Jane Austen, the Secret Radical by Helena Kelly

does so brilliantly is to exhort us all to chuck out the chintz, and the teacups, and all the traditional romantic notions about Austen's work that have been fed to us for so long. Uncovering a radical, spirited and political engaged Austen, Jane Austen, The Secret Radical will encourage you to read Jane, all over again. In her first, brilliantly original book, Austen expert Helena Kelly introduces the reader to a passionate woman living in an age of revolution to a writer who used what was regarded as the lightest of literary genres, the novel, to grapple with the weightiest of subjects – feminism, slavery, abuse, the treatment of the poor, the power of the Church, even evolution – at a time, and in a place, when to write about such things directly was seen as akin to treason. Jane Austen, The Secret Radical puts that right. We just don’t read her properly – we haven’t been reading her properly for 200 years. She writes about serious subjects and her books are deeply subversive. Her novels don’t confine themselves to grand houses and they were not written just for readers’ enjoyment. Uncovering a radical, spirited and political engaged Austen, Jane Austen, The Secret Radical will encourage you to read Jane, all over again.‘A sublime piece of literary detective work that shows us once and for all how to be precisely the sort of reader that Austen deserves.’ Caroline Criado-Perez, GuardianĪlmost everything we think we know about Jane Austen is wrong. In her first, brilliantly original book, Austen expert Helena Kelly introduces the reader to a passionate woman living in an age of revolution to a writer who used what was regarded as the lightest of literary genres, the novel, to grapple with the weightiest of subjects - feminism, slavery, abuse, the treatment of the poor, the power of the Church, even evolution - at a time, and in a place, when to write about such things directly was seen as akin to treason.

We just don't read her properly - we haven't been reading her properly for 200 years.

Her novels don't confine themselves to grand houses and they were not written just for readers' enjoyment. 'A sublime piece of literary detective work that shows us once and for all how to be precisely the sort of reader that Austen deserves.' Caroline Criado-Perez, GuardianĪlmost everything we think we know about Jane Austen is wrong.

Jane Austen, the Secret Radical by Helena Kelly