Jane Austen For Dummies (72 page)

“‘Those who tell their own Story . . . must be listened to with Caution'”
(S 3). In
Sanditon
's hysterical send-up of hypochondriacs and health resorts of which Sanditon is one, filled with broad, physical humor that is uncharacteristic of Austen, she has Mr. Parker, Sanditon's greatest supporter, say these words. Said another way: Never trust the teller; trust the tale. Mr. Parker's comment reminds the reader of the tendency to present an experience in terms of personal prejudices.

Jane Austen, the seventh of eight children and second daughter of the Rev. Mr. George Austen and Mrs. Cassandra (Leigh) Austen, is born in the family home, the Steventon Rectory, in Hampshire, England, on December 16. Jane's siblings at this point are James (1765–1819), George (1776–1838; born epileptic and possibly also deaf and mute, George is sent to live with a local family under his parents' watchful eyes), Edward (1767–1852), Henry (1771–1850), Cassandra, “Cassie” (1773–1845), and Francis, “Fly” as a boy for his speedy movement, later Frank (1774–1865).

George Austen's widowed sister, Philadelphia (Austen) Hancock, and her 16-year-old daughter, Elizabeth Hancock, leave London for Paris to live more economically. Elizabeth was born in India, and her parents call her Betsy. But moving to the more sophisticated Paris, Elizabeth drops Betsy for the French-sounding Eliza.

On June 23, Charles Austen is born at the Steventon Rectory. Austen and her sister Cassandra call Charles their “own particular little brother.” During this year, James, Austen's eldest brother, heads to St. John's College, Oxford University. Meanwhile, Mr. Austen allows his wealthy cousin, Mr. Thomas Knight II, and his wife to take his 12-year-old son, Edward, on their honeymoon with them.

In France, Eliza Hancock marries the Comte de Feuillide, Jean-François Capot, and becomes the Comtesse de Feuillide. They attend many balls at Versailles hosted by King Louis XVI and his queen, Marie Antoinette.

The Austen family and Mr. Austen's students from his rectory school perform their first traditional home theatrical under James's direction. Young Austen enjoys watching.

Austen, Cassandra, and cousin Jane Cooper attend Mrs. Cawley's school in Oxford. Mrs. Cawley inexplicably moves the school to Southampton, a port town with much disease, and a typhoid epidemic breaks out, threatening the girls' health. Mrs. Austen and her sister Mrs. Cooper arrive in Southampton in time to nurse the girls, but Mrs. Cooper soon succumbs to the fever. The Knights formally adopt Edward Austen as the heir to their extensive estates in Kent and Hampshire. The Lefroys move to Ashe, near the Steventon area; Mrs. (Madam) Lefroy, seeing something special in Jane, though only 8, will become a beloved adult mentor to the young Austen.

Another Austen family play is performed in the spring: Sheridan's famous comedy of manners,
The Rivals.

Austen and Cassandra board at the Abbey School in Reading, probably the model for Mrs. Goddard's school in
Emma
.

Edward Austen departs on his Grand Tour of Europe, which lasts until 1790. Francis (Fly) Austen, age 12, enters the Royal Naval Academy at Portsmouth, beginning an illustrious naval career. James goes to the Continent. In December, Austen and Cassandra come home from school, ending their formal schooling experience.

Austen starts writing short fictional works, later known as her
Juvenilia,
as gifts for family members. James returns from the Continent and, in December, produces another play for the family: Susanna Centlivre's comedy,
The Wonder: A Woman Keeps a Secret.
Eliza, Comtesse de Feuillide, who's visiting Steventon with her baby son (born 1786) plays a role. She charms the Austen boys, especially Henry.

With the continuing winter holiday, James produces another play,
The Chances,
in January, and in March does
Tom Thumb.
Austen performs in a small role in the latter. Henry heads to Oxford University in July, and soon thereafter Mr. and Mrs. Austen take their daughters to Kent and London. Their Kent visit may have coincided with Edward's returning from his Grand Tour and staying at the Knights' Godmersham Estate in Kent to learn more about running it. In September, Eliza returns to France with her mother and son. On December 23, Frank, age 14, leaves Portsmouth's Royal Naval Academy and signs on board the
Perseverance,
heading to the East Indies. Over the winter holidays, James produces
The Sultan
and
High Life Below Stairs.

