Would Jane Austen Approve of These Gifts ...?

...I hope so. Some are more affordable than others. All are sure to tickle the fancy of a Janeite.

Scribes Delight features beautiful handmade Italian Almafi writing paper made with deckled edge and 100% cotton rag. These letters will never yellow with age. The site also features old fashioned ink wells (like the one on the left), sealing wax, and sealing wax seals. I did not find the quill pens, but they are available, along with glass pens. Click here for ordering information.

Jane Austen Book Mark


The little plaques measure 1.3"/3.5 cm in height and 1"/2.3cm in width, and both the chain and findings are silver plated. The chain measures 10", the right size to accommodate most hardbacks and soft covers! Very delicate and beautiful, these would make a fabulous present for the book lover in your life, or for yourself! One bookmark remains in stock, priced at $13.00. Click here to order.


The Jane Austen Note Cards from Austen Effusions are printed on thick, beautiful quality paper and come individually wrapped. Whenever I use them, I receive compliments. They arrive tied in a pretty blue ribbon.

Disclaimer: This blog is a personal blog. Any product recommendations I make are a matter of taste. They are not made for any commercial reasons.

Jane Austen Dramas Make Their North American Premieres On December 16th.

TVO (a non-profit, public educational media organization located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada - the PBS of Ontario) will present three Jane Austen Dramas on the following dates:

Northanger Abbey – Sunday December 16, 2007 at 9 pm
Mansfield Park – Sunday December 23, 2007 at 9 pm
Persuasion – Sunday December 30, 2007 at 9 pm

Jane Austen never seems to go out of style attracting new generations of fans who find relevance in her tales of romance and young heroines navigating their way through the trappings of society. In December TVO presents three new dramas fashioned for a contemporary audience that capture the timelessness of Jane Austen's works. These splendidly crafted films will only add to the Jane addiction for fans and attract new admirers in a banner year that also saw the release of the Hollywood feature films The Jane Austen Book Club (2007) and Becoming Jane (2007).

After you click on the above link, please scroll down to “Jane Austen Dramas” for details. Or click on this link to see a video.

Jeanette Kong, producer at the station, writes, "We're creating our own Jane Austen web pages and I've produced three videos on themes found in Jane Austen's work featuring Janeites Elsa Solender, Louise Yearwood, and Eileen McCurdy, as well as clips from the films. These
videos will be available exclusively on TVO.org beginning on Dec. 6th."

Fabulous Fashion Plate Book

View rare fashion plates.
Click here to read the post and enter the David Brass Rare Books site.
You'll find four beautiful hand painted regency era fashion plates.


Enter the David Brass Rare Books website directly here

Dances from Pride and Prejudice

For dance aficionados, Earthly Delights offers detailed and wonderful descriptions of the English Country dances featured in Pride and Prejudice, especially those shown in the two latest movie versions. You can also listen to midi files of the musical pieces as you read about the particulars, including how the dance should be performed.

Jane: Is She Really Not That Into Us?

Here's an interesting take on Jane Austen from an article by Mikita Brottman published today in the Huffington Post:

There's no point trying to understand what it is about Jane Austen that's so compelling to today's women, because Jane Austen™ has very little to do with Jane Austen. Jane Austen™ is a retro fantasy creation, a sassy, ironic, independent woman. Jane Austen™ is all about social snubs, overheard conversations, implied relationships, and signifiers of status, especially hair and clothes. Jane Austen™ thrives in social enclaves full of privileged women obsessed with material wealth, class distinctions, and, always, the underlying
mating dance.

This sweeping statement colors all Janeites with the same brush. Frankly, I see very little of myself in it, since I read Jane for pleasure and approach her era from an historical perspective, much like the other ladies in my local Janeite group.

Update: Interestingly, Austen blog used the same 'brush' analogy as I did. Aren't we Janeites amazingly in sync with one another?

Holiday Gift Ideas

Ruby Lane offers for sale a splendid 27-piece Regency period tea service set circa 1805-1820. What better gift to present the special Janeite in your life than an antique tea set from that era? Cost: $450 USD.

