Sheila's Australian Book Tour

Jane among the koalas

Ready for the book tour

Who could refuse an invitation to speak to Jane Austen Societies in Australia at a time of year when Nova Scotia is buffeted by icy gales and often buried in snow? Yet it was not a matter of weather that was the deciding factor. The Jane Austen Societies in Australia are known for their keen interest in all things Austen, their impressive scholarship and their welcoming spirit. Between the 8th and 23rd February, I was delighted to spend time with them. I spoke about my book, Jane Austen’s Transatlantic Sister, in Brisbane, the Southern Highlands (Bowral), Sydney, Newcastle and Melbourne. My husband, Hugh, accompanied me. 

Speaking in Sydney

Sydney was a focal point of the book tour, both as a transportation point and the largest gathering - 150 members of JASA. There I shared the stage with Susannah Fullerton, author of Happily Ever After: Celebrating Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, A Dance with Jane Austen and Jane and I: A Tale of Austen Addiction, who conducted the AGM of JASA prior to my talk. It was Susannah who initially invited me to speak in Australia and she proved to be a wonderful host and helpful advisor on all aspects during the book tour. A delicious tea followed the talk, a pattern repeated with much panache in Brisbane and elsewhere. 

Mixing with the marsupials

Brisbane provided a warm welcome (in 36 degree’s heat), dinner with the local Jane Austen committee and most hospitable accommodation with Barbara O’Rourke. A strong turnout of 90 members came to hear about Fanny Palmer Austen. While in Queensland Hugh and I made the acquaintance of koalas, kangaroos, wombats, echidnas, and cassowaries at the justly famous Australia Zoo and enjoyed exploring Brisbane on the Water Cat, a convenient form of transport on the river. 

The Bowral meeting took place in the beautiful and delightfully cooler area of the Southern Highlands, located between Sydney and Canberra. A small, but enthusiastic group showed a marked interest in Fanny Palmer Austen and the narrative of her transatlantic life at sea and on shore. We enjoyed several meals with the local committee members and two scenic drives to nearby villages. I saw my first poisonous snake, which fortunately showed no interest in me. 

Lunch with Janeites in the Southern Highlands

Historic Morpeth, NSW

In Newcastle the Hunter Region were great hosts and an attentive audience. Pamela Whalan made us very welcome in her home. I happily traded books with Pamela, who has adapted all six of Jane Austen’s novels for the stage. Pamela also took us on a very interesting day’s drive, exploring the Hunter River valley as far as Maitland and historic Morpeth 

The last stop was Melbourne. Here I was impressed by the range of ages and interests of JAS Melbourne. That college age students met to discuss Jane Austen with members as old as 93 proves Austen’s appeal to the young, the old and all in between. The Melbourne committee arranged a happy dinner after my talk at which there was lots of additional chat. Before leaving Melbourne, Hugh and I had a wonderful day out with Margaret Baulch (a direct descendent of Charles Austen) who took us to the Healsville Animal Sanctuary and the fascinating William Ricketts Sculpture Garden at Mount Dandenong. 

As we departed for home, I learned that JASA is planning a study day on “Jane Austen & Art,” on 29 June, and news that JASA hopes to host Adrian Lukis, the actor who played George Wickham in the 1995 film version of Pride and Prejudice, for a programme in Sydney titled “Being Mr Wickham.” These are only two events of what looks like a vibrant year for the Jane Austen Societies of Australia. Would that they were not over 16,000 km away from my home base in Halifax, Nova Scotia! I close in gratitude for the new friendships and many enjoyments which enriched my book tour. My heartfelt thanks go to all those who hosted and assisted me and my husband along the way. 

Growing up as a Reader: Some Literary Likes

I cannot imagine life without the magic of novels. At age four, I entered the world of Peter Rabbit. I loved the first line of The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies, with its initial caution that “the effect of eating too much lettuce is soporific.” “Soporific” sounded so compelling, so strongly suggestive of a state of affairs not to be taken lightly. And the word was fun to say, to repeat for the sheer pleasure of the sounds. I found myself drawn into tales of adventurous about naughty rabbits and I was motivated to learn to read these tales for myself. The Peter Rabbit stories, with their charming illustrations, remain among the most loved books of my childhood.

