Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Sanditon and The Watsons: Austen's Unfinished Novels
    Sanditon and The Watsons: Austen's Unfinished Novels
    Sanditon and The Watsons: Austen's Unfinished Novels
    Ebook145 pages2 hours

    Sanditon and The Watsons: Austen's Unfinished Novels

    By Jane Austen

    3.5/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Praised by critics and studied by scholars, Jane Austen's novels endure because of their popularity with readers. The author's witty and astute observations elevate her tales of parties, gossip, and romance into matters of captivating drama, offering an evocative portrait of everyday life in the towns and countryside of Regency England. Austen's premature death at the age of forty-two curtailed her legacy, and her devotees have eagerly read and re-read her handful of books. This collection features two of her unfinished novels, an often overlooked pair of gems that enrich our appreciation of Austen’s storytelling gifts.
    These writings first appeared posthumously, when Austen's nephew included the texts in an 1871 memoir of his celebrated relative. The Watsons unfolds in a familiar domestic milieu, in which a spirited heroine finds her marriage opportunities narrowed by poverty and pride. In contrast, Sanditon ventures into markedly different territory. Set at a seaside resort, among a cast of hypochondriacs and speculators, it suggests that Austen's work might have taken some unexpected new directions. Even if these incomplete stories had been of little intrinsic value, they would have been of interest as literary records and curiosities. As it happens, they are of high quality and worthy of reading for their own sake, for pleasure as well as study.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDover Publications
    Release dateMar 6, 2012
    ISBN9780486115436
    Sanditon and The Watsons: Austen's Unfinished Novels
    Author

    Jane Austen

    Born in 1775, Jane Austen published four of her six novels anonymously. Her work was not widely read until the late nineteenth century, and her fame grew from then on. Known for her wit and sharp insight into social conventions, her novels about love, relationships, and society are more popular year after year. She has earned a place in history as one of the most cherished writers of English literature.

    Read more from Jane Austen

    Related to Sanditon and The Watsons

    Related ebooks

    Classics For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      A Heroine for Our Time

      Oct 7, 2017

      JENNIFER EGAN JOINED THE WHO’S WHO of American letters in 2011 when she won a Pulitzer for A Visit From the Goon Squad, an interlinked-story-collection-as-novel that bucked more than a few conventions. Her new novel Manhattan Beach is more convention

      1 min read

    • Article

      The Other Child

      Dec 1, 2018

      The Other Child
      9 min read

    • Article

      Rina Sawayama

      Oct 15, 2021

      Rina Sawayama
      3 min read

    • Article

      How To Keep Your Bathroom Bug-Free

      Nov 16, 2021

      Beyond your usual weekly cleaning regime—loo, shower, bath, washbasin—also disinfect door handles, flush, and light switches or pulls, and wipe down all surfaces. This will help you keep all kinds of bugs at bay. Wash towels after every three uses, a

      1 min read

    • Article

      A Year in Reading: Shanthi Sekaran

      Dec 19, 2017

      You know when your friend writes a play or belts out a song or makes a working beehive out of marzipan and you’re like, “Oh, good God”? I read most of this novel sitting stick-straight, my mouth agape, quietly cursing. The post A Year in Reading: Sha

      5 min read

    • Article

      The Doctor Is In

      Sep 21, 2021

      Q: Dear Dr Max, I am an avid reader of your column which is useful and interesting. I am 85 years old and have a condition of flowing nose when I go out for a walk in cold weather. I do not have symptoms of common cold. Is there a treatment for this?

      1 min read

    • Article

      'Oprah's Book Club' Is Coming To Apple TV+. Here's Her First Pick

      Sep 23, 2019

      You get a book, and you get a book! And you get a book! "Oprah's Book Club" is coming to Apple TV+, the tech company and Oprah Winfrey announced Monday. The series will premiere at the platform's launch with a new episode available every two months.

