My dear husband got this for me many years ago, and it's still my favorite way of re-reading Jane Austen. Do not overlook the chapters at the back of each volume, or the condensed list of dramatis personae. The interrelationships among the characters and their social standing affect so much of the plot line. The Chapman edition was the first modern critical edition of Jane Austen, done in the 1920s and still well respected. Looks like this is the current binding.

Pride And Prejudice

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." So the writer states right in the beginning.

That is because while this is assumed to be a romance it is really a very astute picture of society that transcends time and geography and social boundaries and cultures, and applies universally to any place where there are young women at an age ripe to marry without dowries to bring out grooms out of the woods swarming. This is all the more so when the young women in question are not about to while away time with pretense of careers and attempts at education while the men they school and party with are getting ready, or any other subterfuges of societies they belong to.

Marriage is the beginning of the life they are going to lead with homemaking and child rearing and building of social fabric and of future as their occupation, since time immemorial. It can be said to be the most important occupation in the world, and yet few societies make a provision of how the young women can go about securing their life in it, with few structures and storngholds and little if any security.

Jane Austen writes extensively about this in various settings in her works, and offers much light to guide people - not only young women but men and women of all ages - with good counsel. This is her most popular work and most famous one, and with good reason.

It seems like a romance and at some level it is but only after normal intelligent and prudent women - young and old - use decorum and wise counsel added to commonsense. This like other books by the author is about how to live well and safe and be good and decent, sensible and honourable, prudent and not blinded by illusions, and find love and romance and marriage as well.

Often people of a bit less comprehension are likely to make the mistake of a common sort, where they conclude "Elizabeth married Darcy not out of love, but for his money". She - the writer - herself makes a joke of the sort, somewhere along towards the end, but it is clearly a joke for all that. Elizabeth might not have been sighing and fainting with passionate abandon at first sight, but that is because unlike figures of trashy pulp she is a person with a mind and other concerns as well, and for a normal young woman passion does not necessarily come as the blinding flash at first sight any more than it does for - say - a writer or a poet or an artist or a scientist. Which does not reduce the final outcome of a certainty when it does come. Elizabeth married for her conviction of love, respect and rectitude, not for money.

If that were to be true she would not have refused him, or indeed even been off hand, and not fawning or manipulative, even before with all his standoffish behaviour.

But she behaved normally, and refused him with a growing wrath when he proposed - it was not his money, but to begin with the truth of his letter, and then the regard his household had for him, the people who knew him the most, and subsequently his more than civil behaviour towards her relatives who were only middle class, and his obvious attempts to have his sister know her and have her for a friend - these wer the successive steps that changed her more and more.

The final clinching one was of course his taking all the trouble to make amends to the grievous injury caused to her family by his silence, about someone he should have and did not warn people about, and keeping not only silent about it - the efforts he made to make sure about making amends to the injury caused by his reticence - but making sure her uncle would not tell anyone either.

In between was his aunt arriving haughtily to obtain a reassuarance from her to the effect that she would not marry him - which not only made her stubborn but made the three concerned (the two and the aunt) realise that she might be considering it seriously, although his offer had not been left on the table indefinitely.

So if anyone out there still thinks Elizabeth married him for his money - I suppose you did not read the story, really.
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Sense and Sensibility

This one gives the clash of values characteristic of the writer, with wealth and temptation and opportunity versus rectitude and character and propriety as well as prudence playing the major part. How love itself must give way to rectitude and character is the chief theme, with the obvious lesson that giving way to temptation for now might close the door to happiness, love and future in fact.
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Mansfield Park

The writer of the universally popular Pride And Prejudice explores another angle of the conflicts of dealing with life as it is dealt out - wealth and relative status, temptation and opportunities, family and relationships, extended family and relatives, and love that never might be attained. Above all are rectitude and character and values, to be never lost whatever the temptation.
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Emma

Perhaps arguably the second most popular of the writer's works vying with Mansfield Park for the title, this one again explores values and conflicts from another angle, with growth of character and perception, and temptation to meddle in social affairs, as the chief theme.

It is more serious than it looks, as is usual with a good deal of her work, where the seemingly most superficial and romantic turns out to be most serious and worthy of note.

