User:Simmaren/Sandbox/Draft Jane Austen's Family

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This is not a completed wikipedia article; it is only a draft.

The following article is part of an in-depth biography of Jane Austen (16 December 1775 - 18 July 1817), the English novelist, author of Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Emma, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion.

Contents

[edit] George and Cassandra Austen

The Austen family coat of arms.
The Austen family coat of arms.

The Rev. George Austen and Cassandra Leigh, Jane Austen's parents, married on 26 April 1764. Rev. Austen became the rector of the Anglican parish at Steventon, in Hampshire, and moved his family to the rectory there in 1765, where they remained until his retirement in 1801. According to Mary Lascelles, George Austen "was gentle and strongly attached to his family; he occupied himself with the cares of his parish, his farm and his pupils, and left a reputation for scholarship and literary taste which was supported in his day by having prepared two of his sons, with other pupils, for Oxford, and rests more firmly now on his quick perception of his daughter's gifts."[1] Oliver MacDonagh describes George Austen's importance to his family: "George Austen's steady benevolence and care for his children's interests were generally attested. He provided Jane, and the rest, with secure surrounds within which to develop; he set the tome for the Austen temperateness, loyalty to one another, and judicious sacrifice to the corporate cause."[2] Jane Austen's mother had an entirely different personality, "stronger and more trenchant..., [a] fit mother for her elder daughter [Cassandra]." Jane Austen's relationship with her mother appears to have been proper, dutiful and perhaps a bit distant rather than affectionate.[3]

As junior members of substantial gentry families, Rev. and Mrs. Austen lived on the lower fringes of the English gentry,[4] but successfully established themselves after long effort with the help of their extended families. George Austen's relatives supported his education at Tonbridge School and the University of Oxford, and a second cousin presented him with two livings worth about £210 per year together with land to farm. Rev. Austen supplemented the income from his livings by selling produce he grew and by running a residential boy's school for three or four boys at a time at the rectory from 1773 until 1796 but, even so, was often in debt until his later years.[5] By the time of his retirement in 1801, Rev. Austen's income totaled about £600 per year, an amount sufficient (given the size of his family) for a comfortable style of life. After his death, Mrs. Austen's personal assets (her dowry) produced an income of only £122 per year which, supplemented by a small income accruing to Jane's sister Cassandra from an inheritance and annual contributions from Mrs. Austen's sons, brought the family income to about £450 per year.[6]

[edit] Jane Austen's siblings

Silhouette of Cassandra Austen.
Silhouette of Cassandra Austen.

Jane Austen's immediate family was large and close-knit: six brothers - James, George, Charles, Francis, Henry and Edward - and a beloved older sister, Cassandra, all of whom lived to adulthood. Cassandra remained her closest friend and confidant, chief sounding board and critic for Austen's entire life.[7] James, the oldest brother, chose to be an Anglican clergyman and became his father's successor as rector of Steventon parish. Her second oldest brother, George, suffered developmental disabilities (perhaps prelingual deafness) and lived under custodial care away from home for his entire life.[8] Two of Austen's brothers, Charles and Frances, went into the navy and each eventually attained the rank of admiral. Of her brothers, Jane Austen felt closest to Henry, who became a banker and, after his bank failed, an Anglican clergyman. Henry succeeded his father as his sister's advisor in practical affairs and acted as her literary agent during her lifetime. His large circle of friends and acquaintances in London included bankers, merchants, professional men, publishers, painters and theatrical people and provided Austen with a window on social worlds not normally visible from a small parish in rural Hampshire.[9] Edward was adopted by distant cousins, Thomas and Catherine Knight, and eventually inherited their large estates and fortune. James and Henry were educated at Oxford on scholarships,[10] while Charles and Frances attended the Royal Naval Academy in Portsmouth to prepare for their chosen careers. Both Cassandra and Jane Austen were largely educated at home but attended boarding schools in Oxford, Southampton and Reading from 1783 to 1786, at which point their formal educations ended.[11]

