Jane, everywhere as usual
Several articles on Jane Austen popped up in the past week or so, and we’re just getting around to posting them. (Yes, suffering from blogging malaise again. Might be the weather.)
The New York Times had an article on Literary Darwinists that invoked Pride and Prejudice right up front. We didn’t get much past the first page; if someone would be so kind as to tell us what it’s about, we would be most grateful. 
Should unpublished work be published after an author’s death? A good question, but why drag Northanger Abbey into it? The author of the piece admits that Jane Austen sought publication of the novel during her lifetime, and had she lived long enough, probably would have tried again; Sanditon or The Watsons might be a better choice to question; though we’re glad to have had the opportunity to read both of these. (Though in a way, reading Sanditon is a tease, because you just know that would have been an incredible novel had it been finished.) Besides, the money from the posthumous publication of Persuasion and Northanger Abbey went to Cassandra Austen (mostly) and Henry Austen, both of whom were in need of the cash, and we sincerely doubt that Jane would have begrudged either of them the money. Now, some of the recent films, on the other hand…
This is a fairly interesting article on Jane Austen and America. The author notes military service of various Austen relatives in British-American conflicts (the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812).
February 26th, 2008 at 5:37 am
Brian Boyd, for instance, a well-known scholar of Vladimir Nabokov and professor at the University of New Zealand in Auckland, changed his focus in his 40’s to Literary Darwinism, gripped by what he calls its “one very simple and powerful idea.”
University of New Zealand? Heh.
Funnily enough though, I did take a stage one English paper taught by Brian Boyd with just this kind of focus, and the texts included Lolita and Pride and Prejudice.
February 28th, 2008 at 5:44 pm
Must confess that I didn’t get much beyond the first page either, but it sure sounds like somebody needed an idea for a dissertation and that looking at literature as a record of human biological behavior didn’t seem any more ridiculous than what his/her classmates were doing. I shall tread softly amongst the literary theorists,since it’s neither my training or my inclination, but I guess it gives ‘em something to do with their time.