Why read What Matters in Jane Austen? Twenty Crucial Puzzles Solved?

Book cover of What Matters in Jane Austen? Twenty Crucial Puzzles Solved

Book description

Is there any sex in Austen? What do the characters call each other, and why? What are the right and wrong ways to propose marriage? And which important Austen characters never speak? In What Matters in Austen, John Mullan shows that you can best appreciate Jane Austen's brilliance by looking…

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Topics

Jane Austen

Genres

European history

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Why read it?

1 author picked What Matters in Jane Austen? Twenty Crucial Puzzles Solved as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Mary DeForest

Author

I never saw any of these puzzles before I read Mullan’s book. By solving them, he goes deep into Austen’s novels, examining her miniature world as if with a microscope, offering the reader insights into the subtleties of her art: how people inadvertently reveal through their words what they would prefer to keep hidden or how Captain Benwick, a major minor character in Persuasion, comes across as a solid human being without the reader’s hearing him utter a word. The aspiring novelist can learn much from her tricks.

From Mary's list on The best books for lovers of Jane Austen.