[edit] Family connections

Austen's family[12] was embedded in a network of connections (mainly through her mother's family) to the gentry and (distantly) the aristocracy. George Austen was descended from a family of woollen cloth manufacturers who had risen since the early 17th century through the professions to the lower reaches of the landed gentry.[13] Mrs. Austen's great uncle, James Brydges, was created the first Marquess of Carnavon and Duke of Chandos; his wife's name, Cassandra, became common in Mrs. Austen's family. Mrs. Austen was a member of the prominent Leigh family having its principal residences at Adlestrop in Gloucestershire and at Stoneleigh Abbey in Warwickshire. Mrs. Austen's uncle, Theophilus Leigh, was master of Balliol College at Oxford for about fifty years and, in 1738, served a three year term as Vice Chancellor of the University. Her brother, James Leigh-Perrot, inherited a large fortune through another great uncle and established himself first at Adlestrop and later at Stoneleigh Abbey; Mrs. Austen visited and traveled with the Leigh-Perrots frequently. Two of Jane Austen's brothers married cousins of the Earl of Craven.[14]

[edit] Family theatricals

Amateur theatricals were an important family activity for the Austen family, part of "the rage for amateur theatricals that obsessed English society from the 1770s well into the nineteenth century...."[15] In December 1782, the Austen brothers and their friends staged a play by Thomas Francklyn, a friend of Samuel Johnson, entitled Matilda, in the dining parlor of Steventon rectory. This conventional historical tragedy was the first known of many theatrical productions by the family. In July, 1784, the family mounted a more ambitious production of Richard Sheridan's comedy The Rivals with prologue and epilogue written by brother James. The 1787-1788 "season," presented for the first time in the Austen barn, included presentations of Susanna Centlivre's melodrama The Wonder! A Woman Keeps a Secret, Beaumont and Fletcher's comedy The Chances, David Garrick's farce Bon Ton, and Henry Fielding's burlesque Tom Thumb. The family's last known productions were presented early in 1790: The Sultan and a farce by James Townley entitled High Life Below Stairs. Jane Austen would certainly have joined in these activities, as a young spectator at first and as a participant later on.[16] Most of these plays were comedies, which illuminates the tastes of the Austen family and suggests one way in which Jane Austen's natural comedic and satirical gifts were cultivated.[17] Austen's experience with the theatricals can be seen reflected in three short plays in the Juvenalia—The Visit, The Mystery and The First Act of a Comedy—and a five-act play entitled Sir Charles Grandison or the Happy Man. This was an adaptation of episodes from one of her favorite novels, History of Sir Charles Grandison, by Samuel Richardson.[18]

