-
Jane Austen is born in Hampshire.
-
Period: to
Jane goes to school in Oxford, Southampton and Reading with her sister Cassandra; in 1783 she falls ill with typhus fever and nearly dies.
-
Period: to
Jane writes her teenage writings, including Love and Friendship (1790), Lesley Castle (1792) and Lady Susan (1794).
-
Jane writes Elinor and Marianne, an early version of Sense and Sensibility
-
Period: to
Jane writes First Impressions (later revised and published as Pride and Prejudice). Her father offers it to a publisher but it is rejected.
-
Tom Lefroy, a young lawyer, visits his relatives in Ashe, near Steventon. Jane and Tom dance and flirt.
-
Period: to
Jane writes Susan (later published as Northanger Abbey).
-
On Rev. Austen’s retirement, Jane and her father, mother and Cassandra leave Steventon and move to lodgings in Bath.
-
Jane accepts an offer of marriage from Harris Bigg-Wither, the rich brother of her friends, but the next day she changes her mind and declines the proposal.
-
Sense and Sensibility is published. Jane’s name does not appear on the book – instead it says ‘by a Lady’.
-
Pride and Prejudice is published, ‘by the author of Sense and Sensibility’.
-
Mansfield Park is published. Jane begins writing Emma.
-
Jane’s illness confines her to bed.
-
Northanger Abbey and Persuasion are published. For the first time, Jane Austen is identified as the author.
-
Jane dies at her lodgings in Winchester, aged 41 years old.
-
Jane Austen’s House opens to the public.
