Jane Austen bicentenary -or is it?

I'm just reading Mansfield Park for the first time!

Galen hope you are enjoying it? I have read it several times, along with Pride and Prejudice, so good.

Mawbroon
All the right words but not necessarily in the right order?

The heroine is a bit of a pain, but it contains Austen's naughtiest joke, about Rears and Vices in the Navy, and touches on the issue of slavery (Fanny's uncle has to go to the WI to sort out some problems).

And one of the young men (?Frank Churchill - I am a long way from my copy of the book) admits to the very male characteristic of not asking the way anywhere.

Mansfield Park was a favourite when I was reading my way through Jane Austen in my late teens and early twenties. So much so, I named my dog after the heroine. Lovely name I still believe and I was a bit shocked when some people found it funny.

Roses Have you read "Longbourne" by Jo Baker? It is a novel from the viewpoint of the servants in the Bennet house during the events of Pride and Prejudice. A different perspective on the characters (the girls in the kitchen see a side of Mr Wickham that the Bennet girls don't at first) and a lot about the reality of what had to be done in a household. There are also several subplots of the lives of the servants and of ordinary soldiers.

I enjoyed that book too. It portrayed the hard life of the domestic servants so well. I am hoping they will make it into a film sometime.