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lizziepurpleserenity's review against another edition
challenging
informative
reflective
slow-paced
4.0
DISCLAIMER - I knew very little about Jane Austen and the scholarly interpretations of her novels before reading this book. I read each chapter (along with a friend) immediately after reading (or rereading) each relevant novel, over the course of nine months, so the earlier chapters have faded in my memory a bit! Prior to this book, I had read the novels only in a typical light-hearted chick-lit kinda way, focusing on the characters and relationships, so the ideas set down in this book opened my eyes for the first time to alternative and political interpretations. I have read a few of the 1 and 2-star reviews on here of the book and realise I find it difficult to assess the content and conclusions in this book, because of my lack of knowledge, but I've opted for 4 stars and I'll try and explain here my pros and cons for the book.
As for the novels, Pride & Prejudice and Emma (my favourites) I already knew very well both from the books and TV/movie adaptations, Sense & Sensibility I had already read in the past, and possibly Mansfield Park too although I think I knew that one from the TV adaptation starring Billie Piper.... Northanger Abbey and Persuasion I hadn't read before, though I have vague memories of seeing the latter on TV/movie.
So, my reaction to this book:
Pros:
- I loved getting the historical, political, and personal context behind the time in which the novels were written, and to read about specifics from the novels in such context. I found this aspect of the book really interesting, though bear in mind I am super interested in history in general and especially the 18th and 19th centuries, so it's my jam!
- The alternative takes on what each book was actually intended to be about (or parts of them at least) were very eye-opening for me, given that I knew very little beforehand like I said. I have different feelings about each one and don't entirely agree with all that Kelly asserts but on the whole my reading of the novels has been enhanced with deeper understanding, in a positive, albeit sometimes a bit uncomfortable, way.
Cons
- Too many words in places, I think it could have been shorter and more concise.
- Some of her ideas, about smaller stuff, were a bit far-fetched and possibly unnecessary.
- With one or two aspects I felt like Kelly had not allowed for the fact that what was going on around Jane at the time of writing would naturally make its way into the novel; the setting, and so on - Kelly may have attached too much significance or meaning/intention in a few cases. (For example, the enclosures in Emma)
- I didn't really like the vignettes at the beginning of each chapter, told from Jane's POV. Too speculative, not always relevant. I would have preferred a concise paragraph introducing what Jane was up to/where she lived at the time rather than this.
My favourite chapter was about Pride & Prejudice, mostly because it spoilt nothing about the book and the characters I love - enhanced them in fact - and I love the theme (of revolution).
The chapter that had the biggest negative 'effect' on my feelings about the novel was Sense & Sensibility, and the chapter with the most positive effect on my feelings was Persuasion (my least favourite Austen novel), and also Mansfield Park - both of those two I will reread through a different lens that will improve the novels for me a lot, I think, whereas with Emma and Sense & Sensibility I'd rather continue to enjoy them in the way I did before. (FYI Emma is my favourite Austen, although by a very small margin - difficult to choose between this and P&P!).
Northanger Abbey, being the first novel read nine months ago, I don't remember a lot about but Kelly's chapter certainly put in context the dangers that women faced in their normal, conventional lives and had me going 'woah'...
I'm glad I read the book. But if you want your Austens to remain fluffy, escapist, light-hearted, romantic chick-lits, I'd advise to give it a miss!
As for the novels, Pride & Prejudice and Emma (my favourites) I already knew very well both from the books and TV/movie adaptations, Sense & Sensibility I had already read in the past, and possibly Mansfield Park too although I think I knew that one from the TV adaptation starring Billie Piper.... Northanger Abbey and Persuasion I hadn't read before, though I have vague memories of seeing the latter on TV/movie.
So, my reaction to this book:
Pros:
- I loved getting the historical, political, and personal context behind the time in which the novels were written, and to read about specifics from the novels in such context. I found this aspect of the book really interesting, though bear in mind I am super interested in history in general and especially the 18th and 19th centuries, so it's my jam!
- The alternative takes on what each book was actually intended to be about (or parts of them at least) were very eye-opening for me, given that I knew very little beforehand like I said. I have different feelings about each one and don't entirely agree with all that Kelly asserts but on the whole my reading of the novels has been enhanced with deeper understanding, in a positive, albeit sometimes a bit uncomfortable, way.
