Description
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewJeremy Black's new book on England in the Age of Austen, just published by Indiana University Press (2021), will be a treat for anyone who loves Jane - and who does not? - as well as anyone who is interested in her contexts. Black situates Austen's work in its social, political, economic and religious cultures, showing how her youthful commitments to Jacobite politics evolved into a more mature appreciation of the strengths and weaknesses of late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century England. Alert to the ironies of her own life and the lives of her characters, Austen wrote of the kind of world in which she wanted to live, balancing the disappointments of her own life and those of her characters with a dependency upon providence and an active commitment to preserve the best values of English society.
-- Crawford Gribben * New Books Network *
An absolute 'must' for the legions of Jan Austen fans, England in the Age of Austen is an extraordinarily well written history, impressively detailed, and a seminal work of original scholarship.
* Midwest Book Review *
Table of ContentsPreface
Abbreviations
1. The Rise of the Novel
2. Rural England: The Epicenter of Austen's World
3. Agriculture and Agricultural Change
4. Families, Women and Men
5. Faith and the Church
6. Culture, the Arts, and Enlightenment
7. London: The Capital of Empire
8. Bath: The Capital of Leisure
9. Transport and Industry
10. A State at War
11. The Romantic Landscape
12. Conclusions
Notes
Selected Further Reading
Index
