Jane Austen ( / ˈ ɒ s t ɪ n , ˈ ɔː s t ɪ n / OST -in, AW -stin ; 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English writer best known for her six novels, which discuss, criticize, and give opinions about the English landed gentry at the end of the 18th century.
Her stories often show how women relied on marriage to achieve good social status and financial security. Her works criticize the novels of sensibility from the second half of the 18th century and are part of the move toward 19th-century literary realism. Her use of social commentary, realism, wit, and irony made critics and scholars praise her work.
Austen wrote major novels before the age of 22, but she was not published until she was 35. The anonymously published Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814), and Emma (1816) had some success but did not bring her public fame in her lifetime. She wrote two other novels—Northanger Abbey and Persuasion, both published after her death in 1817—and began another, eventually titled Sanditon, but it was left unfinished when she died. She also left behind three volumes of early writings, the short epistolary novel Lady Susan, and the unfinished novel The Watsons.
Since her death, Austen’s novels have rarely been out of print. A major change in her reputation happened in 1833, when her books were republished in Richard Bentley’s Standard Novels series (illustrated by Ferdinand Pickering and sold as a set). Her works gradually gained wide praise and popularity. In 1869, her nephew published A Memoir of Jane Austen. Her work has inspired many critical essays and has been included in many literary anthologies.
Her novels have often been adapted into film and television. Notable film versions include Pride and Prejudice (1940), Sense and Sensibility (1995), Emma (1996), Mansfield Park (1999), Bride and Prejudice (2004), Pride & Prejudice (2005), Love & Friendship (2016), and Emma (2020). Notable television adaptations include Persuasion (1995), Pride and Prejudice (1995), Northanger Abbey (2007), Persuasion (2007), Lost in Austen (2008), Sense and Sensibility (2008), Emma (2009), and Sanditon (2019–2023).
Biographical sources
The limited information about Jane Austen's life comes from her remaining letters and writings by her family members and people who knew her. Only about 160 of the 3,000 letters she wrote during her lifetime have survived and been published. It is believed that her sister, Cassandra Austen, destroyed most of the letters she received from Jane by burning them or using other methods. One reason given is that Cassandra wanted to protect the reputations of family members from Jane's honest and sometimes sharp comments about others. Cassandra may have also left out details about Jane's health, personal struggles, or events she considered inappropriate. Important parts of Jane's life, such as her brother George's challenges or the story of her wealthy aunt Jane Leigh-Perrot, who was arrested and later cleared of a crime, were not included in early biographies.
The first biography of Jane Austen was written by her brother, Henry Thomas Austen, in 1818. It was published in a collection of her works after her death and included parts of two letters, despite some family members' objections. Later biographies, such as her nephew's "A Memoir of Jane Austen" (1869) and "Jane Austen: Her Life and Letters" (1913) by William and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh, also included more letters but sometimes omitted or added details about her life.
Jane Austen's family and relatives often portrayed her as a quiet, happy woman who found joy in family life. However, many critics have questioned this view, arguing it oversimplifies her character. Modern biographers include information that was left out of earlier writings but aim to present a balanced picture, avoiding claims that Jane was unhappy or trapped in a difficult family situation.
Early years to age 20
Jane Austen was born on December 16, 1775, in Steventon, Hampshire. Her father, George Austen (1731–1805), wrote in a letter that her mother, Cassandra, "certainly expected to have been brought to bed a month ago." He also said the newborn infant was "a present plaything for Cassy and a future companion." The winter of 1775–1776 was very cold, and Jane was not baptized until April 5 at the local church, where she was named Jane.
George Austen was the clergyman for the Anglican parishes of Steventon and Deane. He came from a wealthy family of wool merchants. Over time, George’s branch of the family became poor because each generation’s eldest son received inheritances, leaving George’s family with less money. George and his two sisters were orphaned as children and had to live with relatives. In 1745, at age fifteen, George’s sister Philadelphia was apprenticed to a milliner in Covent Garden. At sixteen, George entered St John’s College, Oxford, where he likely met Cassandra Leigh (1739–1827). She was from the prominent Leigh family. Her father was the rector at All Souls College, Oxford, and she grew up among the gentry. Her brother James inherited a fortune and a large estate from his great-aunt Perrot, but only if he changed his name to Leigh-Perrot.
George Austen and Cassandra Leigh became engaged around 1763, probably after exchanging miniatures. George received the position of clergyman at Steventon parish from Thomas Knight, his wealthy second cousin. They married on April 26, 1764, at St Swithin’s Church in Bath, in a simple ceremony two months after Cassandra’s father died. Their income was modest, with George’s small salary and Cassandra’s expected inheritance from her mother’s death.
