Ellen and Harriet are a mother and daughter who have been talking about Jane Austen together since Harriet first read Pride and Prejudice.
Ellen is a retired senior lecturer in Sociology. She first read Jane Austen when she received Pride and Prejudice as a school prize at the age of 14. Her favourite Jane Austen novel used to be Mansfield Park, but is now Persuasion.
Harriet works for an education publishing company. She read Mansfield Park at age 15, but didn’t enjoy it much. Several years later, she had Pride and Prejudice at school, and then proceeded to read all the other books (including re-reading Mansfield Park). In her undergraduate degree, her major Honours essay was on Sense and Sensibility, Mansfield Park and Persuasion. Her favourite Jane Austen novel is Persuasion.
You can contact us at contact@readingjaneausten.com.
Here are some other things we have put on the internet (mostly YouTube):
- “Such Different Accounts of You”: Representations of Darcy on Screen – Harriet’s presentation to the Jane Austen Society of Australia in February 2024 (previously given at the Jane Austen Society of North America 2023 AGM)
- “To occupy the clever young ladies”: Charlotte Yonge and middle-class girls’ education – Ellen’s video presentation for the Charlotte M. Yonge Society’s 2022 Annual General Meeting
- Wearing a flannel waistcoat to a duel: Why we don’t see Colonel Brandon as a Romantic hero – Harriet’s video for Virtual JaneCon 2022
- Why Edward Ferrars fails as a hero – and why I like him anyway – Harriet’s paper for Austen in August 2021.
- Noel Streatfeild. Harriet’s website about Noel Streatfeild, created over 20 years ago, and very much in need of a design update (and some content updates)!