More people than would care to acknowledge or admit even to themselves do meddle in affairs of others, especially those of heart, with a fond illusion that they can do good to others and provide their happiness for them. But lacking in perception and maturity and judgement and discrimination they often spoil more than they would like to admit, often ruining lives.

Couples that might change the world with their love are torn asunder by a disapproving bunch of relatives or even religious heads with their "concern" for the "soul" of the one who might bring wonderious gifts but is not one of them (hence the gifts of course), and the miracle that would have been the families and souls generated with such love are nipped in the bud. Of course, it is only the couple that knows the tremendous love and the pain and suffering of being torn asunder, while others merely go about congratulating one another for having averted an unsuitable match with an outsider.

Of course, meddling is not limited to that - couples that could have changed the course of the universe with their love and their gifts combined often get torn apart by meddling others who delude themselves that they were acting in good faith for the betterment of society, and if it is clear they were tormenting a woman or a daughter, well that is what they are for - so they can learn to do the same to others in turn, if so lucky, and so goes the chain. Jackals manage to devour the marriage and the love and even the children on all but physical level.

Meanwhile gifts of heaven go squandered into dust because the couples are either too weak to hold on to each other and to their heavenly gift of creation of a new world, or even worse, because one gets turned against another and hurts until the one hurt is no more, which is when the survivor might realise if lucky of what has been lost, even though it might be too late. Often such realisation awaits death of the one who hurt the other one into death.

None of this happened in Emma - she was lucky, to have good counsel and love guarding her, and her weakness of character of meddling with others nipped in bud and her mistakes of perception corrected by someone wiser and stern about serious faults. She was lucky indeed.
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Northanger Abbey

The not so well to do young woman is taken to a resort by comparatively well to do relatives and is invited by the master of the Northanger Abbey, the father of the young and eligible gentleman who has a mutual attracted to her and courting her, to stay with him and his family, under the impression the she is going to inherit the relatives' money.

The character of this father, the rich owner of the home that is the title, unfolds, and there are confusion, test of virtue and character, and separations and misunderstandings.

The young man however has excellent character and fortunately realises what is what, and love triumphs even without money.
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Persuasion

The most gentle love story from Austen repertoire, with the usual cache of gentle women and men following a normal course of life for their day while falling into easy traps of faults or follies and realising their mistakes and generally rising above, with their counterpart of men and women of small follies or serious faults of character providing examples of how not to be or behave.

Someone (name escapes me, having read this long ago, two decades or more) had once pointed out that in Austen nothing happens page after page and yet one reads it with great interest, and to that one might only add, time after time again and again with the interest not diminished at all. And the most interesting are those of her tales that have the gentlest of stories, characters, et al.
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Lady Susan

If one never knew anyone of this sort, one would think the character is entirely invented. At that it is not that uncommon to come across men who deal with their own children, especially daughters, this cruelly or worse, but they are excused or even pressured to be this cruel and admired for it in various cultures (not excepting west or US for that matter) while women are usually this cruel with children of other women, say a lover's wife or a sister in law. But the character therefore is entirely possible, especially in an era when a woman could only obtain wealth and consequence by marriages her own and her relatives'; and the only area she could use her mind however sharp was in fields related to intrigues of social sort, marriages, love affaires, and so on, especially gossip and vile gossip about other women. This unfortunately is what far too many women and even men use their minds for, even now, for sport and not for want of subjects that could use the sharp minds. Sometimes it is the heart of such a gossiper and mud thrower that is at fault seriously in that destroying another person is the pleasure, and use of mind and other facilities is merely a means.

Lady Susan comes as a surprise therefore not because of the subject but the author who chose to write it, since Jane Austen usually is as clear as a sunny day in desert about virtues and vices, and condemning not only the latter but even faults of character that might seem only human today but do lead to follies or tragedies even today often enough unquestionably.

Here Austen chooses the letter form prevalent in her time, and avoids commentary, except in letters of another character, giving equal voice to two opposite characters as it were. The story ends well as all Austen tales do to reward virtue, protect innocent and punish vice or folly only in measure.

A window as always to her time, and informative in that as well.

