Jane Austen's Books & Adaptations discussion

A Visitor's Guide to Jane Austen's England by Sue Wilkes



Discover Jane Austen’s England

Immerse yourself in the vanished world inhabited by Austen’s contemporaries. Packed with detail, and anecdotes, this is an intimate exploration of how the middle and upper classes lived from 1775, the year of Austen’s birth, to the coronation of George IV in 1820. Sue Wilkes skilfully conjures up all aspects of daily life within the period, drawing on contemporary diaries, illustrations, letters, novels, travel literature and archives.

•Were all unmarried affluent men really 'in want of a wife'?
•Where would a young lady seek adventures?
•Would ‘taking the waters’ at Bath and other spas kill or cure you?
•Was Lizzy Bennet bitten by bed-bugs while travelling?
•What would you wear to a country ball, or a dance at Almack’s?
•Would Mr Darcy have worn a corset?
•What hidden horrors lurked in elegant Regency houses?

Put on your dancing gloves and embrace a lost era of corsets and courtship!

📚 A Visitor's Guide to Jane Austen's England - Challenge Category: Plain Facts

Read anytime in November 2021.

I'm gonna start listening to my audiobook tomorrow on my commute to work.

But I'll probably check back with my comments on Friday.

Hi Zuzana,

I will only be able to start onTuesday or Wednesday, but will try to keep up.

Please, don't rush because of me, Melindam. I am pretty slow when it comes to audiobooks. I sure won't listen to more than 3-4 hours this week.

I'm not happy about the narrator. Her voice seems a bit robotic.

Same feelings. It feels like she's narrating a shopping list.

I find it hard to pay attention.

After two chapters I can say that this book is a bit too dense for me to enjoy on audio. The monotone narration doesn't help.

E.g. the money conversion rates just recited like that totally went over my head. Or the weird unconnected words here and there - those are probably titles of illustrations. They are usually not in a sentence and sometimes don't connect directly to the topic. Would be nice to be told that there's an illustration and it's "this and this".

I agree. The audio format does not agree with this book at all.

From the first chapter:

What I found interesting:

- Turnpike roads and turnpike trusts. To learn more I turned to wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turnpik...

- I hoped to learn how to distinguish between different types of carriages. The explanation in the book was too quick for me.
Here is a short and to the point explanation complete with pictures: http://historicalhussies.blogspot.com... and https://www.kristenkoster.com/a-regen...
(barouches, curricles, phaetons, gigs, landaus etc.)

A gig (one horse - two wheels - for two people.)

Jane Austen: Admiral Croft and his wife drove a gig in Persuasion, so did John Thorpe in Northanger Abbey.

A curricle (two horses - two wheels - for two people - fashionable)

Jane Austen: Willoughby drives Marianne in a curricle in Sense and Sensibility, so does Mr Tilney with Catherine in Northanger Abbey)

A phaeton (two horses - four wheels - for two people - very fashionable and expensive)


Barouche (four horses - four wheels - with a coachman up front - for four passengers - with two folding hoods that could be raised to protect the passengers - very fashionable and expensive



Landau (the same as barouche - only one folding hood)

Zuzana wrote: "From the first chapter:

What I found interesting:

- Turnpike roads and turnpike trusts. To learn more I turned to wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turnpik...

- I hoped to learn was how to..."

I think the types of coaches are very well explained in the novels of Jane Austen excellently annotated by David M. Shapard.

I added a link to my previous post and some pictures as reference. :)

I really like this type of stuff.

Melindam wrote: "I think the types of coaches are very well explained in the novels of Jane Austen excellently annotated by David M. Shapard."

I have got his . I wanted to buy this edition of JA novels one by one. But Brexit happenend and shipping with additional custom costs have become prohibitively expensive and impossibly slow.

BTW I've just quickly checked on YouTube and almost every curricle scene from the books was "upgraded" to a four-wheel open carriage.
I think it might have been because of safety concerns. To let an actor handle two horses in a two-wheeled carriage is an accident waiting to happen.

Fascinating!

Zuzana, I have all the annotated editions and they are fantastic. :)

Melindam wrote: "Zuzana, I have all the annotated editions and they are fantastic. :)"

I'm envious. :D

Well, I quite enjoyed the chapter on men's fashion.

I often hear fashion historians complain about ill-fitting breeches in period dramas. I knew that breeches should be fashionably tight. I just didn't how tight.
So apparently the new pair could take up to 20 minutes to get into and a guy needed his servant to help to put them on. I guess that this applies to the buckskin breeches that were very popular at the time. Funny to imagine nowadays majority of men strutting around in leather trousers. XD



Breeches, or short pants worn just below the knee, were popular during the 18th century. During the Regency era, they were worn largely as evening wear or at court, a practice that was to continue until the mid-century.

Buckskins were cut and stitched from the skins of deer, both bucks and does, with hides imported in great quantities from America to England. Buckskin breeches were most usually white or pale tan, and not lined. Unlike most modern leather clothing, buckskins were washable to a point, though if they finally became too worn and stained over time and hard wear, they could be dyed a darker color. They were soft and comfortable like a pair of old jeans.

Pantaloons
Pantaloons are longer (ending mid-calf to ankle) and more tightly fitted than breeches.



Trousers
Trousers were first worn by sailors and working men before 1800, and were adopted by the fashionable set around 1810. The author claims that they were "invented" by the notorious dandy Beau Brummell by which she must mean that he popularized wearing trousers among higher class men.

Trousers were fairly close fitting and ended around the ankles, with slits on the sides for foot access. Some had under-the-foot straps to keep them anchored in place. For day dress, stirrups were worn under the shoe but for evening wear, under the foot.

I know that the eldest unmarried daughter was called Miss XY, e.g. Miss Bennet, and her younger sisters were called Miss Christian Name XY, e.g. Miss Elizabeth Bennet. What I didn't know is that when addressing or talking about an eldest (or only) daughter it was considered impolite and overly familiar to call her by her Christian and Family name. So Mrs Elton calling Jane "Jane Fairfax" was considered quite rude.

Zuzana wrote: "I know that the eldest unmarried daughter was called Miss XY, e.g. Miss Bennet, and her younger sisters were called Miss Christian Name XY, e.g. Miss Elizabeth Bennet. What I didn't know is that wh..."

Sounds like Mrs. E...lol.

Yeah, Mrs E was the chief offender with her "Jane Fairfax" and "Knightley". XD

I finished listening to the audiobook and I have to say that the beginning was rough - it got better with each chapter. My major complaint is that the book was too dense to catch all the facts in audio and the monotone narration didn't help.

I caved in and bought a Kindle edition (for only 2.19 USD on Amazon). I suspect that I'll like it much better in this format. I intend to re-read it sometime next year.

Another interesting bit from the book:

I always thought that "buying a gown" meant that the person in question had bought a dress, as in going to a tailor/seamstress, let them sew the dress and coming home with the completed gown/dress. But according to the book when you "bought a gown" you bought only the material for a dress.

Melindam, have you finished listening to the book? What were the parts you found most interesting?

Off topic, finished A Portrait Of Jane Austen by David Cecil. I liked it, yet it reads more like a hagiography. It idolizes JA and her family too much to seem realistic.