Overview

Northanger Abbey was one of Jane Austen's earliest manuscripts; Persuasion was her last. Published together in a single volume after her death, the two books differ widely. Northanger Abbey is a spirited, Gothic parody, while Persuasion has increasingly been seen as a new direction for the Austen canon. The two texts have been widely analysed and debated since publication, and continue to be so today. In this Readers' Guide, Enit Karafili Steiner: - Delineates a clear trajectory through the books' many interpretations over two centuries, mapping these out thematically and chronologically. - Contextualises and brings into dialogue influential approaches such as psychoanalytical criticism, structuralism, deconstruction, Marxism, New Historicism, and feminism. - Discusses film adaptations of the novels and their relation to literary criticism.

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9781137432162

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Reviews

'Enit Steiner's magisterial overview of the criticism on Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey and Persuasion will be of enormous value to every reader of these novels. With clarity, perception and deep insight, she tracks the responses to these two novels from Austen's relatives and contemporaries through 19th and 20th century criticism up to the present moment, taking into account the theoretical approaches of historical, formalist, psychoanalytic, feminist and sexuality studies. The range and sophistication of her summaries of this criticism is superb.' - Anne Mellor, University of California, Los Angeles, USA 'Steiner's singular achievement is her identification of readers' critical concerns and preoccupations with the novels that ebb and flow, transform and develop, through the ages to the present, providing threads of inquiry both useful and fascinating.' - Allen Reddick, University of Zurich, Switzerland 'This timely and insightful guide is an invaluable source for teaching the history of criticism of Northanger Abbey and Persuasion.' - Annika Bautz, University of Plymouth, UK

'Enit Steiner's magisterial overview of the criticism on Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey and Persuasion will be of enormous value to every reader of these novels. With clarity, perception and deep insight, she tracks the responses to these two novels from Austen's relatives and contemporaries through 19th and 20th century criticism up to the present moment, taking into account the theoretical approaches of historical, formalist, psychoanalytic, feminist and sexuality studies. The range and sophistication of her summaries of this criticism is superb.' - Anne Mellor, University of California, Los Angeles, USA

Author Information

Enit Karafili Steiner is Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland.

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