Lessing on Austen
February 18, 2006
The New York Times reports that Doris Lessing’s new collection of essays contains an essay on Jane Austen, though the review says nothing specific about it.
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It’s a good read – an overview of JA’s life, works and the critical heritage. Lessing has four of Jane’s brothers in the Royal Navy fighting Boney, though.
Sort of like the whole misunderstanding about how many ladies and gentlemen Mr. Bingley was bringing to the Meryton Assembly!
I just read the whole thing, not just glanced at the first few pages like I did yeaterday. It’s really very good indeed, and is mostly about P&P. It was first published as an introduction to a Norwegian edition of P&P. The “how many ladies & gentlemen” thing gets worse, though… Lessing gives Jane Austen four brothers. *Counts on fingers* I think she had six, which is still five if you leave out George, who is often left out of the account since he was disabled and didn’t live at home.