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losthitsu's review against another edition
3.0
Good things first: I have a lot of respect and admiration for the amount of research that went into this book and I appreciate the author highlighting that some of the well known "facts" about Austen's life are nothing more than family traditions and have no root in actual primary sources. However, a lot of the conclusions the book is presenting as groundbreaking revelations are simply too far-fetched to be in any way believable. Yes it is true that it's impossible to read a book in the same way as it was read at the time of its publication after two centuries, and the background information the author provides is always interesting, but the claims that Austen chose the names of her heroines in Persuasion as a veiled critique of the Hannoverian succession, or that the apricot tree mentioned by Mrs Norris is a hidden reference to the Church of England's ties to the slave trade, are franky ridiculous. Yes, Austen was an author remarkably well tuned to her time and yes her books are far more radical than many of the works of her contemporaries, but a lot of Kelly's claims just sound like very arduously constructed wishful thinking. Part of the problem is the artificial attempt to divide the topic by book and by subject, and claim that every book had one main social criticism secretly incorporated in its pages - sorry I just don't buy that.
I don't agree with a lot of the author's reading of the books and her character interpretation (I don't like Fanny's father either but calling him a sadist based on one offhand remark is a bit steep) but I understand that books are open to an infinite number of interpretations. What I hated however were those horrid little "authentic" vignettes that open each chapter, where the author writes about moments from Austen's life from the her POV - apart from being maudlin and uncomfortably patronising ("She wishes she had been better, or braver," thinks Austen on her deathbed according to Kelly, please could we not.), wasn't the whole project of the book to get Austen away from the romanticising gaze of her later critics and reaffirm her as an intelligent, self-aware person who was so much more than a sad little spinster who lived solely through her books?
Perhaps I just fundamentally disagree with the main idea of the book - yes it is important to raise Austen's profile beyond just the author of empty regency fluff, but shouldn't we do that by overcoming the stigma attached to women's writing and acknowledging that she's a phenomenal observer of her corner of English middle-class life, rather than trying to shoehorn "manly" debates about revolutions and parliamentary reforms into her work?
Also please why are we still doing this accent thing in audio books? Either hire a British narrator or let the American one just speak in her own voice, this switching to a really uncomfortable British accent every time a quote comes up is incredibly distracting.
I don't agree with a lot of the author's reading of the books and her character interpretation (I don't like Fanny's father either but calling him a sadist based on one offhand remark is a bit steep) but I understand that books are open to an infinite number of interpretations. What I hated however were those horrid little "authentic" vignettes that open each chapter, where the author writes about moments from Austen's life from the her POV - apart from being maudlin and uncomfortably patronising ("She wishes she had been better, or braver," thinks Austen on her deathbed according to Kelly, please could we not.), wasn't the whole project of the book to get Austen away from the romanticising gaze of her later critics and reaffirm her as an intelligent, self-aware person who was so much more than a sad little spinster who lived solely through her books?
Perhaps I just fundamentally disagree with the main idea of the book - yes it is important to raise Austen's profile beyond just the author of empty regency fluff, but shouldn't we do that by overcoming the stigma attached to women's writing and acknowledging that she's a phenomenal observer of her corner of English middle-class life, rather than trying to shoehorn "manly" debates about revolutions and parliamentary reforms into her work?
Also please why are we still doing this accent thing in audio books? Either hire a British narrator or let the American one just speak in her own voice, this switching to a really uncomfortable British accent every time a quote comes up is incredibly distracting.
flappermyrtle's review against another edition
3.0
Firstly, please, please, please, can we stop writing books that claim to 'read Jane Austen in a new manner', books that claim we have been reading Austen 'completely wrongly', books who revel in finding the smallest details and blowing them up completely into a new reading.
Jane Austen, the Secret Radical manages to find some very interesting angles and, indeed, legitimate proof for some of its interpretations. The presence of the militia in Meryton as a threatening rather than aiding presence is explicated excellently, emphasising the fear of war as well as the danger of having so many single men cavorting about the streets with little to do.
However, the book incidentally reads so closely that I felt it lost the bigger picture, as with the Persuasion chapter and its focus on fossils and evolution. Interesting, though not in the least credible to me, unfortunately.
All in all, recommended if you are knee-deep in Austen studies and familiar with many theories on her novels and its deeper layers and wish to be just a little bit surprised, but to be taken with some grains of salt.