As a teenager I discovered Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. I immediately bonded with Lizzy Bennet, the witty, intelligent and empathetic heroine, who in the course of the novel achieves a nice balance of self awareness and insight into human behaviour. She had the courage to admit when her own opinions were ill judged which I realized was an important lesson for me to take on board. I followed her love life with fascination and rejoiced when she and Mr. Darcy are promised a happy future together. From the prospective of a teenage reader, I had discovered a compelling romance with an absorbing plot, and attractive and amusing characters. This was a book to reread and savour and it was for some time my favourite Austen novel.

My allegiance to Jane Austen remains but Persuasion has replaced Pride and Prejudice as my favourite. Persuasion bears the marks of her mature genius and introduces a sensitive, introspective yet engaging heroine, Anne Elliot, who greatly regrets breaking off her engagement to the enterprising, self assured naval captain, Frederick Wentworth, eight years earlier. I became fascinated with the subtle intricacies of Anne’s self examination of her own disappointment and her efforts to be open to the needs of others, even in the face of her own unhappiness. I was caught up in the suspense of the plot, as Austen describes Anne’s initially fragile but increasingly strengthening hope that she may yet find happiness with Captain Wentworth. I admired and continue to admire Austen’s remarkable ability to capture her characters personalities through their distinctive idiolects, their ways of speaking. This is also a book with a special place in my life: in times of trouble, of worry or uncertainty, it absorbs, it distracts and comforts me.                                                                  

Along with my fascination with Austen, I have enjoyed the rich narratives of Dickens, marvelled at the raw power of the Bröntes, and admired the clever plots and convincing characters of Penelope Lively and Maggie O’Farrell. Among other writers, Penelope Fitzgerald (1916-2000), author of Booker prize winner, Offshore (1979) and nine other novels, stands out for me. I first read Fitzgerald in the early nineteen eighties and immediately became a fan. The pleasure in reading her novels derives from her captivating and mesmerizing style of writing, highly original plots and characters, vivid and compelling settings, endings which are sometimes surprising and unexpected.

Like Austen, Fitzgerald is scrupulous about the accuracy and appropriateness of small contextual details that illuminate her narrative. One such detail surprised and delighted me. In Offshore, the Canadian heroine, Nenna, is caught off guard by an unexpected telephone call from her sister Louise. She tries to defuse the uncomfortable tone of their exchange by a seemingly innocent question about the availability of lobster sandwiches at Harris’s, a restaurant apparently well known to them both. According to Hermione Lee’s biography, Penelope Fitzgerald: A Life (2013), Fitzgerald, on her one visit to Nova Scotia must have passed through Yarmouth on her way to Halifax from where she sailed back to England. I surmise that Fitzgerald visited the real Harris’s restaurant and chowed down their signature sandwich. She tucked away her memory of it, only to use it effectively twenty-five years later in the sisterly dialogue in Offshore. As I know both Harris’s and their justly famous sandwich from personal experience, I appreciate Fitzgerald’s genius in enhancing the authenticity of her character with the inclusion of this tiny but telling contextual detail. I like to think I have had a brief glimpse into Fitzgerald’s creative process and thus made a connection with the author herself.

In my own experiences as a writer, there has been a circle back to Austen and Persuasion. Persuasion is a novel with naval theme and characters, both of which are handled with authenticity by Austen. It has been said that Jane Austen got the naval details correct in her novels because of her close connections with her two officer brothers, Captains Francis and Charles. But there is more to the story. Some years ago, I became interested in the North American phase of Charles Austen’s naval career (1805-1811), when I discovered he had spent considerable time in my home city, the port town of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Finding out about Charles eventually led me to intriguing details about his Bermuda-born young wife, Fanny Palmer Austen. Here was a story waiting to be told, a narrative about a spirited and resilient young woman who made a home for Charles and their daughters aboard a working naval vessel and developed a supportive relationship with Jane Austen. I have been excited by the discovery of this connection to explore the extent to which Fanny was a source of information and inspiration for the novelist when she created the female naval characters in Persuasion. Little did I expect, when I first came to love Persuasion that I would much later return to it with a different interest and perspective, that was in the course of writing my own book Jane Austen’s Transatlantic Sister: The Life and Letters of Fanny Palmer Austen.

First posted on https://bookscombined.com