Cons
- Too many words in places, I think it could have been shorter and more concise.
- Some of her ideas, about smaller stuff, were a bit far-fetched and possibly unnecessary.
- With one or two aspects I felt like Kelly had not allowed for the fact that what was going on around Jane at the time of writing would naturally make its way into the novel; the setting, and so on - Kelly may have attached too much significance or meaning/intention in a few cases. (For example, the enclosures in Emma)
- I didn't really like the vignettes at the beginning of each chapter, told from Jane's POV. Too speculative, not always relevant. I would have preferred a concise paragraph introducing what Jane was up to/where she lived at the time rather than this.
My favourite chapter was about Pride & Prejudice, mostly because it spoilt nothing about the book and the characters I love - enhanced them in fact - and I love the theme (of revolution).
The chapter that had the biggest negative 'effect' on my feelings about the novel was Sense & Sensibility, and the chapter with the most positive effect on my feelings was Persuasion (my least favourite Austen novel), and also Mansfield Park - both of those two I will reread through a different lens that will improve the novels for me a lot, I think, whereas with Emma and Sense & Sensibility I'd rather continue to enjoy them in the way I did before. (FYI Emma is my favourite Austen, although by a very small margin - difficult to choose between this and P&P!).
Northanger Abbey, being the first novel read nine months ago, I don't remember a lot about but Kelly's chapter certainly put in context the dangers that women faced in their normal, conventional lives and had me going 'woah'...
I'm glad I read the book. But if you want your Austens to remain fluffy, escapist, light-hearted, romantic chick-lits, I'd advise to give it a miss!
sophistikitty's review against another edition
3.0
This was an enjoyable, and interesting, read, but I couldn't escape the feeling that, quite a lot of the time, the author was rather stretching things to make her argument. She seems to begin most of her points with 'surely' Jane must have known this, or felt that, and therefore we can draw these conclusions from her text. And perhaps she's right, but she states her case with a lot more certainty than seems warranted.
Of course, the fact that she also expends a lot of energy in casting problematic aspersions on some (or most) of Jane Austen's beloved characters might be biasing me against her, as she no doubt anticipates. But even bearing that in mind, and trying to take it into account, I couldn't quite be convinced.
Even so, I think I'll reread the novels again.
Of course, the fact that she also expends a lot of energy in casting problematic aspersions on some (or most) of Jane Austen's beloved characters might be biasing me against her, as she no doubt anticipates. But even bearing that in mind, and trying to take it into account, I couldn't quite be convinced.
Even so, I think I'll reread the novels again.
clockworkbee's review against another edition
5.0
I really enjoyed Kelly’s analysis of Austen’s works. I didn’t always agree with her, but she did a great job explaining some of the context that is lost to Austen’s modern readers. I liked that she used Austen’s letters at the beginning of each chapter, but I wasn’t a huge fan of her recreating scenes from Austen’s life based off of them. This is purely an audiobook version nitpick, but I also disliked that the narrator attempted a British accent when she read these letters. It was awful! On to the good things though. I believe the author is correct in her assertion that Austen’s works are taught entirely wrong. Modern readers see her as merely a romance author, when in fact she was actually slipping very daring social criticism between the romance. We do a disservice to Austen when we fail to pick up on her references to the political events and published works of her day.
I am a lifelong Austen fan, but I admit that I’ve always hated Mansfield Park. I always thought that Fanny Price was the dull heroine of the bunch. She’s very proper and events take place around her without much of her influence. This book achieved what I didn’t think was possible- it made me appreciate Mansfield Park. In fact, now I feel badly that the work that was clearly so dear to its author’s heart is so little loved by her fans. Once Kelly started putting the novel into context it was so easy to see what Austen was trying get across with Mansfield Park. Fanny isn’t meant to be lovable- she was meant to serve as England’s conscious. She was supposed to make Austen’s original readers reflect on where there money was coming from and face the horrors of slavery. It may not be her most lovable novel, but I think it was her most important. Austen used her novels as a way of critiquing the society she lived in. Women weren’t encouraged to have political opinions in her day. She definitely slipped hers into her writing if you know how to look for them. I really enjoyed this book and I have a feeling I will revisit it again.
