The Austen Education

“I think I may boast myself to be, with all possible Vanity, the most unlearned, uninformed Female who ever dared to be an Authoress,” Jane Austen wrote to the Prince Regent’s librarian on 11 December 1815. In true Austenian fashion, the author was playing with her reader. In the biographical notice that accompanied Northanger Abbey and Persuasion in 1817, her brother, Henry Austen, wrote: “Her reading was very extensive in history and belles lettres; and her memory extremely tenacious. Her favourite moral writers were Johnson in Prose, and Cowper in verse. It is difficult to say at what age she was not intimately acquainted with the merits and defects of the best essays and novels in the English language.” Through letters and literary allusions, modern scholarship has demonstrated how thoroughly well-read Austen was, and how attuned to the literary trends of her day, despite her somewhat unorthodox education.

Austen was born in Steventon in 1775, where her father, George Austen, served as rector of the parish. In an effort to bolster the family’s income, George engaged in farming endeavors, and would also tutor three or four Oxford-bound boys at a time who would board at the Austen home. George had attended St. John’s College, Oxford, as did his sons, and the family’s connections with the university town ran deep. In 1783, Jane and her older sister Cassandra, were sent there to study with Mrs. Ann Cawley. The girls were taken to Southampton later that same year, where Jane contracted a near-fatal bout of typhus. Following this, Jane was educated at home until 1785, when she and Cassandra were sent to Reading Abbey Girls’ School, but this arrangement would only last until the autumn of 1786, when the fees became too costly for the Austen family. From this point forward, Jane and Cassandra were educated at home, having free rein of their father’s library. In this environment, the sisters benefitted from the influence of their father, that of their brothers James and Henry, and the sort of educational practice that was already happening in the household. Thus, Jane and Cassandra would have had the unique opportunity of using the same texts as their male peers, extending their skillsets far beyond dancing, sketching, and needlework.

I. Evidence of Austen: Curiosities of Literature

As bibliographer David Gilson notes: “If we have evidence of what books [Jane Austen] read, the actual copies prove far more elusive. Her first recourse would have been to her father’s library; virtually nothing is known of the fate of the books which this comprised” (Gilson 431). George Austen’s library was sold in 1801, upon his retirement as the family prepared to resettle in Bath. This move from Steventon, coupled with the death of George Austen in 1805, would mark a period of upheaval for Jane Austen, which did not abate until 1809 when she along with Cassandra, their mother, and Martha Lloyd were offered the living of Chawton Cottage on the grounds of Chawton House, an estate that belonged to Edward Austen Knight, Jane’s brother. Edward had been adopted by wealthy relatives as a child, and through this good fortune, was able to offer his mother and sisters a comfortable living. Jane would have had access to the library of the House, as well as the Library at Godmersham Park, Edward’s residence in Kent. While Curiosities of Literature is listed in the 1818 Catalogue of the Godmersham Park Library, crucially, it is a later edition than the present copy.

In addition to Austen’s signature, this copy of Curiosities of Literature bears pencil markings, demarcating the following sections: “Friar Bacon” (4); “Some Ingenious Thoughts” (52); “On the Fair-Sex Having No Soul” (72); “The Absent Man” (171); “Innovation” (179); “On the Custom of Saluting After a Sneeze” (181); “The Monk Turned Author” (189); “Grotius” (191); “On the Adjective ‘Pretty’” (192); “Astrology” (194); “Alchymy” [sic] (195); “Scripture Expressions Derived from Customs” (217); “Trials and Proofs of Guilt in Superstitious Ages” (259); “Singularities Observed by Various Nations in Their Repasts” (264); “English Ladies” (271); and “Spanish Monks” (273). In a very broad sense, one can see threads of Austen’s literary preoccupations pulling though, particularly with such titles as “On the Fair-Sex Having No Soul,” “On the Adjective ‘Pretty,’” and “English Ladies.”  In the latter, D’Israeli writes:

Menage Says—‘Mr. D. tells me that, in England, the public places are
crouded [sic] with the daughters and wives of the Clergy. The reason is,
that the livings there, being very fat ones, all the English Ladies who are
fond of their ease and good living, and who are more partial to the
present hour than to the future, and in raptures to marry a Parson; who,
on his side, never fails, according to the character of a good Ecclesiastic,
of selecting the most beautiful. After his death, mother and daughters
find themselves probably in the greatest distress; and, as they are in
general very handsome, they put into practice all smiles and all their
graces; and for this reason, chuse [sic] the public resorts of Fashion
where they may attract notice.’ (272, underlining Austen’s)

Austen was, of course, the daughter of a clergyman, and this is a theme that plays out over and over through her prose. In Sense and Sensibility (published in 1811, but first drafted as “Elinore and Marianne” in 1795), Edward Ferrars is given the parsonage at Delaford by Colonel Brandon, which ultimately affords Elinore Dashwood a stable life following the death of her father. In Pride and Prejudice (published in 1813, but first drafted in 1796 and titled “First Impressions”), Mr. Collins is the distant cousin of Elizabeth Bennet, and the Bennet estate is entailed to him. While he is a decidedly silly man, he is able to provide financial stability to the Bennet family, should he marry one of its five daughters. Much to Mr. Bennet’s chagrin, when Elizabeth rejects Mr. Collins’s proposal, he almost immediately transfers his affections to Charlotte Lucas, Elizabeth’s close friend and neighbor. The hero of Mansfield Park (1814) is Edmund Bertram, a handsome parson who rescues Fanny Price from poverty. In Emma (1815), Mr. Elton is Highbury’s clergyman, and at the start of the novel is deemed the most eligible bachelor in the village. In Northanger Abbey (1817), Henry Tilney, who ultimately weds Catherine Moreland, the novel’s heroine, is placed as a parson on his father’s estate. And in Persuasion (1817), Charles Hayter is a clergyman with a good education and impeccable manners who wants to marry Henrietta Musgrove. In fact, there isn’t an Austen novel that doesn’t somehow employ this theme, exploring the sort of steadiness and superior life a parson can offer an English lady.

“On the Fair-Sex Having No Souls,” D’Israeli writes: “A Spanish author has affirmed, that brutes have no souls; a French writer supports the same opinion; but an Italian, more bold, has ventured to maintain that the fair-sex have likewise no souls, and are of another species of animal to man” (72-3, with vertical pencil line in margin marking the passage). Many of Austen’s narrative’s debate the perceived inequality of emotion between men and women. In Sense and Sensibility—the title of which nods to this very theme—Marianne Dashwood accuses Edward Ferras of lacking feeling. But he is quick to praise her passionate nature later on in the narrative:

“As for Marianne, I know her greatness of soul, there would not be music
enough in London to content her. And books!—Thomson, Cowper, Scott—
she would buy them all over and over again: she would buy up every
copy, I believe, to prevent their falling into unworthy hands; and she
would have every book that tells her how to admire an old twisted tree.
Should not you, Marianne? Forgive me, if I am very saucy. But I was
willing to show you that I had not forgot our old disputes.” (Sense and
Sensibility, Chapter XVII)

Undeniably, much of Persuasion is predicated on the very notion of which soul feels and loves longest, a man’s or a woman’s, with Anne Elliot attempting to settle the matter through a discussion with Captain Harville: “‘God forbid that I should undervalue the warm and faithful feelings of any of my fellow-creatures! I should deserve utter contempt if I dared to suppose that true attachment and constancy were known only by woman... All the privilege I claim for my own sex (it is not a very enviable one; you need not covet it), is that of loving longest, when existence or when hope is gone’” (Chapter XXIII).

Under the section headed “Atronomy,” three paragraphs related to Charles I are marked, again with a vertical line in the margin (194). Austen’s juvenile work “The History of England from the reign of Henry the 4^th to the death of Charles the 1^st” was composed in 1791, the same year the present copy of Curiosities of Literature was published. Other monarchs such as Elizabeth I and Henry IV are featured in both “The History of England…” and Curiosities of Literature, with each work using rather light language to describe some of Britain’s most formative political moments.

