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Tag Archives: Jane Austen

Jane Austen Week – Jane in Bath

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All this week Risky Regencies celebrate Jane Austen’s birthday. Monday through Saturday each of our blogs will relate in some way to Jane Austen, one of the greatest novelists of all time, a novelist who wrote with such acute authenticity about her own time that she gave subsequent generations such love of it that we still savor Regency novels today.

In celebration (and appreciation) of Jane Austen we will be giving away prizes to two of our Risky Regency commenters this week. Amanda has donated a signed copy of Carrie Bebris’s Mr. and Mrs. Darcy mystery Pride and Prescience, and I have a copy of Maggie Lane’s A Charming Place: Bath in the Life and Novels of Jane Austen to give away. Our winners will be selected at random from all the comments of the week and will be announced next Sunday, Dec 20.

Jane Austen visited Bath as a young woman, once the guest of her aunt, Mrs. Leigh Perrot, who was later falsely incarcerated for stealing a bit of lace. In 1801 Jane’s father decided to retire to Bath, thus Jane had to leave the country village of Steventon to live in a busy city with her parents. Not being wealthy, their circumstances in Bath were less than ideal and the years from 1801 to 1805 (when her father died) were not happy ones for Jane. It is thought that she did no writing in Bath. Still, the city provided her with many opportunities to observe the various characters who lived in Bath and those who visited to take the waters. Perhaps Catherine Moreland of Northanger Abbey reflects the youthful Jane’s impressions of Bath. Anne in Persuasion showed Jane’s more mature, less admiring view.

When Amanda and I visited Bath on the 2003 Novel Explorations Regency Tour, what often filled my mind was that Jane Austen had walked these same streets and saw the same sites.

This is one of the places she called home.

I could imagine her walking a street like this one.

To visit the shops

And gaze in the shop windows.

Maybe she would explore the city and walk down steps like this.

Or visit someone’s Georgian garden.

She, of course, would view the Royal Cresent

And, like we did, she would have danced in the Assembly Rooms.

That’s me, second to the left in the dark blue dress. Amanda is just a little left of center and Deb Marlowe is a little right of center.

If you have visited Bath, what was your favorite place to see? If you’ve never been to Bath, what would you like to see? Do you have any tidbits about Jane Austen’s time in Bath?

Remember to comment for a chance to win! And to visit every day this week

And, don’t forget, Gallant Officer, Forbidden Lady is still in bookstores. Visit my website. I have a contest too.

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How Dickens wrote

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Are you tired of spoiled celebrities and nouveau riche wannabes behaving badly in the news? Yes, I know they’d fit right in with the Regency, but I’ve had enough. I can find better things to do online and I have just discovered some major timesucks that I hope you’ll enjoy too.

First, since we’re heading for Christmas, here’s a fabulous opportunity to take a look at Dickens’ editing process and enter a contest. The original manuscript of A Christmas Carol, owned by the Morgan Library and Museum, usually has one page at a time on display, but has entered into an agreement with the New York Times to photograph and display the entire manuscript, side by side with the final version, so you can compare the two.

City Blog is sponsoring a contest for readers to choose what they think is the most interesting edit and the winner will be invited to tea at the Morgan with blogger Alison Leigh Cowan (but you’ll have to get yourself up to NYC!). You can see the manuscript here.

Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol in six weeks in 1843. He needed the cash, with six children and an expensive lifestyle to maintain, and his current serialized novel Martin Chuzzlewit was not selling well. The first printing of six thousand copies sold out, but Dickens made no money on it, having decided to splurge on hand-colored drawings by John Leech, a well-known illustrator.

If you’re planning a trip to the Morgan, there’s an exhibit A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life and Legacy now through March 14, 2010 which includes manuscripts, personal letters, and related materials.

And back to Dickens–if you care to splurge on a Christmas present to yourself Sothebys is auctioning off a complete set of his Christmas books in original cloth bindings. I’ll be blogging tomorrow at History Hoydens about auctions of writers’ manuscripts and possessions, so I hope you’ll come on over and say hello.

Has anyone seen the Austen exhibit yet or visited any other museum recently? Tell us what you’ve seen! I’m planning to go to Written in Bone at the Natural History Museum in Washington DC this weekend. I visited the exhibit very briefly last summer but want to go back and linger over the bones.

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Jane Austen Everywhere

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Last week I promised you a photo of my Halloween costume. Be afraid. Be very afraid. Here it is.

It didn’t turn out the way I wanted it to. I looked awful, but that was the point, right? I was dressed as “What Not To Wear.” If you watch the TV show on TLC, you’ll know that Stacie and Clinton throw away baggy cropped pants, patterned socks, thrift shop items (like the bowling shirt) and warn against being too “matchy matchy.”

