This excellent cradle-to-grave biography of a much loved novelist who goes in and out of fashion captures her alarming habits and tormented love affairsIn 1971 the author Barbara Pym was at her day job at the International African Institute when she noticed “Mr C” laboriously attacking his lunchtime sandwich with a knife and fork. Pym made a mental note of the detail before asking herself ruefully, “Oh why can’t I write about things like that any more – why is this kind of thing no longer acceptable?” Ten years earlier, Jonathan Cape had dumped her after her sixth book on the grounds that her brand of anthropological observation of English social manners was old lady-ish, dull and didn’t sell. As an extra humiliation, no other publishing house had been interested in picking up Miss Pym: books built on “the daily round of trivial things” could hardly compete with Frederick Forsyth’s The Day of the Jackal or, if you were feeling fancy, Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude. Jonathan Cape had even published John Lennon (Pym liked the Beatles, but still). Clearly there was no place in contemporary literature for Mr C and his oddly formal way with a sandwich.There is nothing unusual about major minor novelists having a disappointing and disproportionate decline, followed by a posthumous flowering in reputation and sales. What’s unusual about Pym is that her phoenix moment came while she was still alive. In 1977 the Times Literary Supplement asked well-known... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2021-04-08 06:30:07 UTC ]
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Hilary Davidson, author of 'Dress in the Age of Jane Austen,' explores the fashions of Britain's Regency period. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2019-11-01 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Jane Austen’s House Museum has saved a section of a letter by Jane Austen after “an outpouring of generosity from the public” saw £10,000 raised in six weeks. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2019-08-21 07:48:21 UTC ]
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In “The Regency Years,” Robert Morrison looks at a dramatic era of 19th-century Britain. Continue reading at The Washington Post
[ The Washington Post | 2019-05-29 16:53:00 UTC ]
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Comedian and TV presenter David Baddiel will be the ambassador for Jane Austen’s House Museum in Chawton, Hampshire, in its 70th anniversary year in 2019. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2018-12-06 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Gill Hornby is moving from Little, Brown to Century for her next novel, Miss Austen, about the relationship between Jane and Cassandra Austen. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2018-10-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The explorer and writer Benedict Allen has gone missing while on an expedition in the jungle in Papua New Guinea. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2017-11-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The new £10 note featuring novelist Jane Austen has entered circulation replacing that featuring Charles Darwin. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2017-09-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The trade is celebrating all things Jane Austen this week, as the Bank of England's new Austen £10 note makes its debut in honour of the author's 200th anniversary. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2017-07-19 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Sandstone Press will publish Jane and Dorothy: A True Tale of Sense and Sensibility by Marian Veevers, linking to the bicentenary of Austen’s death in July 2017. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2016-11-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Think you know everything about Jane Austen? Helena Kelly invites you to think again about one of the nation’s favourite authors in Jane Austen, The Secret Radical. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2016-11-08 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Elena Ferrante—the mysterious Italian writer whose Neapolitan novels have captivated the literary world with their portrait of a lifelong female friendship—has been asked many times why she keeps her identity private. She has responded with many variations on the answer that she gave Vanity Fair... Continue reading at Slate
[ Slate | 2015-10-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The life of Jane Austen is set to be the subject of a new film called "Jane by the Sea", based on the novel by Carolyn V Murray (Sandcastle Press). Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2015-08-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Claiming famous artists operated under the auspices of modern scientific thought ignores what art is all about."Art does not have winners." This is the argument William Deresiewicz makes as he skewers political scientist Michael Suk-Young Chwe's latest book, Jane Austen, Game Theorist in The New... Continue reading at Fast Company
[ Fast Company | 2014-01-23 00:00:00 UTC ]
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French news publisher Le Monde launched its English-language product, Le Monde in English, two years ago, with the goal of generating 30,000 subscribers by the end of 2023. It has since fallen short of that goal, according to business development officer Arnaud Aubron,... Continue reading at AdWeek
[ AdWeek | 2024-04-25 10:00:00 UTC ]
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Women in media recently had a chance to browse and buy clothes owned by the trailblazing TV news anchor. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2024-03-15 09:04:32 UTC ]
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Gather ’round, children, and let me tell you a story about the old bugaboo we used to call DRM. Digital Rights Management was the beast under every gamer’s bed in the mid-2000s, an invisible bit of software baked into game discs that dictated and tracked player behavior under the guise of... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2024-03-04 16:30:21 UTC ]
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The “Aya” series explores the pains and pleasures of everyday life in a working-class neighborhood in West Africa. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2024-02-10 10:02:39 UTC ]
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The debut novel from Leo Vardiashvili, 'Hard by a Great Forest,' has its commercial trappings but ultimately lands with lyrical and heartbreaking resonance. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2024-01-31 18:43:16 UTC ]
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