As some of you know, this year is the 200th anniversary of Jane Austen’s much-too-early death, and many of the faithful are noting events leading up to the end as they pass on the calendar. Yesterday (May 24th), for example, marked the day when Jane left her home in Chawton for what would turn out to be the last time, seeking medical help in Winchester, where she later died.
Jane loved her Chawton Cottage home (which she shared with her mother, sister Cassandra, and friend Martha), and it must have been very painful indeed to leave it, knowing she might never see it again.
Many were the tears shed by them in their last adieus to a place so much beloved. ‘Dear, dear Norland!’ said Marianne, as she wandered alone before the house on the last evening of their being there. ‘When shall I cease to regret you, when learn to feel a home elsewhere? Oh, happy house! Could you know what I suffer in now viewing you from this spot, from whence perhaps I may view you no more!’ (Sense and Sensibility, chapter 5)
Reading the recent posts about Jane’s move to Winchester (such as this one at the Jane Austen Literacy Foundation) brought back to my mind when I had researched this time in her life for The Persuasion of Miss Jane Austen. I took the known facts, filled in from imagination what it must have been like for Jane to leave her home, and then wrote the scene. It seemed appropriate to share it with you today.
So here is most of chapter 31 from The Persuasion of Miss Jane Austen, strategically edited to avoid spoilers (since my version of events in this book departs from the historical record in surprising but happily plausible ways!). Jane Austen tells the story in her own words:
I woke feeling far more tired than when I had gone to sleep, and I was so weak that I could not get out of bed. Within days, the dark blotches, which I could never have feigned, obligingly re-appeared on my skin. The only conscious effort I had to make to advance my objective was to no longer hide what I was feeling. Now, when my back ached, I groaned aloud instead of stifling myself. Now, I did not bother to deny that I was very ill indeed.
My family was genuinely concerned at this most frightening turn, as indeed was I. And, when the limited talents of the local medical man yielded no appreciable result, Mama’s mind was made up for Winchester without my even having to suggest it.
Although the course of action required was decided quickly enough, it could not be enacted without considerable exertion. Letters had to be written – one to Mr. Lyford to warn him of my coming, and another to James to secure the loan of his carriage to take me thither. Winchester lodgings had also to be found. Then there was the packing together of all that Cassandra and I might need for a stay from home of undetermined duration, and the funds necessary to support us through it.
All these arrangements I observed and yet was powerless to assist in. Mama, Martha, Cassandra, and Henry: they all buzzed and fussed about me, fulfilling my every need and providing every tender comfort within their reach. And the others rallied round as well, visiting and contributing what they could.
It is a humbling thing to find oneself utterly helpless, and yet it can be a gift as well. One who is too proud to admit a weakness will never experience the compassionate care of others. It is only when that person is brought low, dropped to the bottom of a deep pit, that he or she will look up for relief and find it.
Such a one was I, although I did not know it before then. I had privately taken satisfaction in my own abilities and often thought myself a cut above my company – not perhaps by society’s standards, but by my own. Now where were my grounds for boasting? What benefit to me was my intellect in this situation? Could I think myself well again? When I was unable to even raise my head from the pillow, could I by my own efforts expect to add one minute to the length of my life?
Only God could do that. He would ultimately decide the length and course of my days. In the meantime, He had already sent his ministering angels round me, I perceived, in the form of my friends. I had never known such tenderness and love as they showed me through my illness. Or perhaps it had been there all along, and I had failed to properly appreciate it. In any case, I understood as never be-fore that I was blessed. And there were moments when I felt as if I might wish for nothing better than to die there, peacefully, at home, and cradled in the bosom of such a family.
But we are not made that way. We are made to cling to life so long as there is hope. And I still had the hope of getting well and the hope of seeing Captain Devereaux again. These things compelled me to continue forward, to not give in just yet.
So, I said goodbye to my mother, knowing it would be, in all likelihood, the last time I would see her on this side of heaven, and I allowed myself to be carried off to Winchester. Cassandra travelled with me in my brother James’s carriage, with Henry and my nephew William riding escort alongside.
“They will surely be soaked clean through,” I said as I watched the rain running down the windows, heard it pattering on the roof of the coach. I was reclined on the makeshift bed that had been arranged for me, bridging across from one set of seats to the opposite. Poor Cassandra was crushed into the little space leftover. “If I were not such a wretched invalid, we could all have ridden inside where is it dry. What a bother I am.”
“Don’t be silly, Jane,” she replied, straight faced. “If you were not an invalid, we would hardly be going to Winchester in the first place.”
She meant it in jest, I knew, and I laughed at her joke – one more proof that she really is the witty one. “Of course, you are right,” I agreed. “It would seem that even my mind is failing me now. More evidence of what I was saying, Cass. I am become a dreadful burden, especially to you.”
“Let us have no more of this kind of talk. It is for me to decide if I am overburdened, not you. And I can always call on Mary to help with the nursing if it becomes more than I can manage.”
