Simplify the following text for a Grade 12 native English-speaking person.
Original: As Southam explains , `` for American literary nationalists Jane Austen 's cultivated scene was too pallid , too constrained , too refined , too downright unheroic '' .
Simplified: As Southam says , `` for American literary nationalists Jane Austen 's cultivated scene was too pale , too constrained , too refined , too downright unheroic '' .