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John Mullan
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What Matters in Jane Austen?: Twenty Crucial Puzzles Solved Kindle Edition

by John Mullan (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 406 ratings
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Which important Austen characters never speak? Is there any sex in Austen? What do the characters call one another, and why? What are the right and wrong ways to propose marriage? In What Matters in Jane Austen?, John Mullan shows that we can best appreciate Austen's brilliance by looking at the intriguing quirks and intricacies of her fiction. Asking and answering some very specific questions about what goes on in her novels, he reveals the inner workings of their greatness.?

?In twenty short chapters, each of which explores a question prompted by Austens novels, Mullan illuminates the themes that matter most in her beloved fiction. Readers will discover when Austen's characters had their meals and what shops they went to; how vicars got good livings; and how wealth was inherited. What Matters in Jane Austen? illuminates the rituals and conventions of her fictional world in order to reveal her technical virtuosity and daring as a novelist. It uses telling passages from Austen's letters and details from her own life to explain episodes in her novels: readers will find out, for example, what novels she read, how much money she had to live on, and what she saw at the theater.?
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Written with flair and based on a lifetime's study, What Matters in Jane Austen? will allow readers to appreciate Jane Austen's work in greater depth than ever before.
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  5. Publication date
    January 29, 2013
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Virginia Woolf once remarked that of all great writers Jane Austen was the most difficult to catch in the act of greatness. If only she'd had Mullan's delightful, though repetitive, book at hand, perhaps Woolf would have discovered the reasons that Austen remains among the greatest, yet most enigmatic, of English authors. Austen expert Mullan (How Novels Work), an English professor at University College London, cleverly captures the novelist's brilliance by answering a set of 20 questions—ranging from unpromising ones such as How much does age matter? and Why is the weather important? to more seductive ones such as Do sisters sleep together? and Is there any sex in Jane Austen? —that uncover the details that give Austen's novels their depth and lasting appeal. Through his answers, Mullan demonstrates that Austen introduced free indirect style to English fiction, filtering her plots through the consciousness of her characters, and perfected fictional idiolect, fashioning habits of speaking for even minor characters that rendered them utterly singular. In one amusing chapter, he provides many examples of the subtle ways that Austen requires the reader to think about sex. Mullan's humorous guidebook encourages first-time Austen readers to pick up her novels and lovers of Austen to re-read for new details. Agent: Derek Johns, AP Watt. (Jan.)

From Booklist

Nearly 200 years after her death, Jane Austen continues to inspire a publishing boomlet. Books in the nonfiction column range from the lightweight to the academic. This entry from the author of How Novels Work (2006)is just right. Mullan poses 20 questions related to strategies Austen employs to reveal character or advance plot. Chapters examine, for example, How Much Does Age Matter?, Is There Any Sex in Jane Austen?, and Why Do Her Plots Rely on Blunders? Some chapters deal with matters related to the characters’ milieu, such as the games they play and the books they read. Mullan isn’t concerned with explaining Regency-era customs, however, except to make clear to the modern reader what would have been apparent to a reader in Austen’s time. The focus is always on showing how Austen puts various devices to work in the service of a story’s arc or a character’s psychology. Mullan’s close reading will provide serious fans with plenty of new insights for the next time they pick up one of Austen’s books. --Mary Ellen Quinn

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B009K4Z2X2
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Bloomsbury Press; 1st edition (January 29, 2013)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ January 29, 2013
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 864 KB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 353 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 406 ratings

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John Mullan

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Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5 out of 5
406 global ratings
Great read for Austen fans!
5 Stars
Great read for Austen fans!
A great read for those who love Austen and discussing/thinking about Austen but don’t want stuffy academia. It’s a smart book but very approachable. The writing is light, breezy, and engaging; each chapter can kind of stand alone, too, so it feels a bit like sitting in on a series of fun college lectures. It addresses some random but super interesting questions about Austen’s novels, and it does it quite well. I will definitely come back to this as a resource, and it’s absolutely made me want to read Austen again and more carefully.
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Top reviews from the United States

