Love and Freindship [sic]

About the book

This collection brings together youthful writings in which Austen tests letters, miniature narratives, history, and dramatic dialogue as vehicles for satire. The title piece gives extravagant feeling and improbable incident the solemn treatment its characters believe they deserve. Other pieces expose vanity, partiality, and selfishness through speakers who reveal more than they intend. The humour is often broader and more abrupt than in the later novels, making sudden reversals and outrageous claims part of its energy. Reading across the collection offers a view of an author trying forms rather than a single continuous story. It also reveals an early fascination with the gap between a polished account of oneself and the motives that account makes visible to a less indulgent observer.

• Literary parody
• Self-deception
• Experimenting with form

Why read it

For the exuberance of Austen's early satire and its delight in unreliable self-presentation.

Collection of juvenile writings · English text