Account: Jean Austen

Jean Austen is a well-known writer that you probably are familiar well. But do we really know
her? In this brief paper, I intend to tell you about the most fascinating and illuminating
aspects of her short but well-lived life. However, it is worth mentioning that this account by
no means intends to contain all the facts, as that would be impossible and of course, a
matter of personal criteria and opinion are involved.

The first thing to discuss is her particular writing style; one would think like the narrator says
that as she was considered to be a very stylish writer, the use of grammar and punctuation
would be very careful and precise. But surprisingly enough, her writing style resembles more
the way we write emails. She did not use paragraphs and instead used a combination of
dashed and colons with the rare exception of a stop.

Continuing with her writing, it is no secret that silence is of paramount importance for focus,
especially to write. But the fact that Jean would not oil the hinges of the door, so to have a
warning when somebody was about to disturb her, simply fascinates me. This was also done
with the purpose of hiding her precious manuscripts, which she was very jealous of.

The fact that she wrote anonymously come to no surprise to me as those times were not
very amiable to women. But the fact that even when she achieved some recognition with the
publication of Sense and Sensibility, she would still remain anonymous and plainly call
herself “The author of Pride and Prejudice” does surprise me very much indeed.

Pride and Prejudice was initially rejected by the publishing company without even having it
read it first and was initially called First Impressions. But in the future, they accepted it with
the name we know today. Only two more novels were published in her lifetime; Mansfield
Park and Emma. When she died, her family made sure that the rest of her work got out into
the public; Persuasion and Northanger Abbey were a success and it was the first time a
book had her name.

To conclude, Jean Austen with only six novels amazed us enough to become one o the
classics. Some say that because of her premature death we were robbed of many great
works that were to come. No matter how disheartening her untimely death may be, we must
celebrate the remarkable author that was.