There are thousands of books available about Jane Austen. Books on her life, on the era in which she lived, books connecting Jane Austen with food / fashion / the clergy / places such as Bath and Lyme / names / the navy, and the list goes on…
There are even books about ‘Jane Austen and Freud’ ,’Jane Austen and Mozart’, and ‘Jane Austen and Darwin’. Then there are the critical books, which analyse her style, irony, themes, responses to politics, her characters and her intentions – books which give us a deeper and richer appreciation of her brilliant novels. There are books about her rise to superstardom, there are novelised versions of her life, there are books about the film versions and theatrical versions, there are sequels, prequels, retellings and adaptations. I have read hundreds of books about Jane Austen and am always eager for more.
For this talk I turned to my large collection of Jane Austen books and selected some especial favourites. It wasn’t easy, but I have tried to choose a range of biographical / critical and historical. I have left out many excellent books, but I could not cover them all in this talk. I hope that my choices will encourage you to do further reading about Jane Austen and that they will take you back to the six novels with a better and deeper understanding of Jane Austen’s extraordinary achievement.
Jane & I: A Tale of Austen Addiction by Susannah Fullerton
Jane Austen & Crime by Susannah Fullerton
Happily Ever After: Celebrating Jane Austen’s ‘Pride and Prejudice’ by Susannah Fullerton
A Dance with Jane Austen: How a Novelist and her Characters went to the Ball by Susannah Fullerton
Susannah Fullerton: Jane Austen – Her life and works, A Video Talk
Susannah Fullerton: Saving Jane Austen’s Home, A Video Talk
A Portrait of Jane Austen by David Cecil
The Definitive Portrait of Jane Austen: Her Life, Her Art, Her Family, Her World by Park Honan
Jane Austen: A Life by Claire Tomalin
Becoming Jane Austen by Jon Spence
Miss Austen by Gill Hornby
Jane Austen: The World of Her Novels by Deirdre Le Faye
Jane Austen: The World of Her Novels by Deirdre Le Faye
Jane Austen and the Clergy by Irene Collins
Jane Austen and Food by Maggie Lane
Jane Austen and Marriage by Hazel Jones
Jane Austen Speaks Norwegian by Marie N. Sørbø
Talking of Jane Austen by Sheila Kaye-Smith & G.B. Stern
Some Words of Jane Austen by Stuart M. Tave
Jane Austen and Representations of Regency England by Roger Sales
A Fine Brush on Ivory: An Appreciation of Jane Austen by Richard Jenkyns
What Matters in Jane Austen?: Twenty Crucial Puzzles Solved by John Mullan
Jane Austen’s Textual Lives: From Aeschylus to Bollywood by Kathryn Sutherland
Jane’s Fame: How Jane Austen Conquered the World by Claire Harman
The Lost Books of Jane Austen by Janine Barchas
Jane Austen by Carol Shields
A Jane Austen Education: How Six Novels Taught Me about Love, Friendship, and the Things That Really Matter by William Deresiewicz
Jane Austen and her Readers, 1786-1945 by Katie Halsey
Jane Austen The Reader: The Artist As Critic by Olivia Murphy
The Daily Jane Austen: A Year of Quotes by Devoney Looser