Feb 05, 2016.
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December 31, 2020.
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Watsons

One wishes she had had time to write it up as she did others; here is an outline written in her green years.
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Sanditon (1817)
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Austen is delightful as ever, in her way of quite succinctly judging characters she writes about.

"Upon the whole, Mr. Parker was evidently an amiable family man, fond of wife, children, brothers and sisters, and generally kind-hearted; liberal, gentlemanlike, easy to please; of a sanguine turn of mind, with more imagination than judgement. And Mrs. Parker was as evidently a gentle, amiable, sweet-tempered woman, the properest wife in the world for a man of strong understanding but not of a capacity to supply the cooler reflection which her own husband sometimes needed; and so entirely waiting to be guided on every occasion that whether he was risking his fortune or spraining his ankle, she remained equally useless."

What with Mr. Parker promoting Sandition with a faith in sea air and bathing as remedy for every ailment, and necessary to health, on one hand - and his siblings swearing their ill heath is too far gone for them to visit, the latter being quite hilarious, this is already promising entertainment and more, right at the beginning.

Later, it's the young Sir Edward Denham, handsome, and flattering in his attentions to the visitor Miss Charlotte Haywood, who is subject of the author's scrutiny.

"Charlotte’s first glance told her that Sir Edward’s air was that of a lover. There could be no doubt of his devotion to Clara. How Clara received it was less obvious, but she was inclined to think not very favourably; for though sitting thus apart with him (which probably she might not have been able to prevent, her air was calm and grave."

Austen is clear about her contempt for a modicum of behaviour slightly reminiscent of Mary Bennett from her most famous work, Pride And Prejudice.

"He surprised her by quitting Clara immediately on their all joining and agreeing to walk, and by addressing his attentions entirely to herself. Stationing himself close by her, he seemed to mean to detach her as much as possible from the rest of the party and to give her the whole of his conversation. He began, in a tone of great taste and feeling, to talk of the sea and the sea shore; and ran with energy through all the usual phrases employed in praise of their sublimity and descriptive of the undescribable emotions they excite in the mind of sensibility. The terrific grandeur of the ocean in a storm, its glass surface in a calm, its gulls and its samphire and the deep fathoms of its abysses, its quick vicissitudes, its direful deceptions, its mariners tempting it in sunshine and overwhelmed by the sudden tempest—all were eagerly and fluently touched; rather commonplace perhaps, but doing very well from the lips of a handsome Sir Edward, and she could not but think him a man of feeling, till he began to stagger her by the number of his quotations and the bewilderment of some of his sentences.

And she has Charlotte bequeathed with intelligence and common sense of Elizabeth Bennett, rather than the self absorption of Emma.

"His choosing to walk with her, she had learnt to understand. It was done to pique Miss Brereton. She had read it, in an anxious glance or two on his side; but why he should talk so much nonsense, unless he could do no better, was unintelligible. He seemed very sentimental, very full of some feeling or other, and very much addicted to all the newest-fashioned hard words, had not a very clear brain, she presumed, and talked a good deal by rote. ... "

Charlotte chooses to stay with Lady Denham on the Terrace, as asked by her, instead of going with others to library.

"Nobody could live happier together than us—and he was a very honourable man, quite the gentleman of ancient family. And when he died, I gave Sir Edward his gold watch.” She said this with a look at her companion which implied its right to produce a great impression; and seeing no rapturous astonishment in Charlotte’s countenance, added quickly, “He did not bequeath it to his nephew, my dear. It was no bequest. It was not in the will. He only told me, and that but once, that he should wish his nephew to have his watch; but it need not have been binding if l had not chose it.”

"“Very kind indeed! Very handsome!” said Charlotte, absolutely forced to affect admiration.

"“Yes, my dear, and it is not the only kind thing I have done by him. I have been a very liberal friend to Sir Edward. And poor young man, he needs it bad enough. For though I am only the dowager, my dear, and he is the heir, things do not stand between us in the way they commonly do between those two parties. Not a shilling do I receive from the Denham estate. Sir Edward has no payments to make me. He doesn’t stand uppermost, believe me. It is I that help him.”