Carolina910
5.0 out of 5 stars I have ALWAYS loved Jane Austen's novels
Reviewed in the United States on August 8, 2014
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I have ALWAYS loved Jane Austen's novels, from the very first read and I do re-read them on a regular basis. I'm interested in that period of European history and I find that particular time and place to be an important - if often unnoticed - part of the "mix". This book satisfied me in so many ways. I loved the approach of looking at the novels that I know so well through the filter of these twenty "approaches". There is something for most people in this book - whether that person is a confirmed "Janite" or just interested in knowing "what's all the fuss about". While some would have made these inquiries into dull, dry "scholarly dissertations", this is an engaging read and would be of interest, I suspect to anyone interested in the craft of writing. I usually donate my books to the public library once they've been read and enjoyed. This one I'm keeping in my own personal collection of books by or about Jane Austen. Were I a teacher I would probably take the "Twenty crucial puzzles" approach to many another subject. It really engages a person to look at these novels with a closer inspection and a deeper appreciation. I KNEW there was something special about Jane Austen and John Mullan's very interesting book has given me a lot of reasons as to why I have always enjoyed her work.
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Caroline Niziol
4.0 out of 5 stars Scholarly Book with Appeal for All Readers
Reviewed in the United States on January 29, 2013
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What Matters in Jane Austen is simultaneously both the most scholarly and most enjoyable book I have read in a very long time. I have read my share of Austen scholarship that veers into mind-boggling dullness and/or extreme readings of the Big Six. In What Matters in Jane Austen, Mullan manages to explore the minutia with style, wit, and insight.

My favorite chapter was probably the one about card games. I'll confess that when Austen talks about the games her characters play during parties or afternoon gatherings, my eyes glaze over those sections. The examination of pairings and numbers for those games, as well as expectations regarding gambling, was both historically interesting and enlightening for certain portions of the books.

Despite the potential for academic murkiness, Mullan keeps the text moving quickly. It was quite fun to read and I also appreciated the brief, relevant mentions of the film adaptations.

[note: I received an ARC from Netgalley.]
19 people found this helpful
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H. Bok
5.0 out of 5 stars Illuminating and Accessible Analysis
Reviewed in the United States on December 16, 2016
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More than any author, Jane Austen inspires popular criticism—lit crit without the flummery, analysis that remains free of the jargon adopted by professional academics. I read on both sides of that fence but infinitely prefer the popular criticism side, which has the power to draw anyone who enjoys attentive reading into its circle. And John Mullan’s book is among the best I have read in that arena.

He approaches the business episodically, through a series of inquiries that range from trivial matters such as “Do Sisters Sleep Together?” to subtler points of style such as “When Does Jane Austen Speak Directly to the Reader?” Each of his leading questions opens a little window on her work, examining issues of her cultural context or her literary technique. The essays embrace all the published novels, with (sadly) only glancing mentions of the juvenilia and unfinished works. (I wish people paid more attention to *The Watsons*!)

Along the way, he illuminates aspects of her world of manners such as the fine points of naming—why it’s rude for Mrs. Elton to call Mr. Knightley “Knightley,” to be sure, but also what Elizabeth Bennet is telling us about herself when she stops saying “Mr. Darcy” and starts referring to him as “Darcy.” (Speaking of the mega-couple, Mullan showed me a lot about their mutual attraction that I had overlooked during a gazillion rereadings of *Pride and Prejudice.*) What other critic would have considered an examination of how Jane Austen uses weather? Or what cues we should pick up from mentions of visits to the seaside?

Mullan has a keen eye for the telling detail, and a clear voice for explaining just how and what it’s telling. His analysis of Jane Fairfax and Frank Churchill’s meeting at Worthing is especially illuminating; and the conclusions he draws from the characters who are not given direct dialogue in the novels goes far beyond the usual platitudes. (*Emma* shows particular skill in the way it uses people speaking and not speaking: Mr. Perry drives the plot without ever saying a word, and Miss Bates reveals the truth without saying anything that we or the characters attend to.)

The back half of the book takes Mullan’s game up a notch when he brings his focus to bear on Jane Austen’s writerly techniques, especially in the chapters “Why Do Her Plots Rely on Blunders?” and “How Experimental a Novelist Is Jane Austen?” (“What Makes Characters Blush?” is also surprisingly illuminating.) He has a gift for discovering a telling keyword or concept and following its thread throughout a novel, showing us how it reveals Austen’s thought processes.

Many of us have had the experience of seeing something new each time we reread a Jane Austen novel. After decades of that experience, I thought I was reaching a point of diminishing returns—till John Mullan showed me how much I was unable to see without his help.
20 people found this helpful
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Sue
5.0 out of 5 stars Read it for the final chapter
Reviewed in the United States on February 21, 2023
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This is extremely interesting and is best read when all of Austen’s novels are fresh in mind. The last chapter is just brilliant.
One person found this helpful
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Patrick McGraw
5.0 out of 5 stars An Indispensable Book for Lovers of Jane Austen
Reviewed in the United States on October 18, 2017
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John Mullan's book is packed with insights about Austen's writing. His approach to Austen involve looking at twenty crucial "puzzles' that he then 'solves.' All of which attempt to catch Austen in the 'act of greatness' (Virginia Woolf's phrase). Mullan asserts that there is so much more going on in any passage of Austen than most people realize. To catch Austen's full meaning, readers must look closely at everything she says. Mullan writes in his introduction, 'Little things matter, not because Austen's interests were trivial, but because the smallest of details--a word, a blush, a little conversational stumble--reveal people's schemes and desires." A small example of what he means can be seen in this passage from his book: 'What time do John Thorpe and James Morland set off from Tetbury to Bath in "Northanger Abbey?" Ten o'clock: we need to be clear because John Thorpe is an absurd braggart obsessed with the unlikely speed of his horse, and his bending of every fact to his purpose ("It was eleven, upon my soul! I counted every stroke") is the essence of his character.' A new friend urged me to read this book, and now I am urging you to read it. If you want to get the most out of reading anything by Jane Austen, you must read John Mullan's "What Matters in Jane Austen."
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Top reviews from other countries

