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Jane Austen and the Theatre Jane Marian had been an orphan, a JANE AUSTEN near death after the betrayal by twin adopted by the Passmore fam- AND THE THEATRE Willoughby, to thereunitingofAnne ily, and while she was always on Elliott and Frederick Wentworth in Persuasion, Gay relays numerous loving terms with them, as the letters Penny Gay scenes and situations which confirm attest, she was also always haunted Cambridge: Cambridge University Austen's strong sense of 'theatre'. by her feeling ofmarginality: "I didn't Press, 2002 realize it hurt so much to be a foster- "The plays performed in the child and orphan." Above all, she JANE AUSTEN'S ~teventhnhome theatricals during was always hard up and bedevilled by Austen's childhood had a profound the double demands of single par- "OUTLANDISH influence on the young writer, alert- enthood and her writing career. COUSIN": ing her both to the seductive power Christ1 Verduyn has long since be- THE LIFE AND of the theatre and to the ambivalence come the pre-eminent Engel scholar LETTERS OF ELlZA of acting." Gay also makes reference and critic. In this volume she and her DE FEUlLLlDE to similarities in plots between some associate, Kathleen Garay, have as- of the popular plays ofAusten's time sembled an excellent selection of let- and her novels, but points out that Deirdre LeFaye, Ed. ters both to Marian and from her. what Austen does, however, is place London: British Library, 2002 Her letters are noteworthy for the her own ironic stamp on her charac- lasting impression they give of a ters and situations. wonderfully talented woman fully REVIEWED BY M. JANE The author also remarks on a involved with her life at all times. BATEY number of women playwrights and From the letters of her travelling authors whose influence on the thea- years to her parents, the Passmores, Penny Gay has written a delightful tre at this time was pronounced, in Sarnia, to a letter to Timothy and informative book, and one that including Hanna Cowley and Ann Findley shortly before she died of will be a welcome addition to the Radcliffe. As well, she calls on her cancer in 1985, she is fully engaged library of Jane Austen fans as well as knowledge of her subject to examine in her adventure of living her life to anyone interested in the English gender and its effect both on the its fullest, always with a ready and theatre during the late eighteenth theatre and in Austen's novels. Gay gallantly humorous flavour: "I'm in and early nineteenth centuries. The succeeds in showing not onlyAusten's fantastic shape except of course for author has a sound knowledge not familiarity with the theatre and the being seriously ill, and in the night only of Austen's novels and her life, subtle aspects of that genre, but also got up and rewrote an article on but also of the theatre at that time. how Austen uses theatricality in her psychological criticism I've been Gay is able to draw on Austen's novels. This bookwill certainly serve thinking of all year." correspondence to show her fami- to broaden both the reader's enjoy- Together with the introductory liarity with various playwrights and ment and understanding- ofthe works chapters, which communicate the their works, as well as her use of it in of Jane Austen. same attractive endorsement of a shaping the theatricality of many Throughout her book, Penny Gay feisty, gifted, and loving woman, the scenes in her novels. In Gay's own makes reference to Eliza de Feuillide, letters bring us extraordinarily close words, she "attempts to tease out acousin ofJane Austen's, who shared to Marian Engel. Her life was cut off both the theatrical context ofAusten's in some of the theatricals performed much too soon, but to the very last writing, and how she deals in each of in the Austen home and who would she lived its every moment with a her major novels with a society that later marryAustenls brother, Henry. vivid involvement that left its mark she perceives to be inescapably Eliza is the subject of another recent on all those who knew her or read her theatrical." book entitledJaneAusten ? 'Outland- works. Gay's opening chapter gives an ish Cousin,' edited by Deidre LeFaye. excellent insight into the world of This volume is primarily a collection theatre in Austen's time, especially of letters sent over a period of some various performances held in Bath, fifty years, primarily from Eliza de and there is ample evidence that Jane Feuillide, although LeFaye draws on Austen did attend many of them. correspondence from Eliza's mother The author then goes on to discuss and others. A well-known Austen Austen's six major novels, focusing biographer, LeFaye's knowledge of on, as she says, the ironic steadiness Austen's life and of her family, both ofAusten's gaze at her society. From immediate and extended, adds greatly the Gothic overtones in Northanger to the editing and commentary Abbey, to the drama of Marianne's