Gilson records a mere 20 titles that were once in the possession of Jane Austen that have since come to light.  Related to this, Gilson notes: “There is no record of [Jane Austen] as actually purchasing books for herself during the Steventon period, but all except the last of the books listed here were most probably in her possession then (the few dated inscriptions fall in the 1780s, and the 1790s, and the dates of publication are all before 1800)” (Gilson 431).

II. Evidence of Austen: Burney’s Camilla

Maddeningly little physical evidence of Jane Austen’s life exists, and as the author’s fame has steadily risen, along with a more critical interest in her writing, scholars have had to rely on textual allusions, manuscript fragments, and a relatively scant body of letters, to sketch an outline of her existence. The pencil markings in Curiosities of Literature may seem commonplace to some, but when compared with other titles known to have been read by Austen, they start to form a fuller picture of her habits not only as a reader, but as an individual deeply invested in the construction of literature. Similar markings appear in Austen’s copy of Fanny Burney’s Camilla: or, A Picture of Youth (1796, Gilson K7), which now forms a part of the Bodleian Library’s collections. It was first owned by Jane Austen, and after her death in 1817 passed to Cassandra, then ultimately to Lady Austen May in 1837. Jane Austen’s name appears in the list of subscribers as “Miss J. Austen, Steventon” (this being the first time Austen’s name appeared in print), and the novel’s influence on her own writing is well-documented. In fact, Camilla is directly referenced in Northanger Abbey no fewer than three times, and here with specific reference to the contemporary perception and reception of novels:

“And what are you reading, Miss——?” “Oh! It is only a novel!” replies the
young lady, while she lays down her book with affected indifference, or
momentary shame. “It is only Cecilia, or Camilla, or Belinda”; or, in short,
only some work in which the greatest powers of the mind are displayed,
in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest
delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour, are
conveyed to the world in the best-chosen language. Now, had the same
young lady been engaged with a volume of the Spectator, instead of such
a work, how proudly would she have produced the book, and told its
name... (Northanger Abbey, Chapter V)

Beyond the explicit reference to Northanger Abbey, there are stylistic echoes that demonstrate Austen’s debt to Burney. In Austen’s own copy of Camilla housed in the Bodleian, for example, the following passage is marked with the same sort of pencil notations found in Curiosities of Literature: “Discriminate, nevertheless, between hypocrisy and discretion. The first is a vice; the second a conciliation to virtue. It is the bond that keeps society from disunion; the veil that shades our weakness from exposure, giving time for that interior correction, which the publication of our infirmities would else, with respect to mankind, make of no avail” (Camilla, Chapter V). This can be compared with the following passage from Pride and Prejudice, which Austen was drafting around the publication of Camilla: “’Vanity and pride are different things, though the words are often used synonymously. A person may be proud without being vain. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves; vanity to what we would have others think of us’” (Pride and Prejudice, Chapter V). This sentiment is first articulated by Mary Bennet, but later expanded upon by Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet:

“Perhaps that is not possible for anyone. But it has been the study of my
life to avoid those weaknesses which often expose a strong
understanding to ridicule.”

“Such as vanity and pride.”

“Yes, vanity is a weakness indeed. But pride—where there is a real
superiority of mind—pride will be always under good regulation.” (Pride
and Prejudice, Chapter XI)

In each instance, the fine line between vice and virtue is made apparent, and the language that’s used remarkably similar (“weakness from exposure” in Burney’s case, and “weaknesses which often expose” in Austen’s). Such linguistic specificity—and drawn from a marked passage, too—demonstrates a clear parallel, whether this is conscious on Austen’s part or not.