Jane Austen, the Secret Radical manages to find some very interesting angles and, indeed, legitimate proof for some of its interpretations. The presence of the militia in Meryton as a threatening rather than aiding presence is explicated excellently, emphasising the fear of war as well as the danger of having so many single men cavorting about the streets with little to do.
However, the book incidentally reads so closely that I felt it lost the bigger picture, as with the Persuasion chapter and its focus on fossils and evolution. Interesting, though not in the least credible to me, unfortunately.
All in all, recommended if you are knee-deep in Austen studies and familiar with many theories on her novels and its deeper layers and wish to be just a little bit surprised, but to be taken with some grains of salt.
afilmfatale's review against another edition
informative
reflective
medium-paced
3.0
I’d love to annotate and research this
veracruzzzzz's review against another edition
4.0
Very detailed and well researched, even if often on the far-fetchy side.
Food for thought.
Food for thought.
letsgolesbians's review against another edition
4.0
3.5, rounding up.
I found this to be an interesting read; the examination of Jane Austen's work felt like something from a college class, which is something I've missed over the past few years--an in-depth examination and discussion of themes over the course of an author's repertoire. Each Austen novel has a chapter dedicated to it, discussing overall themes and symbols and pointing out language that likely goes over the heads of contemporary readers.
Admittedly, I don't know a lot about Austen-era Britain, so I learned a lot while reading this and found it pretty eye-opening. People have an idea of who Austen was and the works that she wrote, but this book shows how intelligent and careful she was with her writing. There were a few times I found arguments to be a bit of a stretch, but almost everything else seemed pretty accurate.
One thing I would have appreciated was an acknowledgment that a lot of what Kelly was describing regarding class and gender only applied to white people; obviously an in-depth look at POC in Austen-era England would have been out of place, as Jane and her characters were all white, but any indication that the customs and rules being described were different for men and women of color. The Mansfield Park chapter discusses slavery, because that's what Jane was condemning with that book, but other than that, there's nothing about POC. Even that chapter says things like this:
It's laughable, or would be if we had no idea of the horrors that lie beneath it--the clinking of chains, the stench of bodies pressed together in their own urine and feces and vomit, the ceaseless movement of the sea, what waited at the journey's end.
...and, you know, the fact that they were fucking SLAVES. The conditions on the slave ships shouldn't be the big horror. Slavery itself was the big horror, and treating slavery like it's a historical thing to be studied (the same way the revolutions and issues with the church are treated in the examinations of Austen's works) rather than a horrible and disgusting part of the world's history is doing a disservice to people of color.
Anyway, I recommend this if you're an Austen fan. I learned a lot, and now I'm really disappointed that Austen died before she finished her book about a mixed-race character.
I found this to be an interesting read; the examination of Jane Austen's work felt like something from a college class, which is something I've missed over the past few years--an in-depth examination and discussion of themes over the course of an author's repertoire. Each Austen novel has a chapter dedicated to it, discussing overall themes and symbols and pointing out language that likely goes over the heads of contemporary readers.
Admittedly, I don't know a lot about Austen-era Britain, so I learned a lot while reading this and found it pretty eye-opening. People have an idea of who Austen was and the works that she wrote, but this book shows how intelligent and careful she was with her writing. There were a few times I found arguments to be a bit of a stretch, but almost everything else seemed pretty accurate.
One thing I would have appreciated was an acknowledgment that a lot of what Kelly was describing regarding class and gender only applied to white people; obviously an in-depth look at POC in Austen-era England would have been out of place, as Jane and her characters were all white, but any indication that the customs and rules being described were different for men and women of color. The Mansfield Park chapter discusses slavery, because that's what Jane was condemning with that book, but other than that, there's nothing about POC. Even that chapter says things like this:
It's laughable, or would be if we had no idea of the horrors that lie beneath it--the clinking of chains, the stench of bodies pressed together in their own urine and feces and vomit, the ceaseless movement of the sea, what waited at the journey's end.
...and, you know, the fact that they were fucking SLAVES. The conditions on the slave ships shouldn't be the big horror. Slavery itself was the big horror, and treating slavery like it's a historical thing to be studied (the same way the revolutions and issues with the church are treated in the examinations of Austen's works) rather than a horrible and disgusting part of the world's history is doing a disservice to people of color.
