General Information about Jane Austen

Jane Austen (1775-1817) is regarded as the greatest of English women novelists because of her six completed novels, that are specially noted for their sparkling social comedy and accurate vision of human  relationships, in fact, they are still read today.
Jane Austen was born on 16 December 1775 at Steventon in Hampshire.
Her father, the Reverend George Austen, was an intelligent and sensitive man who encouraged Jane in her love of reading. From too young she was familiar with the works of Henry Fielding, Sir Walter Scott, Richardson and the poet George Crabbe. Her early tries at writing include humoristic viws of popular romances.
When her father retired in 1801, the family moved to Bath, which was later to feature in her novel Northanger Abbey  (1818).
After his death in 1805 the family moved first to Southampton and then in 1809 to Chawton in Hampshire, where Jane Austen is known to have written her last three novels, Mansfield Park (1814), Emma (1816) and Persuasion (1818).
Although her other novels were written earlier, it was not until 1811 that Sense and Sensibility was first published.
Pride and Prejudice (1813), features Jane Austen’s own favourite heroine, Elizabeth Bennet.
Surrounded by her familly and wholly immersed in her writing and domestic tasks, Jane Austen type of life is noted for its lack of events. However, she attract several admirers.
Jane Austen’s self-contained life often seems reflected in novels. Sir Walter Scott praised Jane Austen for “that exquisite touch which renders commonplace things and characters interesting”, whilse Maugham claimed that she had at her command “the most precious gift a novelist can possess”.
Jane Austen died in 1817.

Marriage, property and intrigue lie at the heart of Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen’s most enduringly popular novel. Met with critical acclaim on its publication in 1813, it is thought to be reworked version of First Impressions, an early work which was refused for publication in 1797.