A book that got a lot of attention last year was published by a 90-year-old Australian lady. What an accomplishment to acquire a doctorate AND become a mainstream published author at such an advanced age! The Jane Austen Remedy tells how Jane Austen helped its author, Ruth Wilson, find her own voice. I gather she is referring to a lifetime of subsuming herself in her roles of wife and mother. A fortuitous family inheritance, she said, enabled her to buy her own cottage in the country away from her husband of 50 years. Money changes everything, as the song goes.
That reminds me of something I plan to explore in a future blog -- the absolute freedom and independence enjoyed by widows with money in Jane Austen's books. Sense and Sensibility, supposedly a subversive protest against the disempowerment of women, is chock-a-block with empowered women, most of whom abuse their power. It features two old ladies who use their wealth to tell the men in their life what to do--Mrs. Smith of Allenham, who cracks the whip over Willoughby, and Mrs. Ferrars, Edward's despotic mother. Mrs. Jennings also has wealth and complete independence but she is not a despot. Fanny Dashwood has her husband wrapped around her little finger.
At any rate, The Jane Austen Remedy is about the author's personal relationship with the works of Jane Austen, and there is actually an entire sub-genre of books of this type. I don't know of any author who has the honour of being the subject of so many books. I think many devoted Austen fans could wax lyrical on what she's meant to them.
Most of these books I haven't read, some of them I have just sampled, but I list them for your interest....
That reminds me of something I plan to explore in a future blog -- the absolute freedom and independence enjoyed by widows with money in Jane Austen's books. Sense and Sensibility, supposedly a subversive protest against the disempowerment of women, is chock-a-block with empowered women, most of whom abuse their power. It features two old ladies who use their wealth to tell the men in their life what to do--Mrs. Smith of Allenham, who cracks the whip over Willoughby, and Mrs. Ferrars, Edward's despotic mother. Mrs. Jennings also has wealth and complete independence but she is not a despot. Fanny Dashwood has her husband wrapped around her little finger.
At any rate, The Jane Austen Remedy is about the author's personal relationship with the works of Jane Austen, and there is actually an entire sub-genre of books of this type. I don't know of any author who has the honour of being the subject of so many books. I think many devoted Austen fans could wax lyrical on what she's meant to them.
Most of these books I haven't read, some of them I have just sampled, but I list them for your interest....
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This is a long form article rather than a book, but it is of this genre, a reflection on the meaning of Jane Austen, specifically, her Mansfield Park.
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