Emma

Jane Austen was born in Steventon rectory on 16th December 1775. Her family later moved to Bath and then to Chawton in Hampshire. She wrote from a young age and Pride and Prejudice was begun when she was twenty-two years old. It was originally called First Impressions. It was initially rejected by the published she submitted it too and eventually published in 1813 after much revision. All four of her novels published in her lifetime were published anonymously. Jane Austen died on 18th July 1817. Northanger Abbey and Persuasion were published posthumously.

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'Jane Austen's Emma is her masterpiece, mixing the sparkle of her early books with a deep sensibility' Observer

Emma is young, rich and independent. She has decided not to get married and instead spends her time organising her acquaintances' love affairs. Her plans for the matrimonial success of her new friend Harriet, however, lead her into complications that ultimately test her own detachment from the world of romance.

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY ANDREW MOTION

Austen's characters are unquestionably one key to her greatness. Her understanding of the human heart is forensic and also frosted with the necessary detachment that gives deeper meaning to her rendering of human frailty.. In Emma, Jane Austen shows us the halting development of an adolescent girl from perky narcissism to something approaching empathyIt is the cleverest of books. I especially love the dialogue - every speech reveals the characters' obsessions and preoccupations, yet it remains perfectly natural...absolutely grippingJane Austen is my favourite author! Shut up in measureless content, I greet her by the name of most kind hostess, while criticism slumbersThe wit of Jane Austen has for partner the perfection of her tasteLike Irvine Welsh, I am a great admirer of Jane Austen