      1 min read

    • Article

      The Perfect Daughter

      Jul 10, 2021

      Standing in a handstand, Jane arched her back and lowered her feet towards the head. Scorpion pose. She saw herself in the mirror, balancing in this challenging position. It was close to perfection… And she felt sick at the sight of it. From the loud

      8 min read

    • Article

      Exhaustively Researched, Often Brilliant Biography Of Sylvia Plath

      Nov 7, 2020

      ALMOST six decades after her death, Sylvia Plath stands as the most consequential poet of her generation. As a feminine voice, she dominates the 20th century. At the time of Plath’s death at age 30, critic A Alvarez wrote: “The loss to literature is

      13 min read

    • Article

      Synnøve Karlsen

      Sep 16, 2021

      Synnøve Karlsen
      1 min read

    • Article

      Things Fall Apart: On Ali Smith’s ‘Autumn’ and ‘Winter’

      Jan 16, 2018

      It’s a care, a real care, when a writer whose work you love takes on a project like a seasonal quartet. The potential for readerly woe is plain: four novels forced into a form already replete with corny allegories and tired themes. Ali Smith begins h

      10 min read

    • Article

      Listermania

      Mar 20, 2020

      Listermania
      5 min read

    • Article

      Jane Austen Trivia

      Mar 26, 2020

      Who knew that Jane brewed her own beer? In a letter to her sister Cassandra in January 1800, Jane told her, “We are brewing spruce beer again.” During this period, brewing was a traditional chore for women because water was often contaminated and it

      5 min read

    • Article

      Behind Every Great Woman Writer Is Another Woman

      Nov 15, 2017

      Persistent images of isolation can be used to weaken female power by giving the impression that there are no tried-and-tested models of intellectual collaboration between women. The post Behind Every Great Woman Writer Is Another Woman appeared first

      4 min read

    • Article

      An Appreciation Of Muriel Rukeyser, “St. Roach”

      Sep 1, 2021

      For that I never knew you, I only learned to dread you,for that I never touched you, they told me you are filth,they showed me by every action to despise your kind;for that I saw my people making war on you,I could not tell you apart, one from anothe

      15 min read

    • Article

      What Kind of Angel: On Percy Shelley

      Nov 21, 2022

      Shelley saw himself as a conduit for the electricity of the universe. The post What Kind of Angel: On Percy Shelley appeared first on The Millions.

      15 min read

    • Article

      LITERARY HOUSE lessons

      Dec 18, 2021

      LITERARY HOUSE lessons
      11 min read

    • Article

      Cosplaying Jane Austen

      Jul 22, 2017

      Cosplaying Jane Austen
      7 min read

    • Article

      City Journal’s Leonardo

      Jun 22, 2018

      City Journal’s Leonardo
      3 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Sanditon and The Watsons

    3.5/5

    9 ratings3 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 3/5
      Lovely stories. Really sad that Austen never had a chance to finish these stories, especially the Watsons.
    • 3/5

      Listening to this excellent audiobook of Jane Austen's incomplete novels very capably narrated by Anna Bentinck was a bittersweet experience. While I enjoyed Austen's customary sharp wit and social satire, it was impossible not to reflect on the circumstances which led to both novels being unfinished.

      Austen started writing The Watsons in around 1803 and probably abandoned it around the time of her father's death in January 1805. It tells the story of Emma Watson, who returns to live with her father and sisters after the wealthy aunt who raised her contracts an imprudent second marriage. Had it been completed, it is clear that a major focus of the novel would have been the economic and social realities of life for women without independent means.

      Austen was very ill when she started writing Sanditon in January 1817 and she completed eleven chapters before abandoning the novel two months later, only four months before her death. It is quite different from Austen's other novels. The novel explores the lives of families who live in Sanditon, a small watering place (probably based on Worthing) which is still in the process of development. Parts of Sanditon are extremely funny, particularly the account of the hypochondria and self-medication of two of the characters and the unstoppable enthusiasm for the development of Sanditon by another.

      Both The Watsons and Sanditon have been finished by other writers and several versions of each of the novels exist. Maybe I'll get around to reading one of more of them one of these days. However, I'm in no real hurry to do so, as I'd rather read an incomplete work by Austen than a complete one by a writer trying to duplicate her style.