After George’s uncle, Francis Austen, bought the Deane rectory, the Austens lived there temporarily until Steventon rectory, a 16th-century house in poor condition, was repaired. Cassandra gave birth to three children while living at Deane: James in 1765, George in 1766, and Edward in 1767. She often kept infants at home for several months before sending them to live with Elizabeth Littlewood, a neighbor, for twelve to eighteen months.
In 1768, the family moved to Steventon. Henry was the first child born there, in 1771. Around this time, Cassandra noticed that her son George had developmental challenges, including seizures and possible deafness. She decided to send him to be fostered. In 1773, Cassandra was born, followed by Francis in 1774 and Jane in 1775.
According to biographer Park Honan, the Austen home had an "open, amused, easy intellectual atmosphere," where family members discussed ideas even if they disagreed politically or socially.
The family relied on support from relatives and hosted many visitors. In 1770, the elder Cassandra spent the summer in London with George’s sister, Philadelphia, and her daughter Eliza, along with his other sister, Mrs. Walter, and her daughter Philly. Philadelphia and Eliza Hancock brought news of their travels and fashionable life in London, which influenced Jane’s later life and works.
Cassandra Austen’s cousin, Thomas Leigh, visited the family in the 1770s and 1780s, inviting young Cassie to visit them in Bath in 1781. Family documents mention Jane’s return home: "… and almost home they were when they met Jane & Charles, the two little ones of the family, who had to go as far as New Down to meet the chaise, & have the pleasure of riding home in it." Le Faye wrote that "Mr. Austen’s predictions for his younger daughter were fully justified. Never were sisters more to each other than Cassandra and Jane; while in a particularly affectionate family, there seems to have been a special link between Cassandra and Edward on the one hand, and between Henry and Jane on the other."
From 1773 until 1796, George earned extra income by farming and teaching boys who stayed at his home. He had an annual income of £200 (equivalent to £26,000 in 2025) from his two church positions. This was a modest income compared to skilled workers like blacksmiths or carpenters, who earned about £100 annually, and gentry families, who earned between £1,000 and £5,000. George also rented a 200-acre farm from his benefactor, Thomas Knight, which could generate £300 (equivalent to £40,000 in 2025) a year.
During this time, Jane attended church regularly, socialized with friends and neighbors, and read novels—often her own—aloud to her family in the evenings. Socializing often included dancing, either at neighbors’ homes after supper or at town hall balls. Her brother Henry later said, "Jane was fond of dancing, and excelled in it."
In 1783, Austen and her sister Cassandra were sent to Oxford to be educated by Ann Cawley, who later took them to Southampton. That autumn, both girls returned home after catching typhus, from which Jane nearly died. She was then educated at home until she attended boarding school with her sister at the Reading Abbey Girls’ School in early 1785, run by Mrs. La Tournelle. The school taught French, spelling, needlework, dancing, music, and drama. The sisters returned home before December 1786 because the school fees were too high for the Austen family. After 1786, Austen "never again lived anywhere beyond the bounds of her immediate family environment."
Her education came from reading,
Ages 20 to 34
When Jane Austen was twenty, Tom Lefroy, a neighbor, visited Steventon from December 1795 to January 1796. He had just finished university and was moving to London to train as a lawyer. Lefroy and Austen likely met at a ball or other social event in the area. Austen’s letters to her sister Cassandra show they spent a lot of time together. She wrote, “I am almost afraid to tell you how my Irish friend and I behaved. Imagine everything most improper and shocking in the way of dancing and sitting down together.”
Austen described Lefroy in her first surviving letter to Cassandra as a “very gentlemanlike, good-looking, pleasant young man.” Five days later, she wrote that she expected an “offer” from Lefroy and said she would refuse him unless he promised to give away his white coat. She added, “I will confide myself in the future to Mr. Tom Lefroy, for whom I don’t give a sixpence” and refuse all others. The next day, she wrote, “The day will come when I flirt my last with Tom Lefroy, and when you receive this, it will be all over. My tears flow as I write at this sad idea.”
Scholars like Halperin note that Austen often made fun of romantic stories in her letters, so some of her comments about Lefroy might have been jokes. However, it is clear she was genuinely interested in him. No other suitors ever compared to him. The Lefroy family sent him away at the end of January. Marriage was not practical because neither Austen nor Lefroy had money. He depended on a great-uncle in Ireland to pay for his education and legal career. Later, if Lefroy visited Hampshire, he was kept away from the Austens, and Jane never saw him again. In November 1798, Austen still thought of Lefroy when she wrote to her sister about meeting one of his relatives and wanting to ask about him but not daring to.