If $450 seems a bit steep, here's a more affordable idea from See Jane Work, which offers an Emma letter holder and tray for $22.95. This white porecelain letter set might just be the perfect gift for a romantic young writer.
Click here to read a post on Letter Writing in Jane Austen's time.

Quiet Blog

I'm going home for Thanksgiving and to be with my mother, who is undergoing hip replacement surgery. I'll maintain Jane Austen's World for now, but Jane Austen Today will lie fallow for a while. Meanwhile, I've added a poll to my sidebar. It asks the question: 'Who is the most dastardly of Jane Austen's villains?' The answer was a tough one for me. Depending on my mood, my choice keeps changing.

Funny Spoof of Becoming Jane

If you're a huge Becoming Jane fan, you might want to skip this YouTube clip of Abridged Classics: Becoming Jane and scroll down to the wonderful link sitting at the bottom of this post. For the rest of us, this clip provides an 8-minute tongue-in-cheek view of the movie, emphasizing Jane as a clingy, gullible female. I especially liked the waist watch observations.



As an apology to Becoming Jane fans, I have added this link. Click here and scroll to the bottom for a wonderful free surprise.

Make a Hand Pieced Quilt Inspired by Jane Austen's Writing Table

Linda Frantz' 's delivery is a little slow, but even non-quilters will find the first few minutes of this video informative. Learn the advantages of hand piecing and enjoy stitching on the go while you create your own diamond quilt, the same size and shape as the Writing Table at Jane Austen's House in Chawton. This 30 minute video shows a few views of the rooms in Chawton Cottage. The pace of the video is slow, and it shows only an overview of how to make the quilt (you can purchase a DVD), but I imagine that seasoned quilters can piece enough information together to make the quilt.

Click here to visit the site where the video resides and here for Linda Frantz' website.

Seen on the Blogosphere

Interested Readers, The major Janeite blogs provide us with all things Austen. But people write about Jane on their personal blogs as well. Here are some gems I uncovered on Dogpile:

From Cecilia's Blog: According to the results of her Meyers-Brigg test, she shared Jane Austen's personality type, which was supposed to be an INTJ. This personality type is a

- moderately expressed introvert
- moderately expressed intuitive personality
- slightly expressed thinking personality
- very expressed judging personality

I agree with her comment: "Jane Austen was supposed to be an INTJ. How the heck do they know that? Silly."
In addition:

• As you are aware, I have been showcasing posts about Jane written by men. In his blog, All Things Ken, Ken writes about Emma with sensitivity, understanding, and knowledge. He is covering the book section by section. A male janeite. How rare.
  

• I know it's a little late for movie reviews about Becoming Jane, but I couldn't pass this one from My Romance Story Blog up. It describes verbatim how I felt when I watched the movie. "I think the real Jane Austen would be disappointed at the lack of wit. And she might be outraged to learn that in this movie some of her best-known literary bon mots were first uttered by other people, thus suggesting that as a writer, she was more a copier than an inventor. Which is nonsense."

• Here's an observation about writers on John Bakers blog that relates to Jane:
  

  In this biography Shields concentrates on Austen the writer, rather than Austen the woman. This is one writer writing about another.

  In reference to Austen’s ten year silence after the move to Bath, Carol Shield reminds us of the words of Virginia Woolf:

  A writer does not need stimulation, but the opposite of stimulation. A writer needs regularity, the same books around her, the same walls. A writer needs self-ordered patterns of time, her own desk, and day after profitable day in order to do her best work.

• Last, but not least, Jane created her own MySpace page. Get a load of who her friends are.

