Jane Austen
1775–1817 · English (Steventon, Hampshire) · Regency Era England
Known for: Master of the English novel of manners—Pride and Prejudice, Emma, Sense and Sensibility
Jane Austen was a rector's daughter who never married, lived quietly with her family, and published anonymously ('By a Lady'). She was witty, sharp-eyed, and devastatingly ironic—her letters are as cutting as her novels. She died at 41, probably of Addison's disease, having published six novels that would become the most beloved in the English language.
Her novels seem small in scope—country gentry, marriage plots, drawing-room conversations—but are vast in psychological insight. She created the modern romantic comedy and influenced every subsequent novelist of social manners. She was celebrated only modestly in her lifetime; her reputation exploded posthumously.
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