I am a lifelong Austen fan, but I admit that I’ve always hated Mansfield Park. I always thought that Fanny Price was the dull heroine of the bunch. She’s very proper and events take place around her without much of her influence. This book achieved what I didn’t think was possible- it made me appreciate Mansfield Park. In fact, now I feel badly that the work that was clearly so dear to its author’s heart is so little loved by her fans. Once Kelly started putting the novel into context it was so easy to see what Austen was trying get across with Mansfield Park. Fanny isn’t meant to be lovable- she was meant to serve as England’s conscious. She was supposed to make Austen’s original readers reflect on where there money was coming from and face the horrors of slavery. It may not be her most lovable novel, but I think it was her most important. Austen used her novels as a way of critiquing the society she lived in. Women weren’t encouraged to have political opinions in her day. She definitely slipped hers into her writing if you know how to look for them. I really enjoyed this book and I have a feeling I will revisit it again.
emilypaull's review against another edition
4.0
Very interesting analyses of the six completed novels, which provide a new degree of context for the modern reader. We cannot know for sure if this is really how Jane Austen intended her books to be read and in any case, once a book is published, the author has little say in how readers interpret it. Still, I’m very keen to reread Austen now.
amythebookbat's review against another edition
3.0
The book was less about Austen's life than about "how we should interpret her books". It was interesting and the author had some valid points, but I wasn't looking for an academic read. I think this book would be a good resource for people taking a course on Austen.
ilonatermaat's review against another edition
3.0
Het begin van elk hoofdstuk was vrij storend (Kelly maakte een soort narratief over Jane die nadenkt over haar boeken en/of haar leven). Verder was de inhoud best heel interessant, ik heb veel nieuwe dingen geleerd. Maar ik echt wereldschokkend vond ik de meeste "nieuwe vondsten" niet; een groot deel heb ik toch ook in andere essays en dergelijke wel voorbij zien komen.
mary_the_librarian's review against another edition
4.0
Very interesting take on Jane Austen and her work. It makes me want to re-read her books with these ideas in mind.
girlwithherheadinabook's review against another edition
4.0
For my full review: http://girlwithherheadinabook.co.uk/2017/08/austen-in-august-review-jane-austen-the-secret-radical-helena-kelly.html
Having set this book front and centre of last year's Christmas list to no avail, it was with some excitement that I spotted Jane Austen The Secret Radical had made its paperback debut. I read it with gusto. Every reader seems to find their own version of Jane Austen and Oxford professor Helena Kelly is no different. Nor is she so very unusual in believing that she alone is correct, with the main thrust of her book being that we have been misinterpreting Austen's novels for all of these years and only here can we finally discover the truth. Indeed, with her chapter openers which imagine Jane Austen going about her life and Kelly's habit of referring to Austen by her first name, one could be forgiven for thinking that Kelly has some kind of direct link. Still, her passion for her mission is clear and her writing style engaging and the feeling that Jane Austen's more subversive messages have been dumbed down over the years is common to many fans - is this the Jane Austen biography to see us through the post-truth era?
Kelly opens with an introduction putting Austen into the political context of her time, then splits off into a chapter on each of the six novels and then closes with an afterword on the great lady's death. She is not afraid afraid to make cross-references between works if they back up her point, but from early on it is clear that Kelly is relying on her own research rather than that of any of her fellow scholars. Unsurprisingly - and particularly so given how brief her own bibliography - this has led to several rather indignant reviews from well-known Austen experts. John Mullan of What Matters in Jane Austen voiced his concerns in the Guardian, while John Sutherland gave a slightly more conciliatory review in The New York Times. Both men noted the way in which Claire Tomalin's seminal 2012 biography Jane Austen A Life was dismissed in a footnote. Helena Kelly is very much doing things her own way here and does seem to have rather set the cat among the pigeons.
