The Incomparable

Jane Austen

The Pen Behind the Parlor Curtain

She never sailed the world or stormed the battlefield, never roamed the moors in disguise or plotted in candlelit chambers — and yet Jane Austen captured the thunder of human longing with nothing but ink, observation, and a razor wit honed sharper than any saber.

From the drawing rooms of Hertfordshire to the hedgerows of Devonshire, Austen exposed the fragile economy of romance, the comedy of manners, and the quiet rebellion of women denied power but never agency. She gave us heroines who questioned their fate and heroes who learned to deserve them. She revealed, with gentleness and scorn alike, the absurdity of a world that ranked worth by income and lineage — and she did it all with a quill dipped in irony and elegance.

Whether you’ve wept with Elinor, blushed with Anne, or sparred like Elizabeth, you’ve walked Austen’s world — and found yourself in it. Her voice endures not because the world has changed, but because in many ways, it hasn’t.

We wrote this for Jane, the girl who sees everything.

Published: 1811
Publisher: Thomas Egerton, Military Library (Whitehall, London)
Authorship: Published anonymously, credited only as "By a Lady"

Published: 1813
Publisher: Thomas Egerton, Military Library
Authorship: Also published anonymously, as "By the Author of Sense and Sensibility"

Published: 1814
Publisher: Thomas Egerton, Military Library
Authorship: Once again, "By the Author of Sense and Sensibility, & Pride and Prejudice"

Published: 1815 (official date listed as 1816)
Publisher: John Murray
Authorship: "By the Author of Pride and Prejudice, &c."
Note: This was the first of her works published by the prestigious John Murray and the only one she saw through publication with some personal recognition—thanks (or no thanks) to the Prince Regent's “request” for a dedication.

Published: Posthumously in 1818
Publisher: John Murray
Authorship: Published together with Persuasion, credited to "The Author of Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Emma, and Mansfield Park"
Note: Originally sold in 1803 to publisher Crosby & Co., who never released it. Jane later bought it back and revised it before her death.

Published: Posthumously in 1818
Publisher: John Murray
Authorship: Released alongside Northanger Abbey under the same attribution
Note: The publication included a "Biographical Notice of the Author" written by her brother Henry, which publicly revealed for the first time that the works had been authored by Jane Austen.