William Austen-Leigh

A beautiful biography, thoroughly researched from family records, this biography looks past the success of her books to see the real women. Studying her personal correspondence to friends and family. Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. Hesperides Press are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

Jane Austen - Her Life and Letters - A Family Record

Arthur Austen-Leigh

Since 1870-1, when J. E. Austen Leigh published his Memoir of Jane Austen, considerable additions have been made to the stock of information available for her biographers. Of these fresh sources of knowledge the set of letters from Jane to Cassandra, edited by Lord Brabourne, has been by far the most important. These letters are invaluable as mémoires pour servir; although they cover only the comparatively rare periods when the two sisters were separated, and although Cassandra purposely destroyed many of the letters likely to prove the most interesting, from a distaste for publicity. Some further correspondence, and many incidents in the careers of two of her brothers, may be read in Jane Austen's Sailor Brothers, by J. H. Hubback and Edith C. Hubback; while Miss Constance Hill has been able to add several family traditions to the interesting topographical information embodied in her Jane Austen: Her Homes and Her Friends. Nor ought we to forget the careful research shown in[vi] other biographies of the author, especially that by Mr. Oscar Fay Adams. During the last few years, we have been fortunate enough to be able to add to this store; and every existing MS. or tradition preserved by the family, of which we have any knowledge, has been placed at our disposal. It seemed, therefore, to us that the time had come when a more complete chronological account of the novelist's life might be laid before the public, whose interest in Jane Austen (as we readily acknowledge) has shown no signs of diminishing, either in England or in America. The Memoir must always remain the one firsthand account of her, resting on the authority of a nephew who knew her intimately and that of his two sisters. We could not compete with its vivid personal recollections; and the last thing we should wish to do, even were it possible, would be to supersede it.

Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters - A Family Record

Jane Austen, Her Life And Letters William Austen-Leigh1600-1764 AT the end of the sixteenth century there was living at Horsmonden-a small village in the Weald of Kent-a certain John Austen. From his will it is evident that he was a man of considerable means, owning property in Kent and Sussex and elsewhere he also held a lease of certain lands from Sir Henry Whetenhall, including in all probability the manor house of Broadford in Horsmonden. What wealth he had was doubtless derived from the clothing trade for Hasted instances the Austens, together with the Bathursts, Courthopes, and others, as some of the ancient families of that part 'now of large estate and genteel rank in life, ' but sprung from ancestors who had used the great staple manufacture of clothing. He adds that these clothiers 'were usually called the Gray Coats of Kent, and were a body so numerous that at County Elections whoever had their vote and interest was almost certain of being elected.' John Austen died in 1620, leaving a large family. Of these, the fifth son, Francis, who died in 1687, describes himself in his will as a clothier, of Grovehurst this place being, like Broadford, a pretty timbered house of moderate size near the picturesque old village of Horsmonden. He seems to have been a careless, easy-going man, who thought frugality unnecessary, as he would succeed to the estate on his father's death but he died of consumption in 1704, a year before that event took place. One of his sisters married into the family of the Stringers (neighbours engaged in the same trade as the Austens), and numbered among her descendants the Knights of Godmersham-a circumstance which exercised an important influence over the subsequent fortunes of the Austen family. Elizabeth Weller, a woman happily cast in a different mould from her husband, was an ancestress of Jane Austen who deserves commemoration. Thrifty, energetic, a careful mother, and a prudent housewife, she managed, though receiving only grudging assistance from the Austen family, to pay off her husband's debts, and to give to all her younger children a decent education at a school at Sevenoaks the eldest boy (the future squire) being taken off her hands by his grandfather. Elizabeth left behind her not only elaborately kept accounts but also a minute description of her actions through many years and of the motives which governed them. It may be interesting to quote one sentence relating to her move from Horsmonden to Sevenoaks for the sake of her children's education. 'These considerations with ye tho'ts of having my own boys in ye house, with a good master (as all represented him to be) were ye inducements that brought me to Sen'nock, for it seemed to me as if I cou'd not do a better thing for my children's good, their education being my great care, and indeed all I think I was capable of doing for 'em, for I always tho't if they had learning, they might get better shift in ye world, with wt small fortune was alloted 'em.' When the good mother died in 1721.

A Biographical Essay on the Author of Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Emma, Northanger Abbey, Persuasion, Lady Susan, The Watsons, and Sanditon

Jane Austen, Her Life And Letters

Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh

This 1914 volume offers a glimpse of Austen's life by members of the Austen family.

A Family Record

Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters

Her Life and Letters : a Family Record

Jane Austen

Almost one hundred years after the death of Jane Austen, William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh published "Jane Austen: Her Life and Letters. A Family Record" (1913). The book lovingly details Jane's birth, childhood, adolescence, and maturity; the everyday minutiae of her life, the circumstances in which she wrote her juvenilia and her six novels, and her early death. Using Jane Austen's own letters, additional letters sent between a large and fond family, and family reminiscences, William and Richard Austen-Leigh continued the family tradition of carefully nurturing the literary and personal reputation of a literary icon who also happened to be a most beloved aunt. -- Goodreads.com

Her Life and Letters, a Family Record

Deirdre Le Faye

This book is the outcome of years of research in Austen archives, and stems from the original family biography by W. and R. A. Austen-Leigh, Jane Austen: her Life and Letters. Jane Austen, A Family Record was first published in 1989, and this new edition incorporates information that has come to light since then, and provides new illustrations and updated family trees. Le Faye gives a detailed account of Austen s life and literary career. She has collected together documented facts as well as the traditions concerning the novelist, and places her within the context of a widespread, affectionate and talented family group. Readers will learn how Austen transformed the stuff of her peaceful life in the Hampshire countryside into six novels that are amongst the most popular in the English language. This fascinating record of Austen and her family will be of great interest to general readers and scholars alike.

William Austen-Leigh

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