I sighed. “I think we can hardly stop her coming. She sounded so determined in her letter,” said I, referring to the note that had arrived from Steventon parsonage along with the carriage, wherein my sister-in-law had volunteered her services.
“Now, Jane, although Mary is not a favourite with you, you ought to be grateful for her kind offer.”
“I know you are right, and I am grateful, but I fear she will become a complication we can ill afford…”
…We jostled along several minutes in relative silence, with only hoof beats, the jingle of harness, and the creaking of the carriage timbers to fill our ears…
…I felt excitement building in my chest as we neared our destination. I began thinking less of difficulties and of what I had left behind, and more for what lay ahead. It would be an adventure either way. I had always liked Winchester for its own sake – the beautiful cathedral especially. Now it was where my fate would be decided. In Winchester, God willing, I would see Captain Devereaux again. Perhaps he was in town already. That thought set my heart to fluttering despite my weariness.
We stopped at Mr. Lyford’s house in Parchment Street only long enough for Henry to go to the door and announce our arrival.
“Lyford said he would come to you tomorrow morning,” Henry reported upon his return to the carriage.
We drove on to College Street, where we had arranged to rent rooms, but attaining those rooms was no easy task. In my dependent state, I had to nearly be carried up the narrow flight of stairs. I was especially glad for young William’s presence then, for it was an awkward business and I doubt as to Henry’s being able to have managed it on his own. Once more I apologised for my helplessness, and once more I was assured that my friends considered it a privilege to be of service to me.
The best feature of our apartment was the neat little drawing room, which boasted a bow window with a view to the street, the old city wall, and Dr. Gabell’s garden. It was a pleasant room, but as I looked about myself I could not help wondering if I would ever leave that place again. Were those four walls, with the faded paisley paper peeling at the seams, the last sight my eyes would behold before closing forever? If so, the glories of heaven were sure to be the more impressive for the dramatic contrast.
I had no complaints, however. My surroundings did not signify… I was content in knowing that I would have a secure place to rest my head and the care of my friends.
If you think this is all too sad to bear, I agree with you. But the good news is the story doesn’t end here. There are seven more chapters!
The Persuasion of Miss Jane Austen is dedicated to every fan who has wished Jane Austen herself might have enjoyed the romance and happy ending she so carefully crafted for all of her heroines. I have endeavored to grant that wish!
First, let me thank everyone who has already read one or both of my two new releases, Leap of Faith and Leap of Hope, especially those who have gone the extra mile and posted a review. I appreciate your confidence and support more than I can say!
Two things Anne de Bourgh understood from a very early age: first, that she was loved by her father, and second, that she would one day marry Fitzwilliam Darcy.
“My sister and I arranged it all between ourselves,” Lady Catherine frequently told her only child, sometimes varying her exact words but never her conclusion. “And the men mean to make no difficulty about it. When the time comes, you shall marry your cousin. It is not only the cherished wish of your mother and aunt, it is a solemn promise and therefore to be considered a settled engagement. The two great estates will thus be united in one family. There could be no connection more highly desirable on either side, no alliance more perfectly natural.”
Today’s the opening day of baseball season! We’ve made it through that 2-month-long drought after Superbowl, where there was nothing to watch on TV, sports-wise, except soccer and basketball, neither of which interest me very much. Now, there will be a Mariners’ game on almost every night to keep me company while I clean up the kitchen, fold the laundry, or putter around on the internet. And just maybe this, at long last, will be Seattle’s year!
For me, baseball is just one of many interests, a pleasant diversion, an undemanding entertainment – not my passion. But for someone aspiring to play the game professionally, it is serious business and, by necessity, an all-consuming passion. Nothing less than single-minded dedication would produce success in one of the most competitive sports on the planet.
Baseball is a beautiful game, one that has been stitched into the fabric of my life since I began playing when I was eight years old. I spent seventeen years on the field and sixteen of them as a catcher behind home plate – a fitting name, for no matter which field, that patch of ground always feels like home to me.
…But, looking back, was it all worth it? – the enormous effort and countless sacrifices made so I could play professional baseball?
victory by the collective sum of their individual efforts.
Now it’s time for me to go on book tour! – virtual book tour, that is, visiting several blogs this month as a guest blogger, all in an effort to get the word out about Leap of Faith and Leap of Hope to a wider audience. Along the way, I’ll be giving more books away (but you still have one day left to enter to win the biggest giveaway at the 
My big double launch day is finally here! And I do mean FINALLY. One of these two books has been waiting a very long time for its turn at publication.
I’ve always been intrigued by the idea that a single choice in life can change everything that happens subsequently. For example, what if rather than choosing to go to college A, where you met your future spouse, you had selected college B? Would you have ended up marrying someone else instead, and consequently having different children? Yikes! Even a minor decision (such as where to eat lunch, what to order, or what route to take getting there) might make the difference between an ordinary day and winding up in the hospital from food poisoning or a car accident. Of course, being the romantic that I am, I’m thinking you might meet that certain someone wonderful in the hospital, which you never would have if you hadn’t gotten sick/injured. The possible variations are endless.