"“Indeed! He is a very fine young man, particularly elegant in his address.” This was said chiefly for the sake of saying something, but Charlotte directly saw that it was laying her open to suspicion by Lady Denham’s giving a shrewd glance at her and replying,

"“Yes, yes, he is very well to look at. And it is to be hoped that some lady of large fortune will think so, for Sir Edward must marry for money. He and I often talk that matter over. A handsome young fellow like him will go smirking and smiling about and paying girls compliments, but he knows he must marry for money. And Sir Edward is a very steady young man in the main and has got very good notions.”"
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Austen writes candidly about - whether consciously aware, and deliberately writing, or simply taking them as facts of life - arranged marriage and caste systems of England in particular, Europe in general; things that since have been, falsely, identified exclusively with India, in line with Macaulay policy to break spirit of India.

"“Sir Edward Denham,” said Charlotte, “with such personal advantages may be almost sure of getting a woman of fortune, if he chooses it.”

"This glorious sentiment seemed quite to remove suspicion. “Aye my dear, that’s very sensibly said,” cried Lady Denham. “And if we could but get a young heiress to Sanditon! But heiresses are monstrous scarce! I do not think we have had an heiress here—or even a Co. since Sanditon has been a public place. Families come after families but, as far as I can learn, it is not one in a hundred of them that have any real property, landed or funded. An income perhaps, but no property. Clergymen maybe, or lawyers from town, or half-pay officers, or widows with only a jointure. And what good can such people do anybody? Except just as they take our empty houses and, between ourselves, I think they are great fools for not staying at home. Now if we could get a young heiress to be sent here for her health—and if she was ordered to drink asses’ milk I could supply her—and, as soon as she got well, have her fall in love with Sir Edward!”"
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And again, as the two parties unite -

"Sir Edward, approaching Charlotte, said, “You may perceive what has been our occupation. My sister wanted my counsel in the selection of some books. We have many leisure hours and read a great deal. I am no indiscriminate novel reader. The mere trash of the common circulating library I hold in the highest contempt. You will never hear me advocating those puerile emanations which detail nothing but discordant principles incapable of amalgamation, ....

I didn't really connect with any of the stories which made me feel like an uncultured swine. I get why people love Jane Austen but I think since these stories are classics and kind of old I couldn't really concentrate.

I don't like Austen's writing but by the ANGELS this book is gorgeous.

Ich glaube, kaum eine Autorin hält sich mit ihren Werken so in den Köpfen der Leser*innen, wie Jane Austen. Ich habe jetzt wirklich lange gebraucht, um alle Romane zu lesen. Da ich immer mal wieder einen gelesen habe und sie nicht direkt hintereinander las, hat mich Jane lange Zeit begleitet.

I got this at Costco probably more than a year ago. and i most definitely got it because the cover is gorgeous. however it is DAUNTING because it has so many books inside and the font is miniscule. but I will try to read it soon! i need to read more classics!

I had read four of Jane Austen’s six novels at various times in the past, but when I got an invitation two months in advance to participate in a panel discussion of this author, I decided to take the opportunity to read all six novels in order. This yielded a fresh and increased appreciation for Austen as one of the rightful heirs to Shakespeare for her rich characterization and penetrating insight.

Austen sits at the turning point between two literary ages – the aristocratic, which dealt with heroes and classic themes, and the democratic, which began to consider ordinary people and their psychological selves. Austen well understood the narrow constraints of the upper class world about which she wrote, but increasingly concerned herself with the actualization of her heroes – a collection of women who perceive their world and the people around them keenly enough to be aware of their ironies.

Austen did not write her novels one at a time in the order they were published, so it is difficult to assess her work chronologically. ‘Sense and Sensibility’ leads easily into the superior ‘Pride and Prejudice’. ‘Mansfield Park’ is equally rich, though it troubles some readers for its tacit admission that the wealth of the family is derived from the slave trade. ‘Emma’ shows Austen loosening up, and if ‘Northanger Abbey’ is a bit of a faux-gothic misstep, ‘Persuasion’ shows the greatest subtlety and incredible control. The shortest of her novels, ‘Persuasion’ is ultimately my favorite, though Pride, Mansfield, and Emma are also indisputable.

