Jane Austen in History: Recent Scholarship

Abstract

Finds both studies disappointing. Faults Cecil for being attached to outmoded beliefs about the permanence of art, and to conventional views of Austen’s place in her society. Considers Brown’s feminist argument deficient because it is circular, making claims about Austen’s ability to represent her contemporaries’ concerns about gender roles but citing only Austen’s fiction as authority for the legitimacy of those claims. Criticizes Brown for imposing twentieth-century views on nineteenth-century novels.