The following is from The Explicator, a subscription journal available through Herrick’s research databases: Jane Austen's irony is endlessly challenging to those of us who like to grasp just how an author achieves distinctiveness and who then want to tell others what we think we have found. No slight part of her ironic effect stems from her use of the "free indirect style" (style indirect libre), as Graham Hough,(FN1) among others, has shown.The quote below is from Studies in English Literature, another journal available through Herrick’s research databases:If Marianne's later walks at Cleveland do receive a faintly satirical treatment, it is not because she seeks out the nocturnal sublime, but because she cultivates it at the expense of prudence--and even then the judgment hinges on the issue of degree. After all, even the poets of sensibility contemplate the effects of rain from a distance, as when, in the "Ode to Evening," William Collins takes refuge in a hut.Here’s a little Jane Austen biography stolen from the Gale Group:Jane Austen was born in 1775 at Steventon, in the south of England, where her father was rector of the parish. She was the seventh of eight children in an affectionate and high-spirited family. In 1801 she moved to Bath with her father, her mother, and her only sister, Cassandra.Here’s the beginning blurb from a paper available at www.megaessays.com. Unfortunately, I didn’t want to pay $15 to see the whole essay.Jane Austen has attracted a great deal of critical attention in recent years. Many have spoken out about the strengths and weaknesses of her characters, particularly her heroines. Austen has been cast as both a friend and foe to the rights of women. ...