I was reminded of Deborah Yaffe's Among The Janeites and its description of Arnie Perlstein, the Jane Austen 'truther' who believed that only he seemed to spot what was really going on with the books. But where Austen fans were united in believing Perlstein a lunatic (and even the kindly Yaffe seemed to think him a 'nice' lunatic), here Kelly is preaching and expecting to be heard and believed. The fact is that not only are some of her theories more convincing than others, the same is also true of their originality. Her chapter on how the plot of Mansfield Park is haunted by the shadow of the slave trade is something which Paula Byrne also argued in her 2013 book The Real Jane Austen: A Life in Small Things, a work which does not appear in Kelly's bibliography. And it is hardly news that the Austen family closed ranks after the author's death to protect her reputation.
Kelly argues that Austen was writing at a time when Britain was essentially a totalitarian state. Habeas corpus was suspended, people could be locked up for distributing leaflets or reciting doggerel interpreted as critical of the state. The intention of all this, Kelly assures us, was to make writers think twice before speaking plainly. Thus, Austen was forced to cloak her message, to code it and then after her death, her family stamped out, scratched out, scribbled out any suspicion of radical sentiment. We are going to have to look beneath the surface if we are going to see what we were supposed to be getting at.
As Kelly rightly points out, Austen was one of remarkably few Regency writers who set their stories within their own time. We read her work as a period piece, but Kelly tries to dive into the concerns and preoccupations of the time. Northanger Abbey considers the 'common anxieties of life', namely sex and childbirth. I found Kelly's analysis of the themes around primogeniture within Sense and Sensibility to be truly compelling - it has never been my favourite of the novels but I am now looking at it with fresh eyes. The various ways in which primogeniture is explored within the plot as injust - from the Dashwood girls' lack of inheritance to Edward Ferrars' lack of independence to Colonel Brandon's inability to marry his childhood sweetheart - it all points to quite a subversive message coming from the younger daughter of a parson who had no financial prospects and who lost her home when her parents gave it to her eldest brother.
Far from the prim and proper conservative, Kelly points out the various ways in which Austen poked holes in the status quo. Pride and Prejudice's heroine Elizabeth Bennet is an undutiful daughter, refuses to obey her mother, holds the vicar Mr Collins in contempt and shows no appropriate respect to the aristocracy - she is 'a conservative's nightmare'. She and Wickham conspire together in their inverted snobbery against the upper classes and Darcy is only able to win her heart when he steps down from his pedestal, befriends the despised Gardiners and shows himself willing to embrace change. While the themes of aristocratic decay within Persuasion were familiar to me, this new perspective on P&P was new to me and Kelly's explanation of the rules regarding social introductions also shed new light.
Similarly, Kelly takes a step back from Emma's Highbury and shows us what is actually going on - Mr Knightley has carried out a land enclosure. The signs are there - he does talk about it, it's just that Emma finds it all too dull to actually attend to. The fences and hedges are up and the poor population are suffering, hence also the increased numbers of gypsies on the roads. Just as Fanny Price also seems to shut her eyes to what is around her, so too does Emma appear ignorant. Although the idea that he only seeks to marry Emma to carry out a second enclosure seems to require a radical reevaluation of the character of the man who scolded Emma so roundly for being cruel to a woman beneath her in social station.
Secret Radical is at its best when looking at the novels through a political lens. Kelly's musings on the apparent sexual phobia within Northanger Abbey raises eyebrows, not least when she confidently describes the passage where Catherine Moreland is trying to get into the chest in her room at the Abbey as a clear metaphor for female masturbation. Several of the reviews by Austen scholars did rather spit feathers at this analogy. Similarly, the idea Fanny Price arms her Portsmouth sisters with silver knives to protect them against their father seems far-fetched, not least because the silver knives would have blunt and there must surely have been sewing scissors or kitchen knives which would have done the job far better. In Emma, Kelly's theory that Jane Fairfax and Harriet Smith are half-sisters seems somewhat half-baked and seems to argue a peculiar need to see sex in every corner. All this being said, Kelly's theory about Colonel Brandon's paternity of Miss Williams was rather more well-reasoned and does beg a few questions.