Beau Brummell's Dandyism and His Far Reaching Influence

Flat Rock: What Makes a Good Neck Tie? offers the following information about that famous Regency dandy, Beau Brummell:

In his advocacy of the straightforward, clean line of men's dress, Beau Brummell single-handedly launched the 150-year reign of the clean shirt-and-tie mentality. A blue coat, a buff waistcoat and pantaloons, together with black boots could, and should, be worn by anyone with pretensions to being well dressed. The more simple and uniform a man's general attire, the better, insisted Beau. "Gentlemen are known for their discretion and lack of vulgar show," said he. But when it came to the thing around the neck, men of distinction stepped away from the off-the-rack mentality, and expressed their individuality in the shape, size, and stiffness of the hanging thing. Beau himself was known for a particularly neat, sensible, and well-starched cravat, which he changed as many as 3 times daily. Exactly how he knotted the thing was the secret of his boudoir, where Beau spent as long as necessary to arrange his linen. The Prince Regent, curious to study the cravat-knotting prowess of Brummell, once spent an entire morning trying to emulate the refined technique of the arbiter of English elegance. Poets satirised the rite:


My neckcloth of course, forms my principal care,
For by that we criterions of elegance swear,
And costs me, each morning, some hours of flurry,
To make it appear to be tied in a hurry.

But the rest of the gentile Anglophone world furiously aped Brummell's dandyism.

The crazed English attention to neckwear was not without a political dimension. Across the channel, Napoleon was overrunning Europe wearing a mere black stock, while the majority of gentile Frenchmen were still sporting lace cravats. By their firmer and more erect neckwear, the English were in fact expressing their martial superiority over the French. On the day of the battle of Waterloo, The Duke of Wellington (nicknamed "the Dandy" by his soldiers) took to the field of battle in an immaculate, and quite stiff, cravat. Napoleon, perhaps oblivious to the strategic importance of power dressing, exchanged his usual black stock for a flowing white handkerchief, tied in a bow about his neck. Wellington, after Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo, was fond of remarking "The history of a battle is not unlike the history of a ball."

In addition to simplifying the neck cloth, Beau is also said to have founded the modern business suit:

Brummell rejected 18th century frills. His mandate, a dark blue coat, buff-coloured pantaloons and waistcoat, black boots and a clean white neck cloth, survives today as the dark business suit, white shirt and silk tie.

The simplicity of Brummell's uniform was adopted by everyone from many working men to his friend, the Prince Regent, later King George IV. For the first time, poorer men hoping to make their way in the world could easily imitate upper class fashion.

• More questions about the origins of menswear are answered on this site: Click here.

• To read about today's male fashionistas, click on Dandyism.net

• Read archived posts about Beau Brummell here.
  

Seen on the Blogosphere

• Lori Smith's book signing was a smashing success, with a standing room only crowd and every single copy of A Walk With Jane Austen sold. Click here to view her photos of the event.

• Nan and Catherine won Lady Jane's book giveaways of The Lost Memoirs of Jane Austen. Congratulations ladies!

• Effusions of Fancy is an illustrated book of Jane Austen's early life, with watercolours painted by Jane Odiwe. This would be a wonderful holiday gift for a friend who loves Jane and her novels as much as you. The book highlights events in young Jane's and Cassandra's lives, with Cassandra writing letters to her sister. You can order it and Jane Odiwe's other books and cards here.

Click here to read Lydia Bennet's Journal.

Becoming Jane and Goo Goo Dolls

A Becoming Jane Tribute set to Goo Goo Dolls? This person did it and somehow it works. Click here to view it on YouTube.

Seen on the Blogosphere: Regency Picture Books

These lovely illustrated books are available at Rizolli and Amazon.com and would make a great holiday gift for a Janeite. The theme that both have in common are the delightful first-hand accounts of regency life through watercolour illustrations.

One, A Picture History of the Grenville Family of Rosedale House, is a recent find. The artist, Mary Yelloly, was only eight when she started the picture book and 12 when she finished it. The book was recently discovered at an auction at a Norfolk rectory. Read more about this fascinating discovery at this link.
The other book, Mrs. Hurst Dancing and Other Scenes From Regency Life: 1812-1823, by Diana Sperling, has been out for a while. Her paintings of regency life, such as the one below of a family playing badminton, are primitive but charming.

