New-York tribune., 1917-07-29

Jane Austen died. At the time OF
~ her death she was comparatively
unknown beyond the circle of her own
family and intimate friends. Her stories
had been published anonymously. She was
emphatically one of the unrecognized art
lists to whom posthumous glory appertalns'
According to the Rev. Canon Vaughan,
NJ. A., writing in "The Treasury:
"The story of her short and uneventful
career only increases our amazement at the
literary work she was able TO accomplish.
"Her life may be conveniently divided into
three periods. The first twenty-five years
were spent in the isolated village of Steven
ton. of which parish her father was rector,
and where she wrote three of her cele-
brated novels-Pride and Prejudice Sense
and sensibility' and 'Northanger Abbey
"The second period consisted Of eight
wears. passed partly at Bath and partly at
Southampton, and is marked by strange
and almost total inactivity as regards lit
erary work
"The third and last period also consisted
Of eight years, and was spent at Chawton,
pleasant village near Alton, in the north o.
HAMPSHIRE, where she wrote her most char
acteristic works, Mansfield Park Emma
and. above all, Persuasion"
ZANE AUSTEN was born on December
- 16, 1775, at the parsonage of Steven
ton. few miles removed from the town Of
Basingstoke.
an this retired village, far away from the
busy haunts of men, seven miles distant from
the nearest country town, amid scenery the
reverse of inspiring or romantic, Jane Austen
spent the first twenty-five years of her short
life.
"Very early, it appears, Jane found an in
terest in writing, and several stories and
dramas are in existence, which, written IN
clear and good English, show the direction
of her genius. Of more serious attempts
there is little indication until we come to the
latter years of her life at Steventon.
"Her twenty-frst birthday finds her busily
engaged in writing Pride and Prejudice
which some consider the most brilliant of her
novels, and which was originally entitled
First Impressions This was completed in
about ten months, when she Immediately be-
gan the story we know as Sense and Sensi-
bility.' This was followed in 1898 by North
anger Abbey
"Mr. Austen was naturally anxious that
his daughters stories should be published,
and accordingly when Pride and Prejudice
was finished he wrote to Mr.. Cadell the we'll
known London publisher, and offered him the
manuscript The proposal, we learn, was
summarily rejected by return Of post. Still!
more humiliating was the early fate OF
'Northanger Abbey 1t was sold to Bath
publisher for the sum of $40; but the good
man repented him Of the bargain, aud did
not venture to print it.
at may have been the sense of discour-
agement and disappointment caused by in
ability to find publisher that led Jane
Austen to abandon her writing for a time.
When in 1901 her father resigned the living
of Steventon, and the family went to reside
at Bath, she had three unpublished novels on
her hands. AT any rate, the fact remains
that the years spent at Bath and Southamp
ton were unfruitful of literary work. She
began, it is true, story at Bath, but never
finished it,"
OF the barren years separating the two
periods of authorship there are, it seems,
few records In 1905 Mr.. Austen died,
and in the following years Mrs Aus
ten and her daughter removed to South
ampton, later going to live in a cottage
near the Chawton estate, to which James
brother Edward succeeded. The writer un-
der quotation observes: