I've just read a comment by Jimmy at https://www.writersandartists.co.uk/question/view/2618 and was reminded of an e-mail that I received not long ago. It said something like: "[Do you] Want to write like Jane Austen?" Or maybe "How to write like Jane Austen". I suppose that it was offering places on a writers' workshop / seminar / whatever, and came from either "The Writers' Workshop" or "Writers & Artists". I've been looking through my e-mail inbox and can't find it, so I guess that I must have binned it. Or maybe there never was such an e-mail and dementia is advancing on me. Can any of you confirm [seeing something like this] (and rescue my sanity)?
Anyway, Jimmy's comment ('According to Jane Austen, the correct form was "Do not you think" ') has spurred me to answer this question "Want to write like Jane Austen?" with a resounding "Certainly NOT!" *
Not only do I not want to write "Do not you think", I ALSO don't want to write novels where the #1 obsession is "Is she going to catch him in the end?" NOR novels where none of the main characters seem to work for a living (OK, OK: an exaggeration, but there ARE a lot of idle rich swanning about with nothing better to do than going for outings in carriages) while the working class hardly puts in an appearance. (And a low income disqualifies them from love.)
Or have I been reading the wrong Jane Austen books?
* Not even the fact that Pride and Prejudice is by far the most down-loaded book of the Gutenberg Project's list sways me. (16,690 down-loads compared with the much-more-deserving #2, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, at 10,183) [See http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/search/?sort_order=downloads] (Sherlock Holmes comes in 3rd, and a piece of erotica victoriana 4th. That's the only one I downloaded. [I've already got Alice in printed form.]) Of course, you have to remember that all the books on their list are copyright-free.
Actually, P&P is one of Austen's that I haven't read. (Perhaps the only one?) But I promised myself that if I was a good girl and behaved myself, I wouldn't have to. Even if it's free.
I wouldn't want to write like, Jane Austen, though I'm a big fan of her novels.
I agree with Professor Walter Allen, a distinguished critic of English literature.
He did a critique on the novels of Jane Austen. In his critique he talked about the splendid plots, settings, characters, style, structure, drama, humour and deep-rooted psychology.
Allen finished by saying - 'You don't accidently stumble onto perfection six times'.
I believe Austen stands alongside the best traditional authors of English literature - Joseph Conrad, Henry James, George Eliott, Thomas Hardy and Charles Dickens.
It's a pity that some choose to judge Jane Austen, or other traditional authors, by today's social values. Austen drew on her experience of life - the society she moved in.
What else could she have been expected to write about so brilliantly?
Austen wrote about what she knew.
b) plot: 2 upper-class twits (one of each sex) [edited: who] are OBVIOUSLY (from the perspective of the most dim-witted/insensitive/unobservant of readers) going to end up together suffer doubts and heartache (through a series of outings in carriages, teas in mansions &cetera) before they finally twig to the inevitable.
Not counting sub-plots (rich older man / poor but virtuous, innocent young woman; financial straits, jealousy, moral dilemmas...) can anyone point out ANY JA novel that hasn't got the MAIN plot sketched out above? (I realise that I haven't read Persuasion, either. I'll give myself an extra treat by not doing so.)
Do I really need to hand over 465 pounds (or however much it is [no I didn't chase up that JA club, but is it free to join?]) to learn plot structure from this unimaginative literary bozo?
Maybe I could learn my "Christian" charity and forgiveness ("Let (s)he that is without sin throw the first indignant, morally-outraged fit.") from JA's vicars-in-training... but, no: I don't think that I WILL avail myself of that kind offer. As you can see, I'm quite adept at that already.
@ Sylvia Neumann (4 hours before this reply)
"You're not suffering from dementia, Wilhelmina! There is a Jane Austen Writer's Club advertised on this very site - see events/the-jane-austen-writers-club.
The rationale is that Jane Austen's writing provides a model of characterisation, plot and dialogue."
Jane Austen's model of
a) characterisation: upper-class swanners-about, with backward (or obscene) mores* and a propensity to gossip and meddle in other people's affairs (ESPECIALLY Emma).
b) plot: 2 upper-class twits (one of each sex) are OBVIOUSLY (from the perspective of the most dim-witted/insensitive/unobservant of readers) going to end up together suffer doubts and heartache (through a series of outings in carriages, teas in mansions &cetera) before they finally twig to the inevitable.
c) dialogue: "[...] do not you know that, of all things upon earth, that is the least likely to happen, brought up as they would be, always together like brothers and sisters?"
* e.g. In Mansfield Park, that awful prig of a romantic male lead, Edmund (Fanny's guru and unquestioned know-it-all, on his way to becoming a vicar), speaks of Miss Crawford's suggestion that her brother marry Maria (after she has been "ruined" by him), and is therefore unmarriageable othewise as "evil [...] a perversion of mind"; while Maria's father is held up as a paragon of virtue for providing her with financial support for the rest of her life... AS LONG AS she never shows her face in decent society OR the family circle ever again.
++++++++++
I rest my case.