Anyway, I recommend this if you're an Austen fan. I learned a lot, and now I'm really disappointed that Austen died before she finished her book about a mixed-race character.
cornynat's review against another edition
3.0
I thought I was cool because I read Pride and Prejudice before watching any of the adaptations - and don't get me wrong, I enjoy the adaptations (yep, especially the zombie one) - but even without those being my default, I still had barely any of the historical and political context to appreciate it (and it's siblings) as Kelly suggests Jane meant us to. And, as Kelly also suggests, Jane's contemporary audience largely didn't either (due to publication delays)... aka, Jane Austen has always been underrated?
I liked the structure (a chapter assigned to each of Jane's published books, but still cross referencing each other) and it was genuinely informative and thought provoking, but it could have been more concise for my taste (language on the flowery side, which instead of being transportive is distracting when trying to think analytically). And Kelly prefaces everything by challenging some common held beliefs about Austen's life that there isn't very solid basis for, but she still does her fair share of speculation... from what mostly seems like solid stuff (i.e. the socio/political climate she wrote them in, which were not necessarily, as mentioned above, the ones they were published in) but which sometimes felt like a reach (albeit interesting ones).
There are some indignant reviews about some things that Kelly reads into, but Jane isn't around to settle any debates, and ultimately a book means to a reader what they want it to mean. All that being said, I don't know if I actually "liked" this book or if I just found the information being used to support Kelly's claims helpful - either way I'm looking forward to eventually rereading Austen's works with some new perspective.
"Forget the Jane Austen you think you know. Forget the biographies; forget the pretty adaptations. Ignore the banknote. Read Jane's novels. They're there to speak for her: love stories, yes, though not always happy ones, but also the productions of an extraordinary mind, in an extraordinary age."
PAGE 293
I liked the structure (a chapter assigned to each of Jane's published books, but still cross referencing each other) and it was genuinely informative and thought provoking, but it could have been more concise for my taste (language on the flowery side, which instead of being transportive is distracting when trying to think analytically). And Kelly prefaces everything by challenging some common held beliefs about Austen's life that there isn't very solid basis for, but she still does her fair share of speculation... from what mostly seems like solid stuff (i.e. the socio/political climate she wrote them in, which were not necessarily, as mentioned above, the ones they were published in) but which sometimes felt like a reach (albeit interesting ones).
There are some indignant reviews about some things that Kelly reads into, but Jane isn't around to settle any debates, and ultimately a book means to a reader what they want it to mean. All that being said, I don't know if I actually "liked" this book or if I just found the information being used to support Kelly's claims helpful - either way I'm looking forward to eventually rereading Austen's works with some new perspective.
"Forget the Jane Austen you think you know. Forget the biographies; forget the pretty adaptations. Ignore the banknote. Read Jane's novels. They're there to speak for her: love stories, yes, though not always happy ones, but also the productions of an extraordinary mind, in an extraordinary age."
PAGE 293
kelswid's review against another edition
3.0
https://alittlebookshouting.com/2019/07/17/four-ways-of-looking-at-jane-austen-7-16-19/
rachelleahdorn's review against another edition
5.0
I really loved this. I was fairly surprised how many reviewers on GR didn’t. I haven’t read other Jane Austen criticism, so maybe these ideas aren’t new to everyone, but I really liked getting the backgrounds on the stuff I wasn’t aware of (dates of events, what enclosure was all about, some of the other social knowledge that people of the time would have known that isn’t relevant in society today).
As another reviewer suggested, maybe I liked it because I want to read Jane Austen as a radical. Maybe it helped that most of the interpretations were new to me (or, at least, I’ve never read them from someone else before). Or maybe I just super love Jane Austen and enjoyed reading a book by someone who also loves her writing.
I thought the book was well-written, an enjoyable read and the author informed me of some things I didn’t know and suggested some ideas I want to think about it next time I read these books.
As another reviewer suggested, maybe I liked it because I want to read Jane Austen as a radical. Maybe it helped that most of the interpretations were new to me (or, at least, I’ve never read them from someone else before). Or maybe I just super love Jane Austen and enjoyed reading a book by someone who also loves her writing.
I thought the book was well-written, an enjoyable read and the author informed me of some things I didn’t know and suggested some ideas I want to think about it next time I read these books.
heathermollauthor's review against another edition
2.0
I only finished this book because a friend asked me to. And I gave it two starts rather than one because I know how hard it is to write a book. I've strained a muscle from all the eye-rolling. Too many sentences from the novels are out of context and from there become an outlandish premise that's not based on fact. The author doesn’t prove most of the claims she makes. Yes, Austen knew there were wars and class struggles and slavery and that people had sex! Not earth shattering news.