At the Crossroads Center, they’re in the business of granting second chances. And their newest client is Ben Lewis, a former star athlete who never recovered from the death of his dream to make it big in the big leagues. Now he’s being offered the opportunity to return to 1991 and try again, this time without the illness that originally ended his baseball hopes. What’s the catch? He will pay for his second chance by forfeiting his memories of the first… and possibly along with them, the love of his life. Can he find his way home to the woman he’s long forgotten but never stopped missing? Or will reaching for the brass ring with both hands cause the treasure he once possessed to slip forever from his grasp?
At the Crossroads Center, they’re in the business of handing out second chances. And their newest client is Hope O’Neil – college student and Jane Austen devotee, who has always believed she’d be more at home in the past, wearing corsets and courted by men in cravats. But can a modern girl really fit into a world with no electricity, cell phones, or indoor plumbing? Hope is about to find out when her wish for an Austen kind of life is unexpectedly granted. Although she envisions her second chance will be like something straight out of Pride and Prejudice – complete with her own Mr. Darcy and a romantic happy ending – she gets more than she bargained for in this delightful romp through Regency England… a lot more.
Today, in coordination with Austen Variations, I have a scavenger hunt for you, complete with buried treasure! If you’ve already been to 
Before, you were looking at quotes from Jane Austen. Now here’s one of mine from
Winners will be chosen by random drawing from those submitting a correct entry via email as directed above. Along with your answers, include your preference of the three prizes, which book you would like and in what format. Winners will be posted (here and on my post at Austen Variations) on 1/11/17 and also notified by email. Good luck!
“Write what you know!” You’ve probably heard the saying, intended as sound advice for anyone with literary aspirations.
I want to acknowledge Jane Austen’s creativity and innovation. She pushed the envelope of her limited world about as far as she could have – as a woman in a man’s profession, as one of the early pioneers of the novel as a literary form, and also for writing what she loved – stories centered around courtship and romance, even though she supposedly had little of these things in her own life (here again, unless you subscribe to my plausible alternate version).
Have you ever wondered how your life would have been altered if at point A you had turned left instead of right? Would you have been happier or not? If you had a chance for a world-class “do over,” would you choose to go back to improve on your own life or pick a different life altogether, perhaps in a totally different time and place? I have always been fascinated by such questions, which led me to start a new series that’s all about second chances (the first two books to be released together in January).
assist these down-on-their-luck people to sort out what to do next. With their help, Ben decides to turn back the clock a few years to take another shot at his dream (read blurb 
But what about the enigmatic Cora and Poindexter? I said I was going to tell you about them, but that’s not easy because nobody seems to know exactly where they came from, what their relationship is, or even what they really look like. Just as with Jane Austen, no photographs exist and descriptions vary. Poindexter, who always wears white, puts Hope in mind of Colonel Sanders. Ben, who doesn’t get along as well with him, 
says Poindexter reminds him of a former pet albino rat named Roscoe. No consensus there! Cora is either a middle-aged brunette or a young, gorgeous blonde, depending on whom you ask. But one thing is for sure, she has a very quirky (even outrageous) fashion sense.
Yesterday, when I went out for my morning constitutional, I had multicolored maple leaves crunching underfoot and the occasional spider web hitting me in the face. I also took a plastic bag along with me, into which I hoped to collect enough blackberries to make a small cobbler – probably the last of the season. (It was delicious, by the way.)
Then I began wondering what Jane Austen had written about the season – autumn, that is, not fall. She wouldn’t have substituted the word “fall,” since that is an Americanism, which I learned too late to save me from making that mistake in my first book, The Darcys of Pemberley.
Jane doesn’t give us pages of extravagant description. Instead she paints a perfectly recognizable picture for us in just a few lines. My favorite passage, though, is from Persuasion, chapter 10. This scene takes place on the group walk to Winthrop:
Ann has had to watch Captain Wentworth show his preference for the younger, blooming Louisa. She has heard him praise Louisa for her character of decision and firmness. Anne endures all this whilst knowing that the captain, whom she still loves, condemns her for being too easily persuaded, and that the beauty of her own spring has long since passed. It seems there is nothing but decline and decay ahead.
I can appreciate the beauties of the season, and, as you can see, I’m always trying to capture some of the brilliant colors in pictures. But Autumn isn’t my favorite season, primarily because of what it means. Summer is over and so is my lighter schedule. Winter is coming, and although we don’t suffer the extremes in the Seattle area (no below zero temps or being buried in snow for weeks at a time), we must now expect six months of relative unpleasantness: cool, damp, and relentless gray.
How does fall effect you? Is the change in seasons a simple matter of fact to you, or does it take on some special significance? Austen refers to the way autumn is portrayed in poetry. Do you have a favorite verse on the subject?
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Shannon Winslow's "Jane Austen Says..." 