After finishing Lady Susan, Austen began her first full-length novel, Elinor and Marianne. Her sister remembered the family read it “before 1796” and it was told through letters. Without surviving original manuscripts, it is unknown how much of the early draft remained in the version published anonymously in 1811 as Sense and Sensibility.
Austen started a second novel, First Impressions (later published as Pride and Prejudice), in 1796. She finished the first draft in August 1797, when she was 21. Like all her novels, she read it aloud to her family as she worked on it, and it became a favorite. Her father tried to publish it in November 1797 by writing to Thomas Cadell, a London publisher. Cadell returned the letter marked “Declined by Return of Post.” Jane may not have known about her father’s efforts. After finishing First Impressions, Austen revised Elinor and Marianne heavily from November 1797 until mid-1798. She changed the story format from letters to third-person narration, creating a version close to Sense and Sensibility.
In 1797, Austen met her cousin Eliza de Feuillide, a French aristocrat whose husband had been executed during the French Revolution. Eliza fled to Britain and married Henry Austen. Hearing about her husband’s execution left Austen with a lasting fear of the French Revolution.
In mid-1798, after revising Elinor and Marianne, Austen began writing a third novel with the working title Susan—later published as Northanger Abbey. It was a satire of popular Gothic novels. She finished it about a year later. In early 1803, Henry Austen sold Susan to Benjamin Crosby, a London publisher, who paid £10 for the copyright. Crosby advertised the book as “in the press” but never published it. The manuscript remained unpublished until Austen repurchased the copyright in 1816.
In December 1800, George Austen unexpectedly announced he would retire from the ministry, leave Steventon, and move the family to 4 Sydney Place in Bath, Somerset. While this change suited the older Austens, Jane was shocked to leave the only home she had ever known. Her writing productivity dropped during her time in Bath. She revised Susan slightly and began a new novel, The Watsons, but abandoned it. Scholars debate whether this was due to depression or a lack of time for writing. Some say Austen was unhappy in Bath, but others suggest her busy social life there limited her writing time. Austen sold the rights to publish Susan to Crosby & Company, who paid £10 (about £720 in 2025). They advertised the book but never published it.
The years 1801 to 1804 are unclear for Austen scholars because Cassandra destroyed all her letters from this period. In December 1802, Austen received her only known marriage proposal. She and her sister visited friends near Basingstoke, where Harris Bigg-Wither, a young man who had just finished university, proposed. Austen accepted but changed her mind the next day. No records describe her feelings about the proposal. Harris was described as unattractive, awkward, and tactless, but the marriage would have provided practical benefits for Austen and her family.
In 1814, Austen wrote to her niece Fanny Knight about a serious relationship, advising her not to commit unless she truly liked the person. Scholar Douglas Bush noted that Austen believed love should unite a husband and wife and that all her heroines shared this ideal.
Ages 34 to 41
In early 1809, Jane Austen’s brother, Edward, offered his mother and sisters a more stable home: a large cottage in Chawton village, part of the estate near his property, Chawton House. Jane, her sister Cassandra, and their mother moved into the cottage on July 7, 1809. Life in Chawton was quieter than it had been since the family moved to Bath in 1800. The Austens did not socialize with wealthy landowners and only entertained guests when family members visited. Jane’s niece, Anna, described their life in Chawton as "very quiet," but noted that the family spent much time reading, helping poor people, and teaching children to read or write.
At the time, many women writers published their books without using their names. Society believed a woman’s main roles were as a wife and mother, and writing was seen as a secondary activity. Women who wanted to write full-time were thought to be harming their reputation as proper women. To avoid this, female authors often published anonymously, making it seem as though they were only writing as a hobby, not as serious writers. Another reason for anonymity was that novels were considered less important than poetry, and many authors—both men and women—chose to hide their identities when publishing novels.
While living in Chawton, Austen published four novels that were well received. Her brother, Henry, helped arrange for the publisher Thomas Egerton to print Sense and Sensibility, which, like most of Austen’s other books except Pride and Prejudice, was published "on commission." This meant the author paid for the costs of printing, and the publisher only received a 10% fee for each book sold. If the book did not sell enough to cover its costs, the author had to pay the difference. An alternative was selling the copyright, where the author received a one-time payment for the book. Austen tried this with Susan (later published as Northanger Abbey), but the publisher did not print it, forcing her to buy the rights back. Another option, selling by subscription, was not available to Austen because it required the author to be well known or have a powerful patron.