throughout the book. The letters in VOLUME 24, NUMBERS 2,3 this volume serve as an insight into Fran~ois-Louis-Henri-Eugkne, no correspondence reveals much about many aspects of the life of young doubt, at least in part, for Eliza's the life of a woman of the middle women in the late 1700s and early benefactor, Warren Hastings. class with a limited income but am- 1800s, and touch on the questions of In much of the correspondence ple wits. Eliza de Feuillide lived an marriage, widowhood, survival in a between Eliza and Phylly, Eliza's life interesting life and, it would seem, to male-dominated world, and how one and lifestyle are spelled out: the death the fullest. She travelled half the woman in particular overcame many ofher husband by the guillotine dur- world, spent time on not only the obstacles. It is extremely well edited, ing the Terror; the poor health and fringes of two royal families but was and LeFaye's comments are unob- early death of her son; the courtship witness to, and aware of, her political trusive and do not in any way inter- by not one, but two, ofJaneAusten's surroundings, while her cousin has ferewith the thrust and continuity of brothers; and her eventual marriage often been accused of ignoring all the letters; rather they serve to eluci- to Henry Austen in 1797. Once that was happening in the outside date situations and explain some of again, she spent time as an officer's world when writing her novels. Yet it the customs prevalent in India, Eng- wife while Henry was in the Oxford- is Jane Austen whom the world land, and France during that time. shire Militia, and there is some cor- knows, and Eliza is simply her 'out- They are particularly revealing with respondence covering this period landish cousin'. respect to the plight of many women which again deals with parties and at the time, for whom marriage was descriptions of some of the new fash- one of the few available options. ions (some of which were thought- The author tells how Eliza's scandalous at the time). These letters MARY mother, Philadelphia Austen, sister are quite "gossipy" and it is not too WOLLSTONECRAFT of Jane Austen's father, journeyed to difficult to think of them as being AND THE India in search of a husband. There simply chatty and somewhat hollow, FEMINIST she married Saul Tysoe Hancock; but on closer reading one realises the she continued to live there until 1765 insight they do give into the lives of IMAGINATION when she returned to England with ordinary people, their relationships, her husband and Eliza, born in 1761. family disputes, and disagreements. Barbara Taylor Her husband would return to India It seems that James Austen's wife Cambridge: Cambridge University and never see his family again, but formed a particular dislike of Eliza Press, 2003 there are many poignant letters be- and thought her flirtatious-with all tween husband and wife, and father the Austen [male] cousins and even THE COLLECTED and daughter. George Austen himself. LETTERS OF MARY Later we read correspondence be- The later correspondence tells us WOLLSTONECRAFT tween Eliza and another cousin, of trips both to Steventon and Phylly Walter. They corresponded Godmersham (the estate ofAusten's for over 30 years and these letters brother, EdwardAusten Knight) and Janet Todd, Ed. contain gossipy little snippets about meetings with Austen over the years. New York: Columbia University fashions, hairstyles, life in Paris and There are also a few letters between Press, 2003 even the French Court. After the Austen and her sister Cassandra, death of her father, Eliza and her written while Jane was staying with REVIEWED BY LAURA mother had moved to the continent Henry and Eliza in Sloane Street in MCLAUCHLAN because the cost oflivingwascheaper. London. Unfortunately, Elizawas to Eliza married a young Captain in the succumb to illness (probably the same Queen's Regiment of Dragoons, breast cancer that had killed her Mary Wollstonecrafi (1759-1797) Jean-Fran~oisCapot de Feuillide mother) and it was Jane whom Henry was never afraid of asking hard (wholiked to be known as the "Comte asked to come and staywith her. Jane questions. As Ann Crittendon notes de Feuillide," though in fact he was was with Eliza when she died in 1813 in The Price of Motherhood (200 1), only the son of a provincial lawyer). at the age of 50. after the American and French She spent a few years as a young Deirdre LeFaye has compiled and Revolutions, "Wollstonecraft posed officer's wife, and may well have edited a wonderful collection of cor- the perfectly logical question: How suffered one or two miscarriages respondence from this fascinating could societies founded on the (there is mention of an "accident" in woman, as well as others, and her principles of universal human rights one letter, which was a euphemism comments and sense of history tie deny those rights to women?" Her for miscarriage at the time).
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