At Oxford, on January 31, James publishes the first issue of
The Loiterer,
which appears weekly until March 1790. It appears that James is the writer of the family. The Lloyd family moves into Deane parsonage; Austen becomes close friends with the daughters, Martha and Mary.

James becomes a curate. In June, Austen writes and dedicates to her cousin, Eliza, a fictional piece called
Love and Freindship
(yes, she spelled it that way) that brilliantly ridicules sentimental fiction. (For more on this work, go to Chapter 4.)

Eliza's husband, the Comte de Feuillide, fights against the French Revolutionary forces on the side of the Royalists (supporting the King). In July, Charles Austen, now 12, follows his brother Frank as a student at Portsmouth's Royal Naval Academy. James rises in the clerical profession, becoming the vicar of Sherborne St. John in September. On December 27, Edward marries Elizabeth Bridges of Goodnestone, Kent.

The year begins with the Lloyds leaving Deane to live at Ibthorpe. Austen and Cassandra visit them in October. On March 27, James marries Anne Mathew. The newlyweds move to the Deane parsonage, which the Lloyds had vacated for them. In August, Austen writes the dedication of
Catharine; or, The Bower
to her sister. (For more info on
Catharine,
see Chapter 3.) Sometime in the winter, Cassandra becomes engaged to the Rev. Mr. Tom Fowle, whose brother had been a student at Mr. Austen's school at the Steventon Rectory.

On January 21, Louis XVI is guillotined in Paris. On January 23, Edward and his wife have their first child, Francis (Fanny); as she gets older, Austen and Cassandra will consider Fanny almost like another sister. On February 1, the French Republic declares war on Great Britain. Henry enlists in the Oxfordshire militia as a lieutenant. Mr. and Mrs. James Austen have their first child, Anna. Austen writes her final piece of
Juvenilia,
a poem called “Ode to Pity,” dated June 3, found at the end of
Volume the First
of her youthful writings, of which there are three volumes. Frank returns home from the Far East in December.

Eliza's husband, the Comte de Feuillide, is guillotined on February 22. On October 23, Edward's adoptive father, Thomas Knight II, dies, and Edward takes over his estates as the heir. Austen possibly composes most of
Lady Susan
in the fall but without writing a conclusion.

Austen writes
Elinor and Marianne,
the epistolary version of what would later become
Sense and Sensibility
. (See Chapter 4 for info on epistolary writing.) On May 3, James's wife suddenly dies, and little Anna, age 2, is sent to live temporarily at the Steventon rectory with her grandparents and aunts. Between December 1795 and January 1796, Austen meets Tom Lefroy, who's visiting his Aunt and Uncle Lefroy at the Ashe rectory. She writes about him in her first existing letter.

Austen's first existing letter is dated January 9–10, 1796. At this time, Cassandra's fiancé, the Rev. Mr. Tom Fowle, sails for the West Indies as the private chaplain of his kinsman, Lord Craven. During the summer, the widowed James courts the widowed Eliza de Feuillide, but nothing comes of it. In November, he gets engaged to Mary Lloyd of Ibthorpe. In October, Austen begins
First Impressions,
an epistolary novel, which is the forerunner of
Pride and Prejudice.

On January 17, James marries Mary Lloyd. The following month, Cassandra's fiancé dies of tropical fever at San Domingo, but she only learns of his death in May because news travels slowly. In August, Austen completes
First Impressions,
which on November 1, her father offers by mail to the London publisher Cadell and Company. They return his letter without even opening it. Meanwhile, Austen returns in November to
Elinor and Marianne
and begins transforming it into
Sense and Sensibility.
In the same month, Austen and Cassandra accompany their mother to Bath to visit her brother and sister-in-law, Mr. and Mrs. James Leigh-Perrot. Edward and Elizabeth move their family from Rowling into the splendid Godmersham country house, also in Kent, that he has inherited from the Knights. On December 31 in London, Henry marries Eliza de Feuillide, who's ten years older than he is.

During the summer, Austen begins
Susan
(later called
Catherine,
and finally published posthumously as
Northanger Abbey
) while visiting Edward at his new estate with her sister and their parents. The Austens remain at Godmersham between August and October 24, when Austen and her parents return home, while Cassandra remains with Edward and his family. Meanwhile, Mr. Austen gives James his curacy of Deane and closes his school at the Steventon rectory. He also gives up his carriage, which hinders personal travel for the family. Mrs. Austen is ill in October and November, and Austen nurses her. On November 17, James's son, James Edward, is born; he becomes an important biographer of his aunt in 1869, though the title page of the first edition of his
Memoir of Jane Austen
gives 1870 as the publishing year.