The book, a collection of amateur watercolor pictures of everyday life, is annotated by Gordon Mingay. The images provide a first hand account of gentry life two hundred years ago. (Image from The Republic of Pemberley)

Image from the book jacket. Note that the carpet has been rolled up and the furniture pushed aside for the dance.

JA Contest Ends at Midnight

Don't forget that Lady Jane at A Lady's Diversions is giving away two copies of The Lost Memoirs of Jane Austen. The contest ends at midnight tonight. Click here for contest details.

Watch Emma 1996

If you want to read Mr. Knightley's Diary (See my review below), but need a refresher on the plot in Emma, Jane's longest book, here's a quick fix. Emma, the 1996 movie is available in its entirety on YouTube. Click here to see each clip in order.

Also seen on the blogosphere, Girlebooks, free ebooks by the gals. Their latest offering is Pride and Prejudice. Previous ebooks include Northanger Abbey, The Age of Innocence, The Secret Garden, Heidi, The Mysteries of Udolpho, Jane Eyre, Middlemarch and more!

Mr. Knightley's Diary

Mr. Knightly, a 37 year old bachelor, has reached a time of life when he is ready to settle down and start a family. But no young lady catches his eye – except for the pretty, young, and very privileged Emma Woodhouse, who, in his opinion, needs to learn to mind her business . . .

After having spent over half my life getting to know Emma through Jane Austen’s eyes, I confess I am delighted to read her story from a male perspective. In Amanda Grange's novel, Mr. Knightley's Diary, we meet all the characters, including Mr. Woodhouse, Miss Smith, Miss Taylor, Miss Bates, Frank Churchill, and Mr. Elton. In a sense, Mr. Knightley leads a curiously parallel life to our meddling Miss Woodhouse, and he encounters her, as well as all the main characters, in each of the crucial scenes in Jane's novel.

I am especially thrilled to meet the Martin family in their own environment, and to observe their affection for Harriet Smith first-hand. We see Mr. Knightley's jealousy of Frank Churchill unfold, and his awareness of his love for Emma grow. These details, implied by Jane, are more fully described by Amanda Grange. Interestingly, I found myself mesmerized by the plot: Would Mr. Knightley get his Emma or not? Even though I knew the ending, Amanda Grange's rewriting of the plot is so fresh that one can feel Mr. Knightley's jealousy as he watches Frank Churchill flirt with her.

Mr. Knightley’s point of view is all the more enjoyable for the reader who is well acquainted with Emma's plot. In addition to satisfying our curiosity about what goes on in Mr. Knightley's mind, Amanda Grange’s writing style is easy and elegant, and the novel moves along quickly. Mr. Knightley's Diary is not a new release, since the hardback version came out last year, and Amanda Grange has created other similar diaries for Mr. Darcy and Captain Wentworth. Apparently this prolific author is busy polishing off the final pages to Edmund Bertrum's Diary. I can't wait to read it.

My rating for this novel is three out of three regency fans.

My Take: I Beg Your Pardon

I've been quiet long enough. When I read drivel like this, I find my blood pressure soaring and I must speak out:

ROYAL wannabe Kate Middleton has single-handedly booted the women's cause back to the Dark Ages by quitting her job and biding her time until Prince William decides if and when he will pop the question.

Rather than making the most of her precious 20s, this silly girl appears to be putting all her eggs into one unreliable basket and pathetically hanging around until William decides if he wants to marry her.

Is she straight out of a Jane Austen novel?

So guess which phrase burns me. (Think red!) I am tired of reporters and critics confusing Jane Austen with a Harlequin Romance Writer (Mills & Boon writer for those of you across the Pond).

Jane's heroines, though restrained by the social conventions of their time, were dynamic. Even Fanny Price, who I find to be a bit insipid, stood up stubbornly for what she believed in. Granted, all Jane's heroines had faults, but they overcame them. That's one quality that makes her novels so grand. To Robin Riley, the reporter from the Herald Sun who wrote those words, my only comment is "Pah!" Go back to English 101 and bone up on your knowledge of Jane Austen. You'll never write such a silly sentence again.

