Jane Austen

Jane Austen was born on December 16, 1775 in the village of Steventon, Hampshire, England. Her father, George Austen, was the rector of Steventon Church. Her mother, Cassandra Leigh, came from a wealthy family and had distant connections, had distant connections to a duke and was related to Lord Leigh, of Stoneleigh Abbey in Warwickshire.

Jane was the seventh of eight children. She had one sister, Cassandra, with whom she was very close. At age 25, Jane moved with her parents to Bath, where she lived until her father's death in 1805. Jane disliked living in the city and her family had to move a few times to find less expensive lodging. Upon her father's death she, together with her sister and mother, then lived with one of her brothers and his family until she moved to the cottage at Chawton in 1809. About two months before her death, in 1817, she moved to Winchester for medical treatment and is buried in the cathedral there. It is now believed that she suffered from Addison's disease.

A reading of her letters to her sister reveals that Jane was once in love with a gentleman by the name of Thomas Lefroy, however, as neither of them had any fortune, they were unable to marry. Later in life, Jane did accept a marriage proposal to a man she did not love, but retracted it the following day. Neither Jane, nor her sister Cassandra ever married.

Parallels can be found in many of Jane's novels to some of her own life experiences. By writing about what she knew, she was able to give an authenticism and a realism to the thoughts and feelings and reactions of her characters. She was a keen observer of human interaction, and able to render those observations in her writing with unerring precision while wrapping them in her own unique perspective and delivering them with biting wit and intelligent humor.

Jane began writing stories for her family's entertainment at a young age, and wrote versions of her some of her novels in her early twenties. The novels were revised before they were anoymously published, some years later, beginning with Sense and Sensibility in 1811. Jane was popular in her own time, and her popularity has not only endured for the past 200 years, but has grown to worldwide proportions. Her novels have never been out of print. Her works have now become a widespread popular culture inspiring countless adaptations which in turn inspire more fans, by continuing to bring her brilliance to the masses in new ways.