Mrs. Austen and Austen visit Bath in May with Edward and Elizabeth and remain there until the end of June. Austen is finishing
Susan
(
Northanger Abbey
) around this time but will work on it again later (1803). Frank is on a ship in the Mediterranean Sea. On August 14, Mrs. Leigh-Perrot, Mrs. Austen's sister-in-law, is formally, but falsely, accused of shoplifting lace from a Bath shop and sent to jail.

On March 29, after spending time in jail, Mrs. Leigh-Perrot is tried and acquitted at the court in Taunton. In late November, Austen visits Mrs. Lloyd and Martha at Ibthorpe. When she returns home in December, she learns that her father has decided to retire and that her parents plan to leave the Steventon rectory to James and his family and move to Bath with her and her sister. Rumor has it that Austen fainted when she heard the news.

In January, Henry Austen begins a business in London as an army agent and banker. He and his wife, Eliza, and her sickly son Hastings de Feuillide (1786–1801) live in London on Upper Berkeley Street. Later in the month, Austen visits her great friends Catherine and Alethea Bigg at Manydown Park in Hampshire. In early May, Mr. and Mrs. Austen, Jane, and Cassandra move to Bath on No. 4 Sydney Place. The four Austens then take their first summer seaside holiday from Bath — which becomes a tradition to escape that city's heat — and visit Sidmouth and Colyton. Austen's supposed short summer romance with a young clergyman who later died occurred at Sidmouth, sometime between this visit in 1801 and the family's visits in 1804. The Austens then visit Steventon (James and his family) and Ashe (the Lefroys), finally returning to Bath in the cool of autumn on October 5.

The Peace of Amiens, ceasing French/England hostilities, is declared on March 25, and Charles and Frank come home. Charles joins the four Austens for the summer. In September, Charles escorts Austen and Cassandra to Godmersham, where they remain until the end of October. Austen's Godmersham visit enhances her understanding (she had already spent much time at other country houses, like Manydown Park) of what country house life is like for the richer gentry. On November 25, Austen and Cassandra visit their old friends, Catherine and Alethea Bigg at Manydown Park. On the evening of December 2, Harris Bigg-Wither proposes to his sisters' old friend, Austen. Harris is the unexpected heir to Manydown, as his older brother died at age 14 in 1794. She accepts. But after a restless night, Austen rejects Harris's proposal, and she and Cassandra immediately leave Manydown for Steventon and then, escorted by their brother James, for Bath. Austen spends the remainder of 1802 revising
Susan
(later
Northanger Abbey
).

In spring, Austen, with Henry's help, sells
Susan
to the publisher Crosby & Company in London for ten pounds. He promises to publish it but never does. On May 18, Napoleon breaks the Peace of Amiens, and Charles and Frank are back at work in the navy. In September and October, the four Austens are again visiting Godmersham and living in luxury. Returning to Bath near the end of October, they visit Lyme Regis (later used in
Persuasion
).

Charles, now a commander, serves the Royal Navy in the Atlantic to prevent slave trade between the United States and the British West Indies, as well as trade of commercial goods between the U.S. and France. Austen works on
The Watsons,
which is left unfinished. The four Austens, joined by Henry and Eliza, return to Lyme Regis for the summer. On returning to Bath, the Austens move to the Green Park Buildings, far less stylish and far more inexpensive than their Sydney Place home. On Austen's 29th birthday, December 16th, her dear friend and mentor, Madam Lefroy, is killed in a freak horseback-riding accident even though Madam Lefroy was a skilled equestrienne.

Mr. Austen dies unexpectedly on January 21. In March, the three Austen women move to 25 Gay Street, Bath, where they're joined in April by Martha Lloyd after the death of her mother. This little band of ladies remains close friends and housemates. Austen concludes
Lady Susan
this year and also makes a final or “fair” copy of it. With Mrs. James Austen expecting her second child, the Austen ladies take James's elder daughter, Anna, with them to Godmersham in June. Anna's sister Caroline is born June 18. On October 21, the English navy, under Admiral Nelson, defeats the French and Spanish navies in the Battle of Trafalgar. Because Frank's ship is sent back to Gibraltar, he misses the glory of Trafalgar.