western canon. Her insights into women's lives and her mastery of form and irony have made her arguably the most noted and influential novelist from her era (though she was only moderately successful during her lifetime).

Adhering to contemporary convention for female authors, Austen published her novels anonymously. Her novels achieved a measure of popular success and esteem yet her anonymity kept her out of leading literary circles. Although all her works are love stories and although her career coincided with the Romantic movement in English literature, Jane Austen was no Romantic. Passionate emotion usually carries danger in an Austen novel and the young woman who exercises rational moderation is more likely to find real happiness than one who elopes with a lover. Her artistic values had more in common with David Hume and John Locke than with her contemporaries William Wordsworth or Lord Byron. Three of Austen's favorite influences were Samuel Johnson, William Cowper and Fanny Burney.

Her posthumously published novel Northanger Abbey satirizes the Gothic novels of Ann Radcliffe, but Austen is most famous for her mature works, which took the form of socially astute comedies of manners. These, especially Emma, are often cited for their perfection of form, while modern critics continue to unearth new perspectives on Austen's keen commentary regarding the predicament of unmarried genteel English women in the early 1800s. Inheritance law and custom usually directed the bulk of a family's fortune to male heirs.

In 1816, the editors of this publication didn't think that Emma was one of the more important novels of the day.Her novels were fairly received when they were published, with Sir Walter Scott in particular praising her work:

That young lady has a talent for describing the involvements of feelings and characters of ordinary life which is to me the most wonderful I ever met with.
Austen also earned the admiration of Macaulay (who thought that in the world there were no compositions which approached nearer to perfection), Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Robert Southey, Sydney Smith, and Edward FitzGerald. Nonetheless, she was a somewhat overlooked author for several decades following her death. Interest in her work revived during the late nineteenth century. Twentieth century scholars rated her among the greatest talents in English letters, sometimes even comparing her to Shakespeare. Lionel Trilling and Edward Said were important Austen critics.

Negative views of Austen have been notable, with more demanding detractors frequently accusing her writing of being un-literary and middle-brow. Charlotte Bront?" criticized the narrow scope of Austen's fiction. Mark Twain's reaction was revulsion:

Jane Austen? Why I go so far as to say that any library is a good library that does not contain a volume by Jane Austen. Even if it contains no other ebook.
Austen's literary strength lies in the delineation of character, especially of women, by delicate touches arising out of the most natural and everyday incidents in the life of the middle and upper classes, from which her subjects are generally taken. Her characters, though of quite ordinary types, are drawn with such firmness and precision, and with such significant detail as to retain their individuality intact through their entire development, and they are uncoloured by her own personality. Her view of life seems largely genial, with a strong dash of gentle but keen irony.

Some contemporary readers may find the world she describes, in which people's chief concern is obtaining advantageous marriages, to be unliberated and disquieting. Options were limited in this era and both women and men often married for money. Female writers worked within the similarly narrow genre of romance. Part of Austen's prominent reputation rests on how well she integrates observations on the human condition within a convincing love story. Much of the tension in her novels arises from balancing financial necessity against other concerns: love, friendship, and morals.

Buy " The Jane Austen Collection" and receive all eight of the e-books

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buy individual Jane Austen e-books:

E-book Titles:

1. Emma
2. SENSE AND SENSIBILITY
3. LADY SUSAN
4. MANSFIELD PARK
5. LOVE AND FRIENDSHIP
6. NORTHANGER ABBEY
7. Pride And Prejudice
8. Persuasion