Table of Contents

Illusion and reality; a didactic novelist?; materials - the archive, the letters of Jane Austen, the "juvenilia"; chronology -Cassandra's evidence, the evidence of the letters, the use of almanacs, 1800-1810; prelude to the novels; "Northanger Abbey"; "Sense and Sensibility"; "Pride and Prejudice"; "Mansfield Park" -the poor relation, the play within the play, the plot of "Mansfield Park"; "Emma" - the two levels, Mr Woodhouse, Harriet Smith, the denouement; "Persuasion" - the two levels, the persuasion, the story, Lyme, the denouement; church and clergy -the church in the 18th century, church music, music in parish churches, Jane Austen and the Evangelicals, Sunday travelling, Jane Austen's religion, the clergy in the novels; rank and status - Emma's snobbery, equality and hierarchy, equality in "Pride and Prejudice", money - "Northanger Abbey" and "Sense and Sensibility", "Pride and Prejudice" and the equality of gentlemen, "Mansfield Park", "Emma" and women, rank and status in "Persuasion"; marriage in the novels - marriage "in esse", a romantic view of marriage - Marianne Dashwood and Elizabeth Bennet, marriage in principle - Sir Thomas Bertram's view, Lady Bertram's view of marriage, Miss Crawford's views on marriage, Mr and Mrs George Knightley, "Persuasion", the wooing of Fanny Knight; convictions and the moral code; epilogue - reflections on the feminism of Jane Austen.