I heartily enjoyed Secret Radical - I have never thought Jane Austen was the dull preserver of Ye Olde England which so many would have her be. Her heroines have intelligence (aside from Catherine Moreland) and each of them challenges the way things are done around them in some way. Many of the matches struck within her books are deeply problematic and do not necessarily augur long-term happiness - Austen was quietly critical of the way that marriage was the only acceptable option available to women. To be frank though, one does not need to subscribe to all of Helena Kelly's theories to acknowledge that Austen was an author with a political agenda. Secret Radical showcases its author's impressive and in depth knowledge of the novels but it is less revolutionary than it appears to be and many of the theories within are less ground-breaking than Kelly's thunderclapping writing style would have us believe. I recommend Secret Radical as an engagingly written rediscovery of of Jane Austen, but Kelly will not be the last writer to do so - she is rediscovered by each reader who picks up one of her books. The best piece of advice comes at the very end of the book when Kelly orders us to go back and read them again.
Having set this book front and centre of last year's Christmas list to no avail, it was with some excitement that I spotted Jane Austen The Secret Radical had made its paperback debut. I read it with gusto. Every reader seems to find their own version of Jane Austen and Oxford professor Helena Kelly is no different. Nor is she so very unusual in believing that she alone is correct, with the main thrust of her book being that we have been misinterpreting Austen's novels for all of these years and only here can we finally discover the truth. Indeed, with her chapter openers which imagine Jane Austen going about her life and Kelly's habit of referring to Austen by her first name, one could be forgiven for thinking that Kelly has some kind of direct link. Still, her passion for her mission is clear and her writing style engaging and the feeling that Jane Austen's more subversive messages have been dumbed down over the years is common to many fans - is this the Jane Austen biography to see us through the post-truth era?
Kelly opens with an introduction putting Austen into the political context of her time, then splits off into a chapter on each of the six novels and then closes with an afterword on the great lady's death. She is not afraid afraid to make cross-references between works if they back up her point, but from early on it is clear that Kelly is relying on her own research rather than that of any of her fellow scholars. Unsurprisingly - and particularly so given how brief her own bibliography - this has led to several rather indignant reviews from well-known Austen experts. John Mullan of What Matters in Jane Austen voiced his concerns in the Guardian, while John Sutherland gave a slightly more conciliatory review in The New York Times. Both men noted the way in which Claire Tomalin's seminal 2012 biography Jane Austen A Life was dismissed in a footnote. Helena Kelly is very much doing things her own way here and does seem to have rather set the cat among the pigeons.
I was reminded of Deborah Yaffe's Among The Janeites and its description of Arnie Perlstein, the Jane Austen 'truther' who believed that only he seemed to spot what was really going on with the books. But where Austen fans were united in believing Perlstein a lunatic (and even the kindly Yaffe seemed to think him a 'nice' lunatic), here Kelly is preaching and expecting to be heard and believed. The fact is that not only are some of her theories more convincing than others, the same is also true of their originality. Her chapter on how the plot of Mansfield Park is haunted by the shadow of the slave trade is something which Paula Byrne also argued in her 2013 book The Real Jane Austen: A Life in Small Things, a work which does not appear in Kelly's bibliography. And it is hardly news that the Austen family closed ranks after the author's death to protect her reputation.
Kelly argues that Austen was writing at a time when Britain was essentially a totalitarian state. Habeas corpus was suspended, people could be locked up for distributing leaflets or reciting doggerel interpreted as critical of the state. The intention of all this, Kelly assures us, was to make writers think twice before speaking plainly. Thus, Austen was forced to cloak her message, to code it and then after her death, her family stamped out, scratched out, scribbled out any suspicion of radical sentiment. We are going to have to look beneath the surface if we are going to see what we were supposed to be getting at.
As Kelly rightly points out, Austen was one of remarkably few Regency writers who set their stories within their own time. We read her work as a period piece, but Kelly tries to dive into the concerns and preoccupations of the time. Northanger Abbey considers the 'common anxieties of life', namely sex and childbirth. I found Kelly's analysis of the themes around primogeniture within Sense and Sensibility to be truly compelling - it has never been my favourite of the novels but I am now looking at it with fresh eyes. The various ways in which primogeniture is explored within the plot as injust - from the Dashwood girls' lack of inheritance to Edward Ferrars' lack of independence to Colonel Brandon's inability to marry his childhood sweetheart - it all points to quite a subversive message coming from the younger daughter of a parson who had no financial prospects and who lost her home when her parents gave it to her eldest brother.