Sense and Sensibility was published in October 1811 and was described as being written "By a Lady." Because it was published on commission, Egerton used expensive paper and priced the book at 15 shillings (about £52 in 2025). The novel was well reviewed and became popular among young aristocrats. Most novels of the time were printed in small editions of 500 copies or fewer to reduce risk, but Austen’s books were printed in larger editions, from about 750 copies of Sense and Sensibility to 2,000 copies of Emma. It is unclear whether the publishers or Austen herself decided to print more copies. Since most of her books were published on commission, the financial risks were mostly hers.
Austen earned £140 (about £9,800 in 2025) from Sense and Sensibility, which gave her some financial independence. After its success, all of her later books were credited to "the author of Sense and Sensibility," and her name never appeared on her books during her lifetime. Egerton published Pride and Prejudice in January 1813, a revised version of First Impressions. Austen sold the copyright for £110 (about £6,600 in 2025). To save costs, Egerton used cheap paper and priced the book at 18 shillings (about £54 in 2025). The book was an immediate success, selling well and receiving favorable reviews. If Austen had published it on commission, she would have earned £475, which was twice her father’s yearly income. By October 1813, a second edition of Pride and Prejudice was released. Mansfield Park, published in May 1814, was ignored by critics but popular with readers. All copies sold within six months, and Austen earned more from this book than any other.
Without Austen’s approval, her novels were translated into French and published in poorly made, pirated editions. A literary critic named Noel King noted in 1953 that Austen’s focus on everyday English life was unusual in France, where readers preferred romantic stories. King also pointed out that Austen’s main French translator, Madame Isabelle de Montolieu, had limited English knowledge and relied on assistants to summarize the books, which she then adapted into French. These versions often changed the stories and characters significantly. The first French edition of an Austen novel that credited her as the author was Persuasion, published in 1821 as La Famille Elliot ou L'Ancienne Inclination.
Austen learned that the Prince Regent admired her novels and kept copies at his homes. In November 1815, the Prince’s librarian, James Stanier Clarke, invited Austen to visit the Prince’s London residence and suggested she dedicate her upcoming novel, Emma, to him. Though Austen disliked the Prince Regent for his dishonest behavior, gambling, and wasteful spending, she could not refuse the request. Later, she wrote a satirical outline of a "perfect novel" based on Clarke’s suggestions, which she called Plan of a Novel, According to Hints from Various Quarters. This work was her way of mocking Clarke’s overly serious advice.
In mid-1815, Austen moved her work from Egerton to John Murray, a more famous publisher in London. Murray published Emma in December 1815 and a second edition of Mansfield Park in February 1816. Emma sold well, but the new edition of Mansfield Park did not, and this loss reduced most of the income from Emma. These were the last of Austen’s novels published during her lifetime. While Murray prepared Emma for print, Austen began working on The Elliots, her final novel.
Posthumous publication
After Jane Austen died in July 1817, her sister Cassandra, her brother Henry Austen, and the publisher Murray helped to publish Persuasion and Northanger Abbey together. Henry Austen wrote a note about his sister’s life in December 1817, which was the first time he publicly said she was the author of the books. This note was described as a kind and well-written tribute. Sales of the books were strong for one year, with only 321 copies left unsold by the end of 1818.
Although Jane Austen’s six novels were no longer being printed in England during the 1820s, people still read them from copies kept in private and circulating libraries. Jane Austen had early readers who admired her work. The first piece of fiction that included her as a character appeared in 1823 in a letter to the editor of The Lady's Magazine. This letter praised her talent and suggested that some writers wished they had her abilities.
In 1832, Richard Bentley bought the rights to publish all of Jane Austen’s novels. Over the next winter, he released five illustrated books as part of his Standard Novels series. In October 1833, Bentley published the first complete collection of her works. Since then, her novels have remained in print without interruption.
Genre and style
Jane Austen’s books criticize the emotional and romantic novels popular in the second half of the 18th century. Her work helped change literature toward more realistic stories in the 19th century. Early English novelists like Samuel Richardson, Henry Fielding, and Tobias Smollett were followed by writers who focused on emotions and romance, such as Sir Walter Scott, Horace Walpole, Clara Reeve, Ann Radcliffe, and Oliver Goldsmith. Austen disagreed with their style and returned to the traditions of Richardson and Fielding, using realistic descriptions of social behavior. In the mid-20th century, critics F. R. Leavis and Ian Watt placed Austen in the same tradition as Richardson and Fielding, believing she used their techniques of irony, realism, and satire to become a superior writer.
