The Life and Times of Jane Austin
JaneFan has resurrected Austentatious, and her first post concerns that one nitpicky thing that drives Janeites crazy the world over…referring to “our” Jane as Jane Austin.
Googling “Jane Austin” for the obvious entertainment value, JaneFan found that there really WAS a 19th century author named Jane Austin. There also is an elaborate fan page for one “Calamity Jane Austin” who apparently wrote some potboilers called The Scarlet Peony, Northanger Abilene, and other interesting titles. (But are they horrid, are you sure they are all horrid?)
January 12th, 2006 at 12:28 am
You all can snark at me after reading this but I will admit to having at least on one or two occasions writing Jane Austin instead of Jane Austen. There are times when I just type to fast for spell check, and because AUSTIN is the capitol of Texas it is not always caught. I have even done it a few times on this board.
While I can agree with JaneFan that it is something that would drive a “true” Austen fan crazy, sometimes we all make the smallest of errors and it would be nice if they were excused. After all at one time or another we have all made a typo.
~R
January 12th, 2006 at 12:40 am
Typos in a blog comment are more readily forgiven than “published” articles, Amazon listings, DVD covers (P2 originally had “Jane Austin’s Persuasion”), etc.
January 13th, 2006 at 7:48 pm
Yes, I agree, if it’s in a blog, etc., it’s much more forgivable. I recently saw one of those decorative wooden signs you hang in you house with a quote from “Jane Austin”. I was sure the quote was from our Jane Austen and would have loved to have it in my home, but the spelling would have driven me crazy (I majored in English and thus am very nitpicky!).