More on Love and Friendship

Synchronicity is a strange and wondrous thing! Within less than one hour of publishing the Love and Friendship post on Monday, my Janeite friend (who lives in another city altogether) turned up at my workplace unannounced, and loaned me a copy of said book, which also contains the hilarious History of England. I had not asked for it - in fact, she hadn't even been aware that I was currently interested in it.

But what a charming work it is, and parts of it were finished when Jane was the tender age of fourteen and a half, so she had a highly developed sense of social satire even then. The swooning and "running mad" of the heroines of Love and Friendship in particular is a perfect delight. More of that to come.