To get my blood pressure back to normal, I read this interesting interview with Emily Blunt, who plays Prudie in The Jane Austen Book Club. The movie is slated to open in the UK on Friday. Read my interview with director Robin Swicord here.

And the Winner is ....

Jane V with the Two Mr. Darcys, winning with 38% of the vote.
Lana, whose brother helped design the Jane Austen icon, gave Jane V a run for her money.

But the closest race was between the icons running for 3rd place. Kayla's Proud Mr. Darcy squeaked ahead of Lois' Colonel Brandon by two votes. I almost hated to see one icon win over the other.
Below are the results for the week. As you can see, this 7-day contest received around 100 votes per day. Thank you all for participating. This was fun! Winners, please email your mailing address to me, and I will make sure to send your prizes.

Pride & Prejudice Film Festival

Create your own free marathon Pride & Prejudice film festival in the comfort of your home!
Setting: Your computer. Food: Champagne on ice and chocolate truffles. Clothing: Your jammies.

Watch:

• Pride & Prejudice, 1995, all 36 clips in six parts.

• Pride & Prejudice, 2005, 12 YouTube clips
  

• Pride & Prejudice: A Latter Day Comedy, 2003, 12 YouTube clips plus trailer (you will need your hanky if you like your Jane Austen pure and old-fashioned.)

• Pride & Prejudice, 1980, all 25 YouTube clips. (Darcy is handsome but stiff, and Lizzie's clothes are frumpy. But it's still fun to watch.)
  

• Pride & Prejudice, 1940, all YouTube clips in glorious black and white noncolor. (you will need your hanky try cry or laugh in if you want your Jane Austen plot faithfully followed.)

Where found: On my side bar (easy) or YouTube (find it yourself). Enjoy them for as long as they are available, or purchase your own DVD's. I admit I own all but two of these videos.

Here's a scene from Bride and Prejudice. Fun!

Seen on the Blogosphere

Lady Jane is giving away two free copies of The Lost Memoirs of Jane Austen by Syrie James! Here are the contest rules:

All you have to do is comment on this post and answer these two questions:

1. Which is your favorite Jane Austen novel? (If you haven't read one, you can list which one you want to read or which movie is your favorite.)

2. If you could have tea with Jane Austen, what is the first & most interesting question you would ask her?

You have until midnight on Wednesday, 14 November 2007, to enter. Lady Jane will randomly choose two winners and then announce the names on her blog on Thursday, 15 November. Click here to enter her blog!

• Austen Blog has revved up its blog engine and is going full blast again, offering posts filled with wonderful Jane tidbits and news.
  

• Don't forget that my Icon contest will end at midnight, Sunday, November 11, USA EST! See the particulars in the post below. The run for the #1 spot is hot and heavy! I expect a flurry of activity before deadline.

• Thanks to Austen-tatious, I discovered this blog's readability level. It is...taaa daaaa!
  
  
  

  Now, here's the rub. Jane Austen's World often contains concepts that are more difficult to grasp than those in this blog, describing customs, manners, language and mores of bygone days. Its readability level? High School. Ahem.
  
  On second thought, perhaps such a rating for a more 'scholarly' blog is not so bad after all. I imagine high school and college students are more apt to read Jane Austen's World for research if they can understand the concepts, so the language should be clear and accessible. Still. High School?
  

Icons Fixed

I apologize to those who could not see five of the icons for several days and for the inconvenience of not being able to vote for them. I could not get to the Internet during that time. Voting will still end at midnight on Sunday. The race is close for first and second place, and there are five icons vying for 3rd place. Amazing! Keep voting if you have a favorite. In my book, they are all winners.

Here are a few more samples I made while learning the ins and outs of icon making, pixels, coloration, and composition.

Click here to vote for the icons in the competition. (See sidebar for details.)

Free Walks in London Podcasts

The votes for favorite icons are coming fast and furiously, and an obvious pattern is developing! In fact, the contest is heating up between two choices. The choice for third place is also exciting. You have five more days to choose and you can vote each day, so please vote often.