The Halloween party was fun in spite of my failed costume. Helen, one of my writing friends and member of my original-and-still-meeting critique group gave the party. I have a double connection to Helen, because our husbands work together. Here’s the “Writing Group” (left to right: Julie, me, Helen, Virginia). As you can see, my costume looks just like I wore horrible clothes; the other costumes were very effective. (Helen, by the way, made that vest and hat)


The real surprise was to find Jane Austen at the party. Not “our” (Risky Regencies) Jane Austen but Helen’s friend Carol who came as Jane Austen vampire. And, let me tell you, her gown was fantastic. She’d made this beautiful pelisse out of a deep purple fabric with black flowery designs on it, almost like applique. I was in complete costume-envy! This pelisse was so elegant and looked like she’d just stepped out of a Regency novel. She also had black angel wings which were not so Regency. And the vampire teeth.

Helen, who also happens to be my modiste, has made me two Regency dresses over the years. The light blue one was from a copy of an authentic Regency era pattern. The dark blue was from a Simplicity pattern and it has (oh the shame!) a zipper. Last year I wore the dark blue one to the Halloween party so could not do so this year. And the light blue one fit me better when I was 20 lbs lighter. (You’ll recognize the other person in these photos as Amanda!)

I’m trying to think of a way to get Helen to make me a beautiful pelisse just like the Jane Austen vampire’s!

Did you have a fun Halloween? How did your costume work out? Better than mine, I hope!

Check out my website, which is not updated yet, but which still has a new contest on it.

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Austen, ice cream and summer

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Inspired (somewhat) by Carolyn’s post yesterday I’ve been over at History Hoydens today talking about eels and thought I’d talk today about summer and summer foods.

First, here’s a great link to some recipes from the online newsletter from the Jane Austen Centre in Bath, including the delectable Anne Elliott’s Apricot Ice Cream.

The modern recipe you’ll find there is based on one in Hannah Glasse’s The Art of Housekeeping Made Plain and Easy (1756):

Pare and stone twelve ripe apricots, and scald them, beat them fine in a mortar, add to them six ounces of double refined sugar, and a pint of scalding cream, and work it through a sieve; put it in a tin with a close cover, and set it in a tub of ice broke small, with four handfuls of salt mixed among the ice. When you see your cream grows thick round the edges of your tin, stir it well and put it in again till it is quite thick; when the cream is all froze up, take it out of the tin, and put it into the mould you intend to turn it out of; put on the lid and have another tub of salt and ice ready as before; put the mould in the middle, and lay the ice under and over it; let it stand for four hours, and never turn it out till the moment you want it, then dip the mould in cold spring water, and turn it into a plate. You may do any sort of fruit the same way.

Another delicious morsel you might have missed was Jonathan Yardley’s article in the Washington Post, Pride. Prejudice. Perfection, one in a series of rereading favorite books. His article is a lovely tribute to his mother, a lifelong admirer of Austen, who, like Mr. Bennett, with a book in her hand was “regardless of time.”

Oh, wait. Summer. A great time for reading and re-reading, for eating delicious seasonal foods (peaches, anyone?). I have finally read Naomi Novik’s latest, such a sad book, but with some phenomenal battle scenes, and writing (although not nearly enough) and not getting nearly enough ice cream.

What have you been doing?

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Sister Story

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This month at the Wet Noodle Posse we’re blogging about sisters and today I’m discussing my sisters there. Last week our Q and A day asked what “Sister” movies were favorites. “Our” Louisa Cornell mentioned Sense & Sensibility.

I watched Sense & Sensibility a couple of nights ago, the Emma Thompson/Kate Winslet version, and agree it is a wonderful sister movie. When Eleanor sobs over Marianne’s sickbed, begging her not to leave her alone, I cried, too.

Eleanor and Marianne were such true-to-life sisters, sometimes being hurtful to each other, other times fiercely supporting each other. In Marianne’s grief over Willoughby, she still tries her best to foster Edward’s attachment to Eleanor, not knowing that Lucy is the impediment.

Pride & Prejudice is another “sister” movie. Elizabeth and Jane are very close and, unlike Eleanor and Marianne, no sharp words pass between them. Lizzie, who is the opposite of Lydia, tries to convince her father not to allow Lydia to go to Brighton, showing her concern for even the most frivolous sister.

Jane Austen was very close to her sister Cassandra. Her relationship to Cassandra was perhaps the most important in her life. It is no wonder she writes about sisters.

The wonder is, why don’t I? I’m the youngest of three sisters. My mother was one of three sisters. Her sister had three daughters. Because we moved around a lot, my sisters and I were often our only companions. My year and a half older sister was my closest relationship growing up.

But my books don’t explore sisterhood. Most of my heroines don’t have sisters (Morgana in A Reputable Rake; Rose in Innocence and Impropriety; Marlena in The Vanishing Viscountess). Or the sisters are estranged (Maddie from The Mysterious Miss M and her sister Emily in The Wagering Widow; Lydia in Scandalizing the Ton)

A big exception is the anthology, The Diamonds of Welbourne Manor. In Justine and the Noble Viscount, I get to introduce the sisters who are the “diamonds,” and Deb and Amanda show how their relationships evolve. See my Wet Noodle Posse blog on The Diamonds of Welbourne Manor

Do you think Jane Austen accurately represents sisters in her books?
What other books or movies are good “sister” stories?

Check out my website for more blogs about The Diamonds of Welbourne Manor.

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