A Truth Universally Acknowledged

It is a truth universally acknowledged that, at some point, most of us will use the phrase 'a truth universally acknowledged' when talking about Jane Austen. But perhaps this shows just how much her novels have become a part of us. Even after 200 years, her books continue to delight, amuse, console and provoke us. What explains our enduring fascination with Austen?

This book brings together thirty-three writers, past and present, discussing just what it is about Jane Austen...
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It is a truth universally acknowledged that, at some point, most of us will use the phrase 'a truth universally acknowledged' when talking about Jane Austen. But perhaps this shows just how much her novels have become a part of us. Even after 200 years, her books continue to delight, amuse, console and provoke us. What explains our enduring fascination with Austen?

This book brings together thirty-three writers, past and present, discussing just what it is about Jane Austen that inspires such devotion. Here Jay Mclnerny confesses to serial crushes on most of Austen's heroines, and celebrates her belief in true love. Amy Heckerling reveals how she transformed Emma into the hit romantic comedy Clueless, and Martin Amis muses on Pride and Prejudice as a divine comedy of love - and imagines a twenty-page sex scene between Lizzy and Darcy. Susanna Clarke shows how happiness depends on a good marriage in Austen's world, while Fay Weldon wonders whether the 'bad' girls in Mansfield Park have more fun.

Whether discussing Austen's gift for comedy, why men and women respond to her differently, or why she would be an ideal dinner guest (although she wouldn't want to come), ATruth Universally Acknowledged shows that there is much more to Jane than ladies in empire-line dresses admiring the roses - and reminds us why we still love the author who wrote about life better than anyone else in the world.