III. Evidence of Austen: Brunton’s Self-Control

Nearly twelve years after the publication of Camilla, and on the verge of Sense and Sensibility’s print debut, in April of 1811 Austen wrote to her sister Cassandra, articulating her steady interest in the works of her peers: “I…am always half afraid of finding a clever novel too clever—& of finding my own story & my own people all forestalled” (Austen, Letter 44). The novel Austen is referring to is Mary Brunton’s Self-Control, which Austen laments not being able to find in London. Kathryn Sutherland notes that “the extraordinary contemporary success of Brunton’s improbable moral tales of independent heroines would continue to irk Austen through the 1810s and in her mind at least invite unwanted association with her own all too probable compositions” (Sutherland 226-227).

Austen was eventually able to procure a copy of Self-Control; one has been continuously in the Knight family collection, and forms a part of the Chawton House Library. This copy also bears similar pencil markings to those found in Curiosities of Literature and Camilla. And on page 203, Volume III, of Self-Control, “stupid” is written—also in pencil—in a hand that is almost certainly Austen’s. Cassandra received more than one letter from Jane that mentioned Self-Control, writing in November of 1813: “I am looking over Self-Control again, & my opinion is confirmed of its’ being an excellently-meant, elegantly-written Work, without anything of Nature or Probability in it. I declare I do not know whether Laura’s passage down the American River, is not the most natural, possible, every-day thing she ever does” (Austen, Letter 91). Many critics have viewed this as praise of Brunton, but such seeming admiration may be laced with sarcasm, rather than pure sincerity. In November 1814, Austen wrote to her niece, Anna Lefroy: “…Mrs Creed’s opinion is gone down on my list; but fortunately I may excuse myself from entering Mr [cut out] as my paper only relates to Mansfield Park. I will redeem my credit with him, by writing a close Imitation of ‘Self-Control’ as soon as I can;– I will improve upon it;– my Heroine shall not merely be wafted down an American river in a boat by herself, she shall cross the Atlantic in the same way, & never stop till she reaches Gravesent” (Austen, Letter 111).

See the Knight Collection’s Copy of Brunton’s "Self-Control"

When the present copy of Curiosities of Literature came to market in 1945, it was offered in Elkin Matthews’s “Catalogue 100: One Hundred Unusual Books, Manuscripts, Letters, and Drawings.” It was then acquired by Mrs. Raymond E. Hartz, a discerning Austen collector. Gilson suggests that Hartz owned a copy of William Turner’s The History of All Religions in the World (1695), signed “H.B. Wither” on the front pastedown, and presumably owned by Harris Big Wither, who proposed to Jane Austen in 1802. Additionally, Hartz sold an Austen letter through these rooms in 1999 (June 22, lot 320).

This lot is accompanied by: Typed letter signed, from R.A. Austen Leigh to J.D. Muir, authenticating the signature on the title-page as Jane Austen's. 1 page, 12mo, 1 New-street Square, London, 27 March 1945. — Typed letter signed, from Bill Jackson to Raymond E. Hartz, concerning a letter received from Percy Muir describing the letter from Austen Leigh, stating that the Curiosities of Literature is coming through customs and promising to send him the book with his bill. 1 page, 4to, Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, The Houghton Library, 9 June 1945. — Compliments slip signed, from Elkin Matthews, begging acknowledgement of the receipt of a cheque for $215:33. 1 page, Takeley, Bishops Stortford, 1 August 1945

PROVENANCE:
Jane Austen (signature to title) — Elkin Matthews (Catalogue 100, 1945, item 2) — Mrs. Raymond E. Hartz (letter; see Gilson K8)

REFERENCES:
Gilson, David, A Bibliography of Jane Austen. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982; Modert, Jo (ed.), Jane Austen’s Manuscript Letters in Facsimile. Carbondale and Edwardsville: Sothern Illinois University Press, 1990; Sutherland, Kathryn (ed.), The Chawton Letters. Oxford: Bodleian Library, 2018; Sutherland, Kathryn, Jane Austen’s Textual Lives: from Aeschylus to Bollywood. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005