Far from the prim and proper conservative, Kelly points out the various ways in which Austen poked holes in the status quo. Pride and Prejudice's heroine Elizabeth Bennet is an undutiful daughter, refuses to obey her mother, holds the vicar Mr Collins in contempt and shows no appropriate respect to the aristocracy - she is 'a conservative's nightmare'. She and Wickham conspire together in their inverted snobbery against the upper classes and Darcy is only able to win her heart when he steps down from his pedestal, befriends the despised Gardiners and shows himself willing to embrace change. While the themes of aristocratic decay within Persuasion were familiar to me, this new perspective on P&P was new to me and Kelly's explanation of the rules regarding social introductions also shed new light.
Similarly, Kelly takes a step back from Emma's Highbury and shows us what is actually going on - Mr Knightley has carried out a land enclosure. The signs are there - he does talk about it, it's just that Emma finds it all too dull to actually attend to. The fences and hedges are up and the poor population are suffering, hence also the increased numbers of gypsies on the roads. Just as Fanny Price also seems to shut her eyes to what is around her, so too does Emma appear ignorant. Although the idea that he only seeks to marry Emma to carry out a second enclosure seems to require a radical reevaluation of the character of the man who scolded Emma so roundly for being cruel to a woman beneath her in social station.
Secret Radical is at its best when looking at the novels through a political lens. Kelly's musings on the apparent sexual phobia within Northanger Abbey raises eyebrows, not least when she confidently describes the passage where Catherine Moreland is trying to get into the chest in her room at the Abbey as a clear metaphor for female masturbation. Several of the reviews by Austen scholars did rather spit feathers at this analogy. Similarly, the idea Fanny Price arms her Portsmouth sisters with silver knives to protect them against their father seems far-fetched, not least because the silver knives would have blunt and there must surely have been sewing scissors or kitchen knives which would have done the job far better. In Emma, Kelly's theory that Jane Fairfax and Harriet Smith are half-sisters seems somewhat half-baked and seems to argue a peculiar need to see sex in every corner. All this being said, Kelly's theory about Colonel Brandon's paternity of Miss Williams was rather more well-reasoned and does beg a few questions.
I heartily enjoyed Secret Radical - I have never thought Jane Austen was the dull preserver of Ye Olde England which so many would have her be. Her heroines have intelligence (aside from Catherine Moreland) and each of them challenges the way things are done around them in some way. Many of the matches struck within her books are deeply problematic and do not necessarily augur long-term happiness - Austen was quietly critical of the way that marriage was the only acceptable option available to women. To be frank though, one does not need to subscribe to all of Helena Kelly's theories to acknowledge that Austen was an author with a political agenda. Secret Radical showcases its author's impressive and in depth knowledge of the novels but it is less revolutionary than it appears to be and many of the theories within are less ground-breaking than Kelly's thunderclapping writing style would have us believe. I recommend Secret Radical as an engagingly written rediscovery of of Jane Austen, but Kelly will not be the last writer to do so - she is rediscovered by each reader who picks up one of her books. The best piece of advice comes at the very end of the book when Kelly orders us to go back and read them again.
amontan's review against another edition
3.0
Jane Austen is one of my favorite authors. I am not under the assumption that she is a romantic author. Or as romantic as the adaptations make her out to be. But there is a certain romance to her writing and the turns of her plot and the outcome for her heroines and heroes. This book does its best to correct any preconceptions and remove any romance to her books. Im not sure I agree. I wish to be an informed reader and there is something to be said for knowing historical context, but how do we really know this or that is what the author intended? Or perhaps that is what makes an author truly great- when people can take away whatever they want from a story. This book is one woman's analysis of Jane's novels. The historical information and background provided in this book were interesting, but I I'm not yet a believer in Jane, The Radical. This book has inspired me to re-read Jane's novels more closely though. Perhaps, then, I can come to my own conclusions.