Literary critic Harold Bloom speaks of Austen as achieving a near-Shakespearean level of characterization, causing even minor characters to bloom on the page with complexity and depth. Her central characters are notable for their heightened perception of the world around them, making them rightful heirs to Rosalind from “As You Like It” – characters so aware, they at times seem to have noticed they are in a book or a play. And when these women encounter men of nearly equal potency – as Elizabeth Bennett does with Mr. Darcy in Pride, and as Anne Elliot does with Captain Wentworth – the frisson of psyches pushing and pulling is palpable and fully human.

For these women, there is one defining transaction to be made in their lives, and that is their marriage. For Austen, love and marriage are business, and she shows us over and over in each novel how that choice reframes a woman’s life, with consequences she will have to accept for as long as she and her husband are alive, and even longer. The reader has a sense of a narrow window through which these women must attempt to jump: Choose a husband too early and risk settling for less than you deserve; wait too long and risk having no one left for whom to settle. Elizabeth Bennett (in Pride) and Anne Elliot (in Persuasion) both struggle with the fear that they have blown their opportunity and are fated for tragic endings. Austen doesn’t spend time deliberating what these women might do if they fail, but the true suspense comes from the intricacies of the present, not the future.

It’s important to note, though, that for Austen love takes second place to affection – a much rarer, much more precious commodity, and the real grand prize in these stories. With loveless or merely convenient marriages scattered about among secondary characters, what keeps us turning the page is the possibility of a marriage enlivened by affection. This suspense transcends the novel of manners, the ironic comedy, and shows Austen to be greater than her form, as we breathe and yearn with these women, and shift against their social constraints.

One note for readers of this Modern Library edition (I believe from 1978): There are a shocking number of typographical errors in this imprint, and one instance of wrongly ordered pages. Be prepared to read pages 1182, 1185, 1184, 1183, and then 1186 if you are going to make sense of ‘Northanger Abbey.’

This book I bought purely for the cover. I had read Jane Austen books as a teenager after falling in love with the BBC mini series.

So as an (barely) new adult I encountered this book and thought "Why not read in in the original language?" And bought this monster.

I quickly realised that reading Jane Austen in English is HARD. Especially if you only read romcom in English and comics. I didn't realise how big the difference between hearing the language and actually reading it.

Also the book is heavy. So taking one story with me and reading it slowly wasn't an option.

That was... ten-isch years ago (?) And I still haven't read Jane Austen in English.

The thing is... the book is bloody gorgeous and I feel ready to tackle the language barrière now. But... it's heavy. So so heavy.

So I will do what every bookwurm will old do: buy more books. Such a burden.

Lo so, lo so è un doppione... Ce li ho già (quasi) tutti ma non ho potuto resistere... Quando vedo qualcosa di "inedito" di Jane non ce la faccio, è più forte di me: devo possederlo! E questa versione era troppo allettante e succulenta da lasciarla lì sullo scaffale tutta sola... Mi chiamava. Ed ora è li, nella mia libreria in mezzo a tutti i suoi fratelli! Si lo so... sono da rinchiudere. ^___^

I love jane austen 10/10

I'm a huge fan of all of Austen's works. I've read each of her novels several times over the years. This "six-pack" offers them all in one place, on my eBook reader, which is a great way to travel with them. The bargain of $2.99 (which is what I paid, and I assume that hold steady) on Kindle makes it attractive, but the fact that the novels are laid out well and allow for movement between the novels and through the novels easily is essential to that price being well worth it.

I started to listen to this abridged volume of 3 (of the 6) novels by Jane Austen after mid-December. On Libby this is available separately, and wanting to listen to each a couple of times required several borrows and being on waiting lists to achieve this. I can give you the long-winded account of how I came across this collection (and it’s very convoluted), the short version is it was purely luck; more so when  this Goodreads page  has the correct image but the description is referring to the complete collection that combines Volumes 1 and 2.

Of the three here I have previously read the full version of Emma and Persuasion but Northanger Abbey was a new read for me.

This is my first for abridged novels, I completely took to this by the second listening of each one, in fact I enjoyed them so much that if I had the time I would listen to them again. I haven’t given much thought to abridged novels but I would consider them from now on.