Page 68 - All About History - Issue 54-17

Never Mind
Blokes

The

How Regency women sparked a revolution
in arts, culture and politics

Written by Catherine Curzon

w wo hundred years after her death, reality of y ove r n i gh t s e n s a t i o n . T h e A ge of E n l i gh
y
y f her class and time that did not shy
f
overnight sensation. The Age of Enlightenment
o one woman remains the centrepiece away f from difficult truths. This included her only !
ff
o y went so far, after all!
Yet she did
g
o of British Regency literature. Jane u understanding that women’s lives in the early Ye h d dn’t struggle alone, and all Y ggl l d ll
Y
around the world, women just as remarkable
19th century were limited in opportunity,
A u st en i s a li te ra ry l eg en d an d a 19th century were limited in opportunity around the world women just as remar
Austen is a literary legend and a
Tfigure to whom millions still turn even among the gentry and upper middle as her were battling convention, society and
to for entertainment, a little romance and the classes, and that marriage was often a means to expectation to be heard. They came from
occasional pithy put-down. Her polite comedies financial security and social respect. mansions and hovels, from Great Britain,
of manners, featuring militamen eloping with The divine Miss Austen was a remarkable Europe, China, America and further afield,
rich young heiresses and social-climbing woman in an era when the whole world was lone voices crying out in a worldwide chorus
gorgons prowling the lawns of eligible young dominated by men. Her path to success was that couldn’t be ignored. From suffragists to
bachelors, spear social conventions and can be far from easy and she fought to make her voice abolitionists, pirates, authors and even proud
as savage as they are romantic. heard. After all, her most famous work, Pride advocates of free love, here are eleven women
Rather than being demure drawing room And Prejudice, was completed in 1797 but didn’t who would give any feisty fictional heroine a
dramas, Austen held up a mirror to the social see the light of day until 1813, so Jane was no run for her money.
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