The Complete Novels of Jane Austen, Volume 2: Emma, Northanger Abbey, Persuasion

by Jane Austen

Book Overview

"Mansfield Park" - Frances "Fanny" Price, at age 10, is sent from her overburdened family home to live with her uncle and aunt in the country in Northamptonshire. It is a jolting change, from the... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0679600256
• ISBN13: 9780679600251
• Release Date: September 1992
• Publisher: Modern Library
• Length: 736 Pages
• Weight: 1.63 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 5.7" x 8.3"

Customer Reviews

Strong Edition

This hardback is a solid binding on good quality paper. It easily stands up to the many re-readings Austen's novels deserve.

Jane's prose is perfect

Jane Austen is still where she belongs, between book covers. We know the stories are good, but what isn't immediately obvious is the many recent adaptations is what an impeccable writer of English prose she is - no posturing word-dropper, no purveyer of hoary terminology, but a fine, simple, straightforward narrator. She is brief but telling, using tilt and tone to make us smile. She doesn't bore with tedious flashbacks or podding descriptions of a new character's background. And she tells us what we wanted to know, just when we want to know it. As I am wondering what became of Mr. Bingley, he turns up; as I am trying to remember what the party is doing in Bath, it becomes clear. She's always ahead, dropping just the right number of crumbs. Jane's world moved slowly, and reading her takes time. Her cncerns are universal - how to fill the hours of the day, the pairing of single young men and women, the effects of money, household matters. Her ethical domain is dominated by consideration - of others' feelings, needs, requirements. The occasional rebellious spirit is not admired, concepts such as fulfillment and freedom never enter her head. As for "needs" beyond basic physical ones - an idea that would have astonished her - she would have substituted "obligations." But there is something about all this that keeps us going back, and back and back.

Small world, high drama

Now that Jane Austen's work has made it onto the big screen in a big way, the myth that her novels merely dealt with the niceties of social interaction in the early nineteenth century is being blown clean away. Her novels are a world in miniature, but a brutal world that left women at the mercy of men for their fortunes and misfortunes. Take for instance the start of "Sense and Sensibility": the head of the household dies, leaving his wife and daughters dependent on the goodwill of his son from a previous marriage. The son's good intentions are shorn away in a cutting dialogue between him and his wife until what he gives his step-family will keep them only in genteel poverty. Small wonder then that the often-quoted start of "Pride and Prejudice" is so loaded with irony--a rich husband was a catch indeed for he could save you and your loved ones from poverty. Despite the grim circumstances of her novels and their often claustrophobic atmosphere, Jane Austen's wit gives her work a deceptive lightness. Her work may be about women struggling to survive in a world that tried to keep them on the margins but it has all the sharpness and pace to ensure her books have been read for over 150 years.

A "must-have" for any fiction collection

Not sure if you want to read a Jane Austen novel after seeing the movie based on her book? I can only speak for myself, but I thoroughly enjoyed reading these novels. It became clear to me upon reading these timeless tales of human relationships why Hollywood has been feverishly adapting Austen's stories for film. These stories never lose their relevance! Austen had a way of portraying the eccentricities and weaknesses of human nature in a gentle but honest fashion. The heros and heroines in these novels are witty, amusing and endearingly flawed as they blunder their way along to true happiness, though never quite in the way they imagine. This collection of her novels is a well-loved and worthy addition to my permanent collection.