      Given that the works are incomplete, it's not realistic to rate these books as highly as Austen's masterpieces and they fall into 3-1/2 star territory. However, they are definitely worthwhile reading for the Austen enthusiast.
    • 4/5
      Like Austen's other novels, Sanditon offers a look at the little dramas that mark small-town living. However, this time, Austen takes her readers away from the country to the coast when the observant Charlotte Heywood is invited to stay with the Parkers in their home in Sanditon, a budding seaside resort town that Mr. Parker hopes will become as lucrative as the more well-known bathing spots. In Sanditon, Charlotte is introduced to a fascinating cast of characters, from hypochondriacs to impoverished, but highly romantic wards. Sadly, we only get to know these characters briefly before the fragment ends.Gricel @ things-she-read.org

    Book preview

    Sanditon and The Watsons - Jane Austen

    1817

    Sanditon

    CHAPTER 1

    A GENTLEMAN & a lady travelling from Tunbridge towards that part of the Sussex coast which lies between Hastings & E. Bourne, being induced by business to quit the high road, & attempt a very rough lane, were overturned in toiling up its long ascent half rock, half sand.—The accident happened just beyond the only gentleman’s house near the lane—a house, which their driver, on being first required to take that direction, had conceived to be necessarily their object & had with most unwilling looks been constrained to pass by—. He had grumbled and shaken his shoulders so much indeed, and pitied & cut his horses so sharply, that he might have been open to the suspicion of overturning them on purpose (especially as the carriage was not his master’s own) if the road had not indisputably become considerably worse than before, as soon as the premises of the said house were left behind—expressing with a most intelligent portentous countenance that beyond it no wheels but cart wheels could safely proceed. The severity of the fall was broken by their slow pace & the narrowness of the lane, & the gentleman having scrambled out & helped out his companion, they neither of them at first felt more than shaken & bruised. But the gentleman had in the course of the extrication sprained his foot—& soon becoming sensible of it, was obliged in a few moments to cut short, both his remonstrance to the driver & his congratulations to his wife & himself—& sit down on the bank, unable to stand.—"There is something wrong here, said he—putting his hand to his ancle—But never mind, my dear—(looking up at her with a smile)—it cd not have happened, you know, in a better place.—Good out of evil—. The very thing perhaps to be wished for. We shall soon get relief.—There, I fancy, lies my cure—pointing to the neat-looking end of a cottage, which was seen romantically situated among wood on a high eminence at some little distance—Does not that promise to be the very place?—His wife fervently hoped it was—but stood, terrified & anxious, neither able to do or suggest anything—& receiving her first real comfort from the sight of several persons now coming to their assistance. The accident had been discerned from a hayfield adjoining the house they had passed—& the persons who approached, were a well-looking, hale, gentlemanlike man of middle age, the proprietor of the place, who happened to be among his haymakers at the time, & three or four of the ablest of them summoned to attend their master—to say nothing of all the rest of the field, men, women & children—not very far off.—Mr Heywood, such was the name of the said proprietor, advanced with a very civil salutation—much concern for the accident—some surprise at any body’s attempting that road in a carriage—& ready offers of assistance. His courtesies were received with good-breeding & gratitude & while one or two of the men lent their help to the driver in getting the carriage upright again, the travellor said—You are extremely obliging, sir, & I take you at your word.—The injury to my leg is, I dare say, very trifling, but it is always best in these cases to have a surgeon’s opinion without loss of time; and as the road does not seem at present in a favourable state for my getting up to his house myself, I will thank you to send off one of these good people for the surgeon. The surgeon, sir!—replied Mr Heywood—I am afraid you will find no surgeon at hand here, but I dare say we shall do very well without him.—Nay sir, if he is not in the way, his partner will do just as well—or rather better—. I wd rather see his partner indeed—I would prefer the attendance of his partner.—One of these good people can be with him in three minutes I am sure. I need not ask whether I see the house; (looking towards the cottage) for excepting your own, we have passed none in this place, which can be the abode of a gentleman.—Mr H. looked very much astonished—& replied—What, sir! are you expecting to find a surgeon in that cottage?—We have neither surgeon nor partner in the parish I assure you.—Excuse me, sir—replied the other. I am sorry to have the appearance of contradicting you—but though from the extent of the parish or some other cause you may not be aware of the fact;—Stay—Can I be mistaken in the place?—Am I not in Willingden?