Jane Austen - Biography, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Filmography (Read)

Jane Austen - biography, date of birth, place of birth, filmography, clips, Writer.

December 16, 1775, Steventon, Hampshire, England, UK - July 18, 1817, Winchester, UK - English writer, herald of realism in British literature, satirist, wrote the so-called romance novels.

Her father, George Austin, was a parish priest. He came from an old Kent family, was an enlightened and well-educated person. His wife, Cassandra Lee, also belonged to an ancient but impoverished family. Besides Jane, the family had six boys and one girl (Cassandra). Jane Austen was the penultimate child.

Despite the high infant mortality rate in those years, they all survived.

Much less certain information is available about the writer herself. The opinions of contemporaries differ even about her appearance. Jane "is not at all pretty, she is prim for her twelve years old, capricious and unnatural," her cousin Philadelphia said. “She is attractive, good-looking, thin and graceful, only her cheeks are a little round,” said the brother of her close friend. Cassandra's portrait of Jane is similar to this description.

Jane Austen loved outfits, balls, fun. Her letters are full of descriptions of the styles of hats, stories about new dresses and gentlemen. Fun was combined in her with a natural intelligence and a decent, especially for a girl of her circle and position, who had not even graduated from school, education.

Between 1783 and 1786 she studied with her sister Cassandra at Oxford, Southampton and Reading. Jane had no luck with her schools; in the first, she and Cassandra suffered from the oppressive nature of the headmistress and nearly died of typhus. Another school in Reading, on the other hand, was run by a very good-natured person, but the knowledge of the students was the last concern of her life. Having returned his daughters home, George Austin decided to take care of their education himself and was very successful in this. Skillfully guiding their reading, he instilled in the girls a good literary taste, taught them to love classical authors whom he knew perfectly from the nature of his own occupations. Shakespeare, Goldsmith, Hume were read. They were also fond of novels, reading authors such as Ridcharson, Fielding, Stern, Maria Edgeworth, Fanny Bernie. Of the poets, they preferred Cowper, Thomson, Thomas Gray. The formation of Jane Austen's personality took place in an intellectual setting - among books, constant conversations about literature, discussions of what was read and what was happening.

Although the writer spent her short life in the provinces, Steventon, Bath, Choten, Winchester, only occasionally leaving for London, the big world with its events and cataclysms: wars, uprisings, revolutions - constantly burst into the outwardly calm and measured existence of the daughter of an English priest.

Jane Austen's youth and maturity fell on turbulent times: the Napoleonic Wars, the War of Independence in North America, England was engulfed in an industrial revolution, the first Luddite actions had already swept through it, Ireland was engulfed in uprisings.

Jane Austen was in lively correspondence with brothers, their wives, distant relatives, and some of them were direct participants in historical events. The French Revolution radically changed the fate of Elise de Feyd, brothers Charles and Francis went to war with France. Cassandra's fiance died in the West Indies; for several years, the Austin family raised the son of the former governor of India Warren Hastings.

The letters provided Jane Austen with invaluable material for her novels. And although in none of them can you find a story about wars or revolutions, and the action is never taken out of England, the influence of what is happening around is especially noticeable, for example, in her last novel, Arguments of Reason, where there are many sailors who have just returned to land after hostilities, distinguished themselves in battles, sailed to the West Indies. However, Austin did not consider herself competent to write in detail about the hostilities and the beginning of the colonial expansion of England.

Restraint is not only a feature of Austin's creative appearance, but also an integral part of her life position. Austin came from a family with strong English traditions: they knew how to deeply feel and experience, but at the same time were restrained in showing feelings.

Jane Austen never got married. When Jane was 20, she had an affair with a neighbor, Thomas Lefroy, the future Lord Chief Justice of Ireland, and then a law student. However, the marriage of young people would be impractical, since both families were relatively poor and hoped to use the marriages of their offspring to improve their financial and social situation, so Jane and Tom had to leave. At thirty, Jane put on a cap, thereby announcing to the world that from now on she was an old maid who had said goodbye to hopes for personal happiness, although once an offer was made to her. The Austins were never rich, and after the death of their father, their financial circumstances became even more strained. Jane sewed up the family and helped her mother with the housework.

Her books are recognized masterpieces that combine the simplicity of the plot, deep psychological insight into the souls of the characters and ironic, soft, truly "English" humor. Jane Austen's writings are required at all colleges and universities in the UK.

All Information About: Jane Austen - Biography, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Filmography.
Author: Jane Watson