Anonymity and Austen
During Jane Austen's lifetime, she successfully published four novels - Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814), and Emma (1815). All of these four novels were published anonymously, so why did Jane opt to do this?
In today's society, with a vast array of social media, we can often post comments anonymously on articles and posts, which can lead to nasty comments as people hide behind their anonymity. I definitely don't believe that this was the reason Jane published anonymously. Though I can imagine her getting into trouble with her wit sometimes if she had a Twitter account!
It was quite common at the time to publish anonymously, especially for female writers as it was not deemed ladylike to pursue a career in writing or publish for profit. Maria Edgeworth and Fanny Burney, contemporary writers whom Jane admired, also published anonymously. Women of the gentry were not expected to pursue a profession, they were expected to marry well for financial stability.
Although the aforementioned is likely the predominant reason for remaining anonymous, Jane may have also wanted to avoid criticism for her works. The reviews for her works were mainly favourable, although Mark Twain, a later author, famously said (after Jane's death) “I want to dig her up and beat her over the skull with her own shin-bone" and Charlotte Brontë, also later, is known for hating Jane Austen.
So why do we know the works as being written by Jane Austen today?
Following her death in 1817, her brother Henry Austen published Northanger Abbey and Persuasion together with a biographical notice revealing that Jane was the author of the two novels and also the four previously published novels.
Although it wasn't deemed as a profession for a lady, Jane's family encouraged her with her writing. Her father Rev George Austen sent a letter of inquiry in November 1797 to publisher Thomas Cadell, with hopes of publishing Pride & Prejudice, then titled First Impressions, and her brother Henry was instrumental in ensuring her other novels were published. Some of her nieces certainly knew that Jane was a writer as they would ask her for advice in their own writing.
It is thought that it was known in some circles that Jane was the author, although she kept it a secret from the neighbours. After a Miss Benn visited and talked bout the novel in front of the author, she had no idea that Jane herself was the author. Jane writes in a letter to her sister Cassandra: “I beleive it passed with her unsuspected." Jane used to write at a small table (right) at Chawton cottage (now the Jane Austen House museum) and she could hear the floorboards creak to warn her someone was coming so she could hide her manuscript.
The Prince Regent was a big fan of Jane Austen and it was said that he kept a copy of her novels in each of his libraries. She was invited by the Prince's librarian Rev James Stanier Clarke to visit the Prince's library at Carlton House in 1815. He had discovered that Jane was the author through the surgeon Charles Thomas Haden who was attending on her brother Henry in London.
We do still see some authors publishing anonymously today. JK Rowling uses a psuedonym to publish crime novels so that people do not make assumptions that they are the same as her popular Harry Potter series. Sense and Sensibility was published as "by a lady" and Pride and Prejudice was published as "the author of Sense and Sensibility", and so on, so there was a connection between Jane's novels that they were by the same author and her novels are also within the same genre.
I wonder what Jane would think today now that she is a world famous author by name.
