Customer Reviews

Jane Austen For Dummies

5 star:		(31)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I hate the name of this series, but this volume by Joan Klingel Ray, president of the Jane Austen Society of North America is a terrific, clear, concise, and inviting set of explanations for all of those questions that newer readers of Austen have about her world: Why doesn't Elizabeth Bennet just get a job? Why will Mrs. Bennet have to leave Longbourn if Mr. Bennet dies? How rich IS Darcy?

Plus, because Ray's learning is so deep, the chapter on manners, for instance, is framed not by vague ideas of "well, we all want to behave nicely, don't we?" but by Castiglione and the translations of it into Latin and English. This kind of learning is in evidence in every chapter.

I've been reading Austen since I was 13--more than 35 years--and I find new information in this volume. Plus, it's fun to read sections and see just how much I already knew.

For instance, do you know how to navigate via the Tube and trains to the Austen sites in the countryside? I didn't. Dr. Ray tells all.

I do love a clear explanation!

Pamela Regis, Professor of English
McDaniel College
Westminster, MD

You may be surprised to learn how much you don't know about Jane Austen.
Glance over the Table of Contents of Jane Austen for Dummies and you
can't help but envy Professor Joan Klingel Ray's students. She manages to
present in an informative and very entertaining manner Jane Austen's
life, works, literary predecessors, legacy, and so much more. This book
is for everyone who reads Jane Austen - and for those who don't. Think
Jane Austen is only for ladies who sip tea? Think Jane Austen favored the
aristocracy? Think Jane Austen lived a sad, lonely life and never
traveled? Read this book and discover the truth of the matter. You can
buy countless books about Jane Austen and spend the next decade or so
reading them, or you can get just this one.

I found this book to be really a great read. It is a good, solid, reference book. There is so much about Jane Austen that is known but this is one place where you can get a lot of information in one place. For non-Janites it is a great introduction to some of the things about Jane. All in all I would recommend this to everyone Janites and non-Janites. You will enjoy it.

Jane Austen for Dummies is a delightful and helpful companion volume both for readers (and movie-goers) who are new to Austen and for those of us who read her six wonderful novels again and again! Joan Klingel Ray, who teaches university-level Austen courses and who, as former president of JASNA*, has given many well-received lectures on Austen throughout the U.S. and Canada, is the perfect guide to lead us through the world of Austen and her novels. Written in an entertaining style but based on her extensive knowledge and scholarship, Ray's book gives us context and a richer understanding of Austen's life and writings. Do you want to know about the "rules" of flirting, courtship, and marriage in Austen's day? The often precarious position of gentlewomen? The significance of primogeniture and entail? Or, for today's readers planning a literary pilgrimage--which sites associated with Austen can be visited? And how to get there? You'll find lots of information and pleasure within the covers of this book. Highly recommended for individual purchasers/readers and for library collections!! (*JASNA is the Jane Austen Society of North America.)

This is an outstanding book. I was worried that a book "For Dummies" might be too basic but I learned that the "for dummies" applies to the easy-to-understand style of writing rather than a low level of scholarship. The author, Joan Ray, is an internationally recognized Austen scholar who has done a marvelous job of placing Jane's work in context. I did not understand, from a 21st century viewpoint, many aspects of the novels but this book shows they made perfect sense in Janes's time considering the then current customs, social mores, economy etc. I recommend the book unhestitatingly!

When Shakespeare wrote "Much Ado About Nothing" his audiences were well aware that the word "nothing" was Elizabethan slang for female genitalia. Like Shakespears' audiences Jane Austen's Regency readers had a decided advantage over modern readers in that they would have understood the political and class dimensions of her characterizations and plots. Why did Jane Austen send Lydia and Wickham to Brighton instead of to Weymouth? Professor Joan Klingel Ray's amazing "Jane Austen for Dummies" answers this question and many more, and in so doing gives us the information to enjoy the novels like we were Regency readers. With humor and wit Professor Ray explains the nuances of daily life in Jane Austen's time that help us to appreciate even more this extraordinary novelist's command of the written word.

The art on the cover is a perfect depiction of what this book is about. Joan Ray explores in depth the cultural background of Jane Austen's era. She picks a topic such as How a Gentleman Courts a Young Gentlewoman, gives historical information, and then cites examples of good and bad behavior from Austen's novels.

For a reader new to Austen there can be a bit of an overload of names. The cast of characters becomes a blur of Bennets and Bingleys, Catherines and Crawfords, Dashwoods and Darcys. Luckily the format of the books allows you to jump around from topic to topic and cherry pick what interests you.

For copies of the actual novels I like the Oxford World's Classics paperbacks. They have a new, clean typesetting, and each book has an introductory essay that gives background and analysis focused more specifically toward the story at hand.

The main reason I bought and read Jane Austen for Dummies was the author's credentials as a College Professor (with lifetime teaching guarantee at her college), and 3-time President of JASNA (Jane Austen Society of North America). Since reading it, I feel almost as if I had had the pleasure of (and time for!) taking a class from Professor Ray. It is my first book ABOUT Jane Austen, as opposed to BY Jane Austen, and I expected, as I have found with other FOR DUMMIES books, that I would learn what I wanted to know, painlessly, and be thoroughly entertained in the reading. I was not disappointed; to put it less ironically (which technique Miss Austen specializes in, as you will learn from Dr. Ray!) I was delighted with the book; you will be too. Don't hesitate, go ahead and buy it -- It's a great book!

Jane Austen for Dummies will leave a contented smile on the face and satiated delight in the belly of even the most discriminating Austen afficionado! Joan Klingel Ray's scholarship is evident, but the manner in which she doles out both the essential and the trivial ingredients of all manner of things Regency and Austen will satiate any literary taste bud. I loved the organization of the text and the index is fabulous. I would love to see this book "taught"; it would enhance immeasurably the certain enjoyment of reading any of Asuten's novels.

I've read several biographies about Jane Austen and I loved this book. Joan Kingel Ray (former JASNA President) does a great job presenting potentially dry material in a witty and informative manner. This book truly enriched my understanding of Jane's life and the social structure in which she lived.