—Is not this Willingden? Yes, sir, this is certainly Willingden. Then, sir, I can bring proof of your having a surgeon in the parish—whether you may know it or not. Here, sir—(taking out his pocket book—) if you will do me the favour of casting your eye over these advertisements, which I cut out myself from the Morning Post & the Kentish Gazette, only yesterday morng in London—I think you will be convinced that I am not speaking at random. You will find it an advertisement sir, of the dissolution of a partnership in the medical line—in your own parish—extensive business—undeniable character—respectable references—wishing to form a separate establishment—You will find it at full length, sir,—offering him the two little oblong extracts.— Sir,—said Mr Heywood with a good humoured smile—if you were to shew me all the newspapers that are printed in one week throughout the kingdom, you wd not persuade me of there being a surgeon in Willingden,—for having lived here ever since I was born, man & boy 57 years, I think I must have known of such a person, at least I may venture to say that he has not much business—To be sure, if gentlemen were to be often attempting this lane in post-chaises, it might not be a bad speculation for a surgeon to get a house at the top of the hill.—But as to that cottage, I can assure you, sir that it is in fact—(in spite of its spruce air at this distance—) as indifferent a double tenement as any in the parish, and that my shepherd lives at one end, & three old women at the other. He took the pieces of paper as he spoke—& having looked them over, added—I believe I can explain it, sir.—Your mistake is in the place.—There are two Willingdens in this country—& your advertisements refer to the other—which is Great Willingden, or Willingden Abbots, & lies 7 miles off, on the other side of Battel—quite down in the weald. And we sir—(speaking rather proudly) are not in the weald.—Not down in the weald, I am sure sir, replied the traveller, pleasantly. It took us half an hour to climb your hill.—Well sir—I dare say it is as you say, & I have made an abominably stupid blunder.—All done in a moment;—the advertisements did not catch my eye till the last half hour of our being in town;—when everything was in the hurry & confusion which always attend a short stay there—One is never able to complete anything in the way of business you know till the carriage is at the door—and accordingly satisfying myself with a brief enquiry, & finding we were actually to pass within a mile or two of a Willingden, & said—"Before we accept your hospitality sir,—& in order to do away with any unfavourable impression which the sort of wild goose-chase you find me in, may have given rise to—allow me to tell you who we are. My name is Parker.—Mr Parker of Sanditon; this lady, my wife Mrs Parker.—We are on our road home from London;—My name perhaps—tho’ I am by no means the first of my family, holding landed property in the parish of Sanditon, may be unknown at this distance from the coast—but Sanditon itself—everybody has heard of Sanditon,—the favourite—for a young & rising bathing-place, certainly the favourite spot of all that are to be found along the coast of Sussex;—the most favoured by nature, & promising to be the most chosen by man.—Yes—I have heard of Sanditon. replied Mr H.—Every five years, one hears of some new place or other starting up by the sea, & growing the fashion.—How they can half of them be filled, is the wonder! Where people can be found with money or time to go to them!—Bad things for a country;—sure to raise the price of provisions and make the poor good for nothing—as I dare say you find, sir. Not at all, sir, not at all—cried Mr Parker eagerly. Quite the contrary I assure you.—A common idea—but a mistaken one. It may apply to your large, overgrown places, like Brighton, or Worthing, or East Bourne—but not to a small village like Sanditon, precluded by its size from experiencing any of the evils of civilization, while the growth of the place, the buildings, the nursery grounds, the demand for every thing, & the sure resort of the very best company, those regular, steady, private families of thorough gentility & character, who are a blessing everywhere, excite the industry of the poor and diffuse comfort & improvement among them of every sort.—No sir, I assure you, Sanditon is not a place—— I do not mean to take exceptions to any place in particular sir, answered Mr H.—I only think our coast is too full of them altogether—But had we not better try to get you——Our coast too full" repeated Mr P.—On that point perhaps we may not totally disagree; at least there are enough. Our coast is abundant enough; it demands no more.—Every body’s taste & every body’s finances may be suited—And those good people who are trying to add to the number, are in my opinion excessively absurd & must soon find themselves the dupes of their own fallacious calculations.—Such a place as Sanditon, sir, I may say was wanted, was called for.—Nature had marked it out—had spoken in most intelligible characters—The finest, purest sea breeze on the coast—acknowledged to be so—excellent bathing—fine hard sand—deep water 10 yards from the shore—no mud—no weeds—no slimey rocks—Never was there a place more palpably designed by nature for the resort of the invalid—the very spot which thousands seemed in need of.—The most desirable distance from London! One complete, measured mile nearer than East Bourne. Only conceive, sir, the advantage of saving a whole mile, in a long journey. But Brinshore, sir, which I dare say you have in your eye—the attempts of two or three speculating people about Brinshore, this last year, to raise that paltry hamlet, lying, as it does between a stagnant marsh, a bleak moor & the constant effluvia of a ridge of putrefying sea weed, can end in nothing but their own disappointment. What in the name of

    Enjoying the preview?
    Page 1 of 1