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ Mary Lascelles, Jane Austen and Her Art, Oxford University Press (Oxford 1939; reprinted 1966), p. 2.
  2. ^ Oliver MacDonagh, Jane Austen: Real and Imagined Worlds, Yale University Press (New Haven 1991) [ISBN 0-300-05084-4], pp. 111-112.
  3. ^ MacDonagh, p. 112
  4. ^ Described by a contemporary writer, Clara Reeve, as the "inferior gentry." For an extended quotation from Reeve and a brief discussion of English gentry social classes at this period, see Vivien Jones, "General Notes — Social Class" in Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, Penguin Books (New York 2005) [ISBN 0-14-303623-8], pp.370-371, and footnote 2 to Chapter 3 and footnote 2 to Chapter 4 of Book I on pages 374-375 in the same edition. See also Park Honan, Jane Austen — A Life, St. Martin's Press (New York 1987) [ISBN 0-312-01451-1], pp. 29-30. Thomas Keymer gives the following demographic facts about the upper ranks of English society at this time (1803): the peerage consisted of about 300 families, beneath which (in status) were the gentry families of approximately 540 baronets, 350 knights, 6,000 landed squires and 20,000 gentlemen, comprising about 1.4% of the population of England and enjoying about 15.7% of national income. Thomas Keymer, "Rank," in Janet Todd, editor, Jane Austen in Context, Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, U.K. 2005) [ISBN 0-521-82644-6], p. 390.
  5. ^ Park Honan, 17-18.
  6. ^ Deirdre Le Fay, "Chronology of Jane Austen's Life," in Edward Copeland and Juliette McMaster, editors, The Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen, Cambridge University Press (Cambridge, U.K. 1997) [ISBN 0-521-49867-8], p. 1; Jan Fergus, "Biography," in Jane Austen in Context, pp. 5-6; Thomas Keymer, "Rank," p. 389; Jan Fergus, "The Professional Woman Writer," in The Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen, p. 31, Footnote 44; Claire Tomalin, Jane Austen—A Life, Alfred A. Knopf (New York 1997) [ISBN 0-679-44628-1], pp. 186-187; Oliver MacDonagh, Jane Austen—Real and Imagined Worlds, Yale University Press (New Haven 1991) [ISBN 0-300-05084-4], pp. 44-54. For an informative discussion of the meaning of various income levels in terms of status and life style at this time in England, see Edward Copeland, "Money," in The Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen, pp. 131-138. For a comment on the importance of annual income figures in everyday social intercourse in Austen's world, see Honan, pp. 88-89.
  7. ^ Fergus, "Biography," p. 3; Tomalin, p. 142; Honan, pp. 23, 119; William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh, Jane Austen: Her Life and Letters — A Family Record, Smith, Elder & Co. (London 1913), p. 50-51.
  8. ^ Park Honan believes that he was probably a deaf-mute and notes that Jane as a child was observed by a relative using "finger-language" to communicate with him. Honan, pp. 9-10.
  9. ^ MacDonagh, pp. 50-51; Honan, p. 246; Lascelles, p. 4.
  10. ^ Another illustration of the importance of family connections: George Austen's two sons attended Oxford on "Founder's Kin" scholarships for which they qualified because they could demonstrate descent through the Leigh family from Sir Thomas White, the founder of St John's College. Tomalin, p. 26; Honan, p. 56.
  11. ^ Tomalin, pp. 9-10, 26, 33-38, 42-43.
  12. ^ Park Honan points out that Jane Austen took "the widest possible view of the word 'family'. For Jane ... that word included more than merely husband, wife and children....she viewed the effective 'family' as a whole collection of second cousins, great-aunts, nephews and ancestors. Her large view of the family was not unique but it was intensely felt." Honan, p. 30.
  13. ^ Honan, pp. 11-14.
  14. ^ Tomalin, pp. 6, 13-16, 147-151, 170-171; Donald J. Greene, "Jane Austen and the Peerage," in Ian Watt, editor, Jane Austen — A Collection of Critical Essays, Prentice-Hall, Inc. (Englewood Cliffs 1963) [ISBN 0-679-44628-1], pp. 156-157; Keymer, pp. 388-389; Fergus, "Biography," pp. 5-6.
  15. ^ George Holbert Tucker, "Amateur Theatricals at Steventon," in The Jane Austen Companion, p. 1.
  16. ^ Le Fay, "Chronology," pp. 2-3; Tucker, "Amateur Theatricals at Steventon," pp. 1-2; Tomalin, pp. 31-32, 40-42, 55-57, 62-63; Honan, pp. 35, 47-52, 423-424 (Footnote 20).
  17. ^ Honan, pp. 53-54; A. Walton Litz, Jane Austen — A Study of Her Artistic Development, Oxford University Press (New York 1965), pp. 14-17.
  18. ^ Tucker, "Amateur Theatricals at Steventon," pp. 2-3.

[edit] References

  • Austen-Leigh, William; Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh (1913). Jane Austen: Her Life and Letters — A Family Record. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 
  • Copeland, Edward; Juliet McMaster, editors (1997). Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen. Cambridge, U. K.: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-49867-8. 
  • Grey, J. David, managing editor (1986). The Jane Austen Companion. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company. ISBN 0-52-545540-0. 
  • Honan, Park (1987). Jane Austen — A Life. New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0-312-01451-1. 
  • Lascelles, Mary (1939; reprinted 1966). Jane Austen and Her Art. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 
  • Litz, A. Walton (1965). Jane Austen — A Study of Her Development. New York: Oxford University Press. 
  • MacDonagh, Oliver (1991). Jane Austen — Real and Imagined Worlds. New Haven: Yale University Press. ISBN 0-300-05084-4. 
  • Tomalin, Claire (1997). Jane Austen — A Life. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 0-679-44628-1. 
  • Todd, Janet, editor (2005). Jane Austen In Context. Cambridge, U. K.: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-82644-6. 
  • Watt, Ian, editor (1963). Jane Austen — A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall. ISBN 0-130-53769-0. 
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