Jane Austen & Her Bookshelf: A Visit with Susan Allen Ford
June 6, 2024
"The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid."
—Henry Tilney, Northanger Abbey
As an avid reader and a novelist herself, Jane Austen of course loved to read novels. But what else did she read, and what influence did it have on her writing? What books did she place in the hands of her characters, and what do their reading habits and choices say about them? Drawing from her forthcoming book, What Jane Austen's Characters Read (and Why), Professor Emerita Susan Allen Ford joins us in this episode to answer these questions and more.
Dr. Susan Allen Ford is Editor of JASNA’s journals Persuasions and Persuasions On-Line and is Professor of English Emerita at Delta State University. She has spoken at many AGMs and to many JASNA Regions and has published essays on Austen and her contemporaries, gothic and detective fiction, and Shakespeare. She was a plenary speaker at the 2016 AGM in Washington, D.C., and has served as a JASNA Traveling Lecturer. Her forthcoming book, What Jane Austen’s Characters Read (and Why), will be published by Bloomsbury in 2024.
Many thanks to Susan for appearing as a guest on Austen Chat!
Listen to Episode 12
Listen to the interview or read the transcript and show notes on our Episode 12 webpage, or stream the episode on your favorite podcast app. Austen Chat is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, and other streaming platforms.