Meanwhile, if travel to London is not possible in the near future, look no further. This link will take you to Free Walks in London on Your Ipod or MP3 player. You can have your vicarious thrill as you walk the dog. Or better yet, download these episodes before visiting London. October's visit takes you to Highgate. Isn't the 21st Century grand?

Meanwhile, I'm off to a conference and this blog will lie fallow until the weekend. If you haven't done so in a while, feel free to visit the Jane Austen's World website. I've added many links to the history, original sources, and social customs pages.

Icon Contest: Please Vote for Your Favorite!

I cannot tell you what a difficult time author Lori Smith and I had choosing these icons. She chose ten, and I chose ten. Our overlapping choices definitely made the cut, but then I had to decide the rest, and I chewed my nails down to the nub deciding on the finalists. In fact, the close runners up sit in the honorable mention section.

Now it is your turn to vote. Please choose your favorite icon. You may vote once a day for a week. I will announce the winner next Monday night. If there is a tie, there will be a 'sudden death' vote off! You have until midnight Sunday, November 11th and you may vote once per day.

Here are your choices in no particular order:

#1
What woman wouldn't want Colonel Brandon to worry about her health?
Sent in by Lois.





#2
Here are two Matthews as Mr. Darcy for the price of one!
Submitted by DJVivash. She sent several that were to die for.




#3
Jane and candles: A fabulous combination!
Submitted by Lana





#4
This is an animated GIF icon of Darcy walking out of the mist. Please click here to see it.
Submitted by Darcylicious




#5
Doesn't Jennifer Ehle simply look wholesome and wonderful as Lizzie in this icon made by _oddities on Livejournal?
Submitted by Sonetta



#6
Pride and Prejudice in a nutshell. The stances and words say it all.
Submitted by Cubbie





#7
James McAvoy as Tom Lefroy. Who can object?
Submitted by Kayla



#8
Captain Wentworth by candlelight. I agree with Ann Eliot: This man is well worth waiting for.
Submitted by Heather




#9
Anne reading the captain's letter in an animated GIF icon. Click here to see it.
Submitted by Diane.




#10
Jane purists hated this scene, but I am still cooling off at the thought of our Mr. Darcy in a wet shirt. Sent in by Bookworm.




#11
Anne might be more beautiful than Jane, but she played her quite becomingly.
Submitted by Lilac Butterfly



#12
Our proud Mr. Darcy was sent in by Kayla




VOTING HAS ENDED!

Which Icon Do You Like Most?
	Colonel Brandon
	Two Darcys
	Jane and Candles
	Darcy in the Mist
	Wholesome Lizzie
	Pride and Prejudice
	James McAvoy as Tom
	Captain Wentworth
	Animated Persuasion
	Wet Darcy
	Anne as Jane Austen
	Proud Mr. Darcy
Free polls from Pollhost.com

Honorable Mentions:

This screen shot submitted by Paula was too large to successfully turn into the smaller icon, but I wanted to showcase it for its humor.










In addition, I really like these icons too:



Ah, Mr. Colins, you would be ridiculous in any age. Thanks for sending this on Sharon T.





I adore this photo of Keira and Matthew, from which Lady Jane created this icon. DJVivash also used this image to create a luscious icon.





Emma Thompson as Elinor looking so very lovely.
Submitted by Mascha. She also submitted the breathtaking image of Marianne below.






Heather sent us her dream house. Mmmm. I wonder if it comes with Mr. Darcy?







Kayla sent in an icon of Lydia. How fabulous to view a secondary character.





Lois knew that Emma and her Mr. Knightley only have eyes for each other.






Kate Winslet made the tiresome Marianne seem adorable. Sent in by Kayla.







Kayla sent in this one of Jane and Tom. He seems so in love.





Lois sent in this lovely image of Toni Collette as Harriet Smith. I love seeing the secondary characters.





I keep returning to this animated icon made by Cubby. It was hard to choose between this one and Darcy walking through the mist.




Here's another one I made. It's a bit large but I just had to throw it in.