By Nava Atlas | On July 29, 2022 | Updated July 29, 2024 | Comments (4)
When I created a roundup of classic women authors and their dogs, it seemed that dogs might have an edge as the preferred furry friends of writers. But digging deeper, I’m no longer convinced that this is the case. As it turns out, women writers and their cats have long been just as companionable.
Let’s take a look at some beloved women writers and the feline companions who at the very least comforted them, and in some cases, even inspired some of their writings.
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By Lynne Weiss | On June 29, 2022 | Updated June 15, 2026 | Comments (2)
In September 1856, the 36-year-old woman heretofore known as Mary Ann Evans (alternatively Marian) wrote in her journal that she had “made a new era” in her life, “for it was then I began to write fiction.”
It was a new era in another way, as well, because it was soon after this that Mary Ann Evans began to transform herself into the author we know as the eminent British novelist and essayist, George Eliot (1819 – 1880).
Mary Ann Evans was in the process of reinventing herself in several ways. A few months after she began writing fiction, she sent a letter to her beloved brother Isaac in which she announced, “You will be surprised to learn … that I have changed my name and have someone to take care of me in the world.” Read More→
By Melanie P. Kumar | On June 27, 2022 | Updated August 20, 2022 | Comments (0)
Like most teenagers in India who enjoyed the English classics, Pride and Prejudice came into my life. It prompted me to borrow the Complete Works of Jane Austen from the library and to read all her novels. But if you were to ask me to recall the plots today, Pride and Prejudice is the one that has etched itself most clearly in my mind.
This could also be because I had to study this novel as part of my English Honors program in college. I recall the name of the teacher who took up this book but can’t remember many insights that she left me with.
What comes to mind is that she spoke of it as a “drawing room novel,” as a lot of the action indeed takes place in these various home settings, starting with that of the Bennet family in Pride and Prejudice. Read More→
By Sarah Fanny Malden | On May 28, 2022 | Updated July 12, 2023 | Comments (0)
Jane Austen by Sarah Fanny Malden (1889) is a valuable resource on the life and work of the beloved British author from the perspective of the late 19th century. The following excerpt describes her final days —her illness, the courage she displayed, and her death.
Persuasion, the novel Jane Austen (1775 – 1817) was working on when she took ill, and Northanger Abbey (her first completed novel, still unpublished at the time of her death) were both published six months after her death in 1817.
There has been much speculation on the exact cause of her death, and the nature of her illness; but since no one can go back and prove one theory or another, that’s exactly what they remain — theories. You can explore some of these contemporary conjectures; take them all with a grain of salt: Read More→
By Sarah Fanny Malden | On May 25, 2022 | Updated December 13, 2025 | Comments (0)
Jane Austen’s talent was recognized early on and taken seriously by her entire family. Her father and brothers played key roles in getting her works published, as it wasn’t considered proper for a woman to do so herself in the early 1800s. This 19th-century view of Jane Austen’s first attempts at publishing illustrates the difficulties of the pursuit.
Austen longed to see her work in print, regardless of whether or not it would gain her fame or fortune — but getting it published was important to her, contrary to the myth about her extreme modesty.
Her father and brothers took it upon themselves to seek publication opportunities for Jane’s first works. It was clear that she didn’t write merely for her own amusement but was deeply invested in having her work published and read. Read More→
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