The first edition of this definitive biography of Jane Austen was published in 1913 by William and Richard Arthur-Leigh, who based it upon family traditions and some surviving letters. It has not hitherto been reissued, and much information about the novelist and her work has since come to light.
For this fully revised and expanded edition, Deirdre Le Faye has had unique access to the Austen family archive to produce a detailed, well-documented account of Jane’s life, family background and literary career. Here, through quotation from many original letters, journals and memoirs, the Austen family and their friends speak to modern readers in their own voices, as they once did to each other.
With eight pages of plates, a chronology and genealogies, Jane Austen : A Family Record will be a permanent source of reference and enjoyment for literary scholars and all lovers of Jane Austen’s works.