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Harriet Smith
5.0 out of 5 stars Like putting on 3D glasses
Reviewed in Canada on September 5, 2013
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Ever feel you were missing something in Jane Austen's novels? This book is like putting on 3D glasses. Here's your guide to manners and meanings. Find out what readers in regency England already knew. Example: What does omitting a courtesy title or using a first name mean? Do movie versions cast actors that are too old? What was the ideal marriageable age? Graze from chapter to chapter. Readable and fun.
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Silke
5.0 out of 5 stars Festmahl für Jane Austen Fans
Reviewed in Germany on January 21, 2016
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Das Buch erklärt sehr anschaulich und an vielen Beispielen, warum Jane Austen so gut ist und das ganz ohne jede Herablassung gegenüber "Frauenliteratur" (chick-lit).

Für jemanden wie mich, der sich jedesmal ärgert, wenn Austen ausschließlich als bessere chick-lit vermarktet wird und nicht gleichzeitig als Hochliteratur ist das Buch der reine Balsam.
2 people found this helpful
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Lucia C
5.0 out of 5 stars Smart and informative
Reviewed in France on January 23, 2015
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Jane Austen was such a fantastic writer that there are a multitude of details that you may not even notice in the richness of her writing and the wit of her social observations. There are also so many details that one may have thought to notice but which resonate throughout her work in such a manner that one could not realise it - unless one is a Jane Austen scholar. Whch John Mullan seems to be.
The "puzzles" - more like series of essays answering a question, are very well chosen, the questions are so simple but so good that more than once the Janeite in me thought "surely I know the answer to this!" but yet I learned so much in reading John Mullan's work.
Being specialized (I feel) in Emma, he goes in depth about this book, but I find he has made an effort to look at answers throughout all Jane Austen's books, and that makes What Matters in Jane Austen a sound and rigorous academic work, as well as a fantastic read.
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Andrew Banks
4.0 out of 5 stars Jane Austen, literary pioneer
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 27, 2012
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As well as his day job as a professor of English at University College London, John Mullan writes a very entertaining column about contemporary fiction in the Saturday edition of 'The Guardian'. This formed the basis of his earlier book, 'How Novels Work'. With his latest book, John Mullan takes a detailed look at Jane Austen's prose fiction. As he mentions in the 'Acknowledgements' section at the end of the book, Professor Mullan road tested a lot of this material in a series of lectures to various branches of the Jane Austen Society. I was present at the Quaker Meeting House in York, when Professor Mullan gave a talk for the North of England branch of the Jane Austen Society, in which he previewed material which I now recognise in the chapters 'What do characters call each other?' and 'Which important characters never speak in the novels?'

The book is subtitled '20 crucial puzzles solved', and these twenty puzzles provide the basis for the book's twenty chapters. Despite her cosy and genteel image, as Professor Mullan shows, in her own day, Jane Austen was a cutting edge literary pioneer. Whilst her contemporaries, like Mary Brunton ('Self Control'), preferred perfect heroines, Jane Austen wrote about very flawed protagonists such as Miss Woodhouse in 'Emma'. Furthermore, as Professor Mullan demonstrates in his chapter on Jane Austen as an experimental novelist, Austen virtually invented the free indirect style, and 'Emma' the novel is a bravura display of technical brilliance in its extensive use of free indirect discourse.

In conclusion, this book is an interesting study of the Austen canon which helps to provide the reader with several insights about Jane Austen's six novels. It was almost as entertaining as reading the novels themselves.
23 people found this helpful
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BookLover
5.0 out of 5 stars Full of Fascination
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 5, 2023
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This book was highly recommended to me and is full of fascinating facts about the thought processes and puzzles behind the Austen novels and the revelation of Jane's own character, prejudices and beliefs. Prof John Mullan really knows his stuff and you are in the safest of hands. How much money is enough? What makes her characters blush? Which important characters never speak in her novels? These are essential questions that reveal so much and add even more to our enjoyment, and Prof Mullan has set out to answer such conundrums and many more
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