Happy Birthday Jane Austen (244th) & Mary Russell Mitford (232nd)! (and Jane...
[NOTE: Since I first wrote my first post yesterday [ http://sharpelvessociety.blogspot.com/2019/12/a-proposed-extension-of-devoney-loosers.html ] about Mary Russell Mitford’s 1823 mock letter about...
View ArticleThe awe-inspiring “architecture” of Northanger Abbey
I’ve now had time to read reread, and think about Collins Hemingway's excellent article, “Northanger Abbey: The Bridge to Austen’s Mature Works—and More” in the new Persuasions...
View ArticleThe Nabokovian Gravity of Jane Austen’s Subtle Relative Puns in Mansfield Park
In the first enacted scene of MP in Chapter 1, we read an exchange between Mrs. Norris and Sir Thomas about the pros and cons of having Fanny grow up in the Bertram household around Tom and Edmund:...
View Article‘They found Mary, as usual, deep in the study of thorough-bass and human...
I recently saw Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley, and found the following rave review to be...
View ArticleThe Bride of Northanger by Diana Birchall
I blogged the other day about seeing a fabulous stage performance of Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley, the brilliant sequel to Pride & Prejudicewritten by Gunderson and Meldoc. I’m back today...
View ArticleThe subtle pun in Pride & Prejudice that Maria Edgeworth paid homage to in...
Today I serendipitously came upon another one of Jane Austen’s remarkable puns – always a special treat – and, as I’ll explain tomorrow in Part Two, I owe my discovery to someone who, in May 1813, was...
View ArticleThe Finale of THE GOOD PLACE
*********[SPOILERS!]*********My wife and I watched the final episode of The Good Place Thursday night, less than 2 months after we started bingeing the series from scratch, on the recommendation of my...
View ArticleThe 2 Remarkable Sources for the ‘Irreconcilable’ Comma in Satan’s 1st Speech...
In the Milton-L group last Saturday, Carl Bellinger asked, “Why the middle comma” in the defiant speech by Satan, immediately after the precipitous descent down to Hell at the beginning of Book 1 of...
View ArticleMilton Alluded to Calvin’s Four “Guerre, Irreconciliable” References
Since my initial post https://sharpelvessociety.blogspot.com/2020/02/the-2-remarkable-sources-for.htmlon Tuesday, I’ve had the chance to follow up on my claim that Milton’s War, Irreconcileable” not...
View ArticleMore Evidence of Mr. Elton’s ‘invasion’ of Emma, during their snowy carriage...
In November, 2015, I wrote a post in this blog….. http://tinyurl.com/pph3n9j …..entitled “Mr. Elton’s ‘invasion’ of Emma, during their snowy carriage ride, as a parody of Napoleon ‘frozen’ in...
View ArticleThe many idle assertions and impudent falsehoods the excess of vanity will...
Did you ever think about the unwitting ironic "tell" of Trump constantly using the words "incredible" and "unbelievable" when he's telling his biggest lies???The following remarkable video by talented...
View ArticleAnother literary quiz with a twist
I’m thinking of a great work of literature that meets ALL of the following criteria:It was written long ago by an author whose name is known to countless people, including many who’ve never read their...
View ArticleThe Answers to My Quiz with a “Twist”: Austen meets Aristophanes!
I’m thinking of a great work of literature that meets ALL of the following criteria:ONE: It was written long ago by an author whose name is known to countless people, including many who’ve never read...
View ArticleTrump & Co's Immodest (barbaric) Proposal to Rid our Country of "useless eaters"
Today, literature touches real life again. My brilliant old friend Chris has just chillingly summed up one particularly horrific aspect of our general nightmare:CHRIS: "So it has come to this. Earlier...
View ArticleThe Extraordinary Debate over The Depth, Breadth, and Height of Jane Austen’s...
Four months ago, we had a thread in the Janeites group about Devoney Looser’s exciting discovery of an April Fools Day, 1823 mock letter about Jane Austen and her writing. Devoney claimed that such...
View ArticleA Triple Literary Quiz
I’m thinking of an author who produced:ONE: A writing in which riddles and the number “3” are both given special, interrelated prominence in several ways;TWO: A writing in which false modesty (i.e., an...
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Sally Rooney's Normal People is the real Austenian deal!
My wife and I have watched 3/4 of Normal People,the new miniseries on Hulu, and will watch the rest by the end of this weekend. We have found it to live up to all the buzz, and then some – it is...
View ArticleSally Rooney's Normal People as Midrash on Jane Austen's Emma
The following is an online dialog between myself and my good and brilliant friend, Mary Cantwell, over the past few days, regarding my claims in my initial blog post the other day here…....
View ArticleInvitation to a small Austen-themed Zoom group during the COVID Era
As a hardcore Janeite for the past 26 years (I started late, at 42), and JASNA member since 2005, I'm always up for a lively, informed conversation about all things Jane Austen.Since the COVID era...
View ArticleAusten's Persuasion & Richardson's Clarissa
It seems like the author, Christopher Fanning, of one of the articles in the latest Persuasions #41 (2019) failed to use Google in checking for prior scholarly commentary – specifically, mine -- on his...
View ArticleQuiz about two famous stories, seemingly unrelated, which actually have (at...
[Answer is given below when you scroll down]I’m thinking of two famous stories which are parallel with each other in each of the following nine ways. In each story:ONE: There is an unreliable narrative...
View ArticleFor Love, Money….and Worldly Wisdom: How to Read Jane Austen Better
Today, a good (non-Janeite) friend alerted me to the publication of yet another article about Jane Austen:“How to Misread Jane Austen (or, For Love or Money)” by Louis Menand in The New Yorker...
View ArticleThe Pious Hypocrite of Hunton….or Hunsford?: Austen's Anti-Slavery Parody in...
My eye was caught today by a retweet by a sharp Twitter elf of the following article: “The ‘Slave Bible’ is Not What You Think” by Jill Hicks-Keeton June 3,...
View Article“…matter and impertinency mix'd!”: I am the Walrus as Lennon’s Shakespearean...
I’ve long suspected Lennon & McCartney of being sneakily serious readers of English literature, and that John Lennon in particular loved pretending that his most cryptic lyrics were mere jokes....
View ArticleAnother Missing Party-cipant in one of Jane Austen’s Novels
In the print edition of Persuasions #18 (1996)… https://jasna.org/persuasions/printed/number18/austen-leigh.pdf…Joan Austen-Leigh famously speculated that Jane Austen had nodded, i.e., that she had...
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