Walter Scott noted Austen’s rejection of the exaggerated and dramatic stories common in many novels of her time, which he called “ephemeral productions” that appealed to people at resorts and in libraries. However, her relationship with these genres is complex, as shown in Northanger Abbey and Emma. Like William Wordsworth, who criticized overly dramatic novels in his Lyrical Ballads (1800), Austen avoided stories that let readers escape reality. She focused instead on disciplined and innovative storytelling, showing that “less is more” in writing. She avoided Gothic fiction, which often featured heroines trapped in remote places like castles or abbeys (32 novels between 1784 and 1818 had “abbey” in their titles). In Northanger Abbey, the heroine, Catherine, expects to move to a remote location, but Austen contrasts the real, elegant setting with Catherine’s imagined fears. She does not fully reject Gothic fiction but transforms it, showing how social rules and expectations, not supernatural events, create tension.
In Sense and Sensibility, Austen’s characters are more complex than those in sentimental fiction, according to critic Tom Keymer. While the book parodies sentimental stories, Marianne’s emotional reactions to the rigid world around her reflect a “justifiable scream of female distress.”
In Emma, the character Emma is left alone to think and feel sad after a disappointing event. She feels it is a terrible situation, as everything she hoped for has been ruined.
Richardson’s Pamela, a model for sentimental novels, is a moral love story with a happy ending. It was written during a time when women began to have more choice in selecting husbands but still faced social limits. Austen tried Richardson’s letter-writing style but found storytelling more useful for her realistic approach. She used a technique called free indirect speech, which allowed her to show characters’ thoughts directly while keeping control of the story. This method, first used extensively by Austen, lets readers hear characters’ voices while still following the narrator’s perspective.
Scholar Mary Lascelles noted Austen’s skill in making characters’ speech sound natural and accurate. She used speech patterns, sentence structures, and word choices to show differences in social class and personality. For example, when Elizabeth Bennet rejects Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice, her awkward and complicated sentences show how deeply he has hurt her.
Austen’s stories highlight how women relied on marriage for social and financial security. Unlike 18th-century novels, which were not taken as seriously as 19th-century novels, Austen’s work used humor and irony to explore life. Critic John Bayley said Austen’s wit came from her belief that comedy helps people cope with life’s challenges. She is famous for being the first woman to write great comic novels, following advice from Samuel Johnson, who said writers should “represent life as may excite mirth.”
Austen’s humor comes from her modesty and fairness, allowing characters like Elizabeth Bennet to rise above petty concerns that less thoughtful characters focus on. She used comedy to explore women’s independence and relationships, often blending it with moral ideas. Critic Robert Polhemus wrote that Austen’s work shows both her respect for life and her ability to mock it, revealing the balance she sought between satire and kindness.
Reception
Jane Austen's books were published without her name, so she did not become famous during her lifetime. Her stories were popular among important people, but few wrote about them. Most reviews were short and generally positive, though they focused mainly on the lessons about good behavior in her novels.
Sir Walter Scott, a well-known writer, wrote a secret review of Emma in 1815. He used this to support novels as a serious form of writing and praised Austen’s ability to show real life in her stories. Another important review was written by Richard Whately in 1821, though he later said he did not write it. This review compared Austen to famous writers like Homer and Shakespeare and praised her storytelling skills. Scott and Whately influenced how Austen’s work was discussed for many years.
Some 19th-century critics did not like Austen’s books because they did not match the Romantic and Victorian ideas that writing should be full of strong emotions and vivid descriptions. These critics preferred the works of Charles Dickens and George Eliot. Even though Sir Walter Scott liked Austen’s work, many people still preferred the writing styles of the time. Austen’s books were republished in Britain starting in the 1830s and sold well. A series called Standard Novels, published by Richard Bentley, included Austen’s six books and called her “the founder of a school of novelists” and a genius.
The first French person to write about Austen was Philarète Chasles in 1842. He said she was not a good writer. Austen was not widely appreciated in France until 1878, when Léon Boucher wrote an essay calling her a “genius.” The first accurate French translation of Austen’s work was Northanger Abbey, translated by Félix Fénéon in 1899.
