Jane Austen is one of England’s greatest and best-loved novelists, whose works are still widely read and enjoyed nearly two hundred years after her death. Memories of Jane were increasingly recorded as her reputation and fame grew in the nineteenth century.

This is the life of Jane in the words of the people who knew her; it provides a fascinating insight into her life as a member of a close, loving family and her works as a novelist. The Jane Austen Files brings these memories, in the form of family diaries and memoirs by her nearest and dearest relatives, as well as all of Jane’s own letters, together in one volume. This book also opens a window on to the England in which Jane Austen lived, and lovingly set her novels.