Pride and Prejudice and the persistent popularity of Jane Austen

2019

I hereby declare that I am the sole author of this thesis. This is a true copy of the thesis, including any required final revisions, as accepted by my examiners. I understand that my thesis may be made electronically available to the public.

Caterina Colomba (ed.), Forum, Editrice Universitaria Udinese, Udine, 2016

2017

This is the first exploration of the performative and theatrical force of Austen’s work and its afterlife, from the nineteenth century to the present. It unearths new and little-known Austen materials: from suffragette novels and pageants to school and amateur theatricals, passing through mid-twentieth-century representations in Scotland and America. The book concludes with an examination of Austen fandom based on an online survey conducted by the author, which elicited over 300 responses from fans across the globe. Through the lens of performative theory, this volume explores how Austen, her work and its afterlives, have aided the formation of collective and personal identity; how they have helped bring people together across the generations; and how they have had key psychological, pedagogical and therapeutic functions for an ever growing audience. Ultimately, this book explains why Austen remains the most beloved author in English Literature.

2023

A 3-page review essay about Pride and Prejudice.

Persuasions Online, 2010

Palgrave, 2019

This volume explores the multiple connections between the two most canonical authors in English, Jane Austen and William Shakespeare. The collection reflects on the historical, literary, critical and filmic links between the authors and their fates. Considering the implications of the popular cult of Austen and Shakespeare, the essays are interdisciplinary and comparative: ranging from Austen’s and Shakespeare’s biographies to their presence in the modern vampire saga Twilight, passing by Shakespearean echoes in Austen’s novels and the authors’ afterlives on the improv stage, in wartime cinema, modern biopics and crime fiction. The volume concludes with an account of the Exhibition “Will & Jane” at the Folger Shakespeare Library, which literally brought the two authors together in the autumn of 2016. Collectively, the essays mark and celebrate what we have called the long-standing “love affair” between William Shakespeare and Jane Austen—over 200 years and counting. CONTENTS Chapter 1: Introduction: Jane and Will, the Love Story Marina Cano and Rosa García-Periago Part 1: History, Contexts and Criticism Chapter 2: Jane Austen as ‘Prose Shakespeare’: Early Comparisons Joanne Wilkes Chapter 3: William Shakespeare and Jane Austen: Biographical Challenges Robert Bearman Chapter 4: Shakespeare and Austen Translated Marie Nedregotten Sørbø Chapter 5: Jewels, Bonds and the Body: Material Culture in Shakespeare and Austen Barbara Benedict Part 2: Intertextual Connections Chapter 6: Is it ‘a marriage of true minds’? Balanced Reading in Northanger Abbey and Persuasion Lynda Hall Chapter 7: ‘As sure as I have a thought or a soul’: The Protestant Heroine in Shakespeare and Austen Claire McEachern Chapter 8: Tyrants, Lovers, and Comedy in the Green Worlds of Mansfield Park and A Midsummer Night’s Dream Inger S. B. Brodey Chapter 9: Forbidden Familial Relations: Echoes of Shakespeare’s King Henry VIII and Hamlet in Austen’s Mansfield Park and Sense and Sensibility Glenda Hudson Part 3: Theatre, Film and Performance Chapter 10: Shylock’s turquoise ring: Jane Austen, Mansfield Park and the Exquisite Acting of Edmund Kean Judith Page Chapter 11: Austen and Shakespeare: Improvised Drama Marina Cano Chapter 12: Shakespeare, Austen and Propaganda in World War II Rosa García-Periago Chapter 13: Screening Will and Jane: Sexuality and the Gendered Author in Shakespeare and Austen Biopics Lisa Starks Part 4: Popular Culture Chapter 14: Austen and Shakespeare, Detectives Lisa Hopkins Chapter 15: In the Pursuit of Love: Twilight, Jane and Will Heta Pyrhönen Chapter 16: Curating Will & Jane Janine Barchas and Kristina Straub Chapter 17: Afterword Mark Thornton Burnett

Journal of English Language and Linguistics, 2022

This research paper aims to investigate the critical feministic issues reflected by Jane Austen in Pride and Prejudice. The story widely reflects the English society of the Regency period. Specifically, this article sheds light on Austen's writing which comes in response to the Georgian Era. Accordingly, the position of woman has been terribly marginalized, including inequality, scarcity of women schools, class distinction, and prohibition of legacy that were noticeably questioned. These unjust practices where woman regressively faced, have been analysed on the light of the .

Women's Writing, 2020

PUNE RESEARCH, 2021

Literature has always acted as a mirror to the society. As the human society evolved slowly and gradually, literary writings, especially the novels played a pivotal role in reflecting and expressing the social scenarios and defining the human psyche. Women are the most integral part of the social discourse. Since centuries, they have strived hard in search of their true identity and worth. Turning through the pages of literary history, we can easily trace the footmarks of the transformation in the position of the females through societies and ages. Women writers and critics have given a glimpse of the social norms and structures prevalent during their times through their writings. Jane Austen is one such poignant writer from the Romantic Period of English Literature who broke apart from the traditionally accepted storyline through her youthful spirits and portrayal of strong female protagonists, who could think for themselves and take their own decisions. Born in a society that hugely discriminated between the rights given to men and women, Austen, since her childhood developed an internal anguish against the unjust social system. This even resulted in her being unmarried throughout her life and continued writing as a profession to be financially independent. Austen always advocated marriage in her novels, but she believed in marriage for love and not for gaining social status. Women during Austen’s times were expected to be submissive and timid. They were considered incapable of thinking wisely and hold own individuality. Her novels parodied the then conventional novel plot of love, marriage and courtship through youthful playfulness and subtle irony. Her female protagonists were the heroes of her novels; they were progressive as well as headstrong. They did not believe in social conformity in the male dominated society.