In Britain and North America, Austen’s popularity grew over time. In the United States, her books were recommended for school reading as early as 1838. George Henry Lewes, a philosopher and critic, wrote many positive articles about Austen in the 1840s and 1850s. Later, Henry James, a novelist, praised Austen and compared her to Shakespeare and other great writers.
The book A Memoir of Jane Austen, published in 1869, shared her life story with the public, calling her “dear aunt Jane.” This book led to new editions of her novels being released in 1883. Fancy illustrated editions and collections followed. Leslie Stephen called the growing interest in Austen in the 1880s “Austenolatry.” Some scholars later criticized this popularity, saying it was too simple and not based on deep understanding.
Henry James argued that people were overly excited about Austen, even though her work might not be as great as they thought. A. Walton Litz noted that critics like Mark Twain, Henry James, Charlotte Brontë, D. H. Lawrence, and Kingsley Amis did not like Austen, but their opinions reflected their own personal views, not her true worth.
Austen’s work has drawn many scholars. The first academic paper on her was written in 1883 by George Pellew. In 1911, A. C. Bradley, an Oxford scholar, divided her novels into “early” and “late” works, a classification still used today. In 1914, Paul and Kate Rague published the first academic book on Austen in France, and Léonie Villard wrote the first serious study of her work in France. In 1923, R.W. Chapman created the first scholarly edition of Austen’s collected works, a milestone for English literature.
Mary Lascelles’ book Jane Austen and Her Art (1939) helped make Austen a major subject of academic study. She examined the books Austen read and her writing style. Some worried that scholars were making her work too complicated for the public to enjoy.
Since World War II, critics have used many different approaches to study Austen, including feminist and postcolonial theories. This has created a gap between how the public and scholars view her work. In 1994, Harold Bloom ranked Austen among the greatest Western writers of all time.
In China after 1949, Austen’s books were seen as too simple and were banned during the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) as “British bourgeois imperialist” writing. When her books were republished in the late 1970s, their popularity surprised Chinese authorities, who did not understand that people read for enjoyment, not political lessons.
Gene Koppel, a conservative professor, said Austen and her family were strong supporters of traditional values. Some feminist writers, like Claudia Johnson and Mollie Sandock, argued Austen supported women’s rights. Koppel said people can interpret Austen’s work in different ways, as long as their ideas are based on the text and history. It is possible to see her as both a critic of society and a supporter of its values.
Adaptations
Jane Austen's novels have led to many different types of adaptations, including sequels, prequels, and even fantasy stories. In the 19th century, members of her family published endings for her incomplete novels. By the year 2000, more than 100 printed adaptations of her works had been created.
The first dramatic adaptation of Austen’s work was published in 1895. It was titled Duologues and Scenes from the Novels of Jane Austen: Arranged and Adapted for Drawing-Room Performance by Rosina Filippi. Filippi also created the first professional stage adaptation, The Bennets, in 1901.
The first film adaptation of Austen’s work was a 1940 production of Pride and Prejudice by MGM, starring Laurence Olivier and Greer Garson. BBC television adaptations released in the 1970s and 1980s tried to follow Austen’s plots, characters, and settings very carefully. A British critic named Robert Irvine noted that American film adaptations, beginning with the 1940 version of Pride and Prejudice, often less emphasized the class differences and social hierarchy based on land ownership and family history that Austen described.
From 1995, many more adaptations appeared. These included a film version of Sense and Sensibility directed by Ang Lee, for which screenwriter and star Emma Thompson won an Academy Award. The BBC also produced a popular television miniseries of Pride and Prejudice, starring Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth. In 2005, a British film version of Pride & Prejudice was directed by Joe Wright and starred Keira Knightley and Matthew Macfadyen. This was followed by ITV adaptations of Mansfield Park, Northanger Abbey, and Persuasion in 2007. In 2016, a film titled Love & Friendship was released, starring Kate Beckinsale as Lady Susan. This film was based on Austen’s Love and Freindship [sic].
Honours
In 2013, books by Jane Austen were shown on a set of British postage stamps released by the Royal Mail to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the publication of Pride and Prejudice. Jane Austen's image appears on the £10 banknote introduced by the Bank of England in 2017, replacing the image of Charles Darwin. In July 2017, a statue of Austen was built in Basingstoke, Hampshire, to mark the 200th anniversary of her death. In October 2025, a statue of Austen created by Martin Jennings was shown publicly at The Close, near Winchester Cathedral.
List of works
Juvenilia—Volume 1 (1787–1793)
Juvenilia—Volume 2 (1787–1793)
Juvenilia—Volume 3 (1787–1793)