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Period: to
Life
Birthday and death date -
First Schooling
Cassandra and Jane Austen are sent to Oxford, England to be educated by a private tutor named Ann Cawley. Both girls contract typhoid fever during an outbreak and return home to Steventon. -
Boarding School
Austen enrolls in boarding school at Abbey School in Reading. -
Home School
The family's money runs out and Austen returns to Steventon from boarding school. The rest of her education is completed at home from her father's voluminous library. Austen lives with her parents and sister for the rest of her life. -
Lady Susan
Austen begins Lady Susan, a novella told in the form of a series of letters. She works on it for two years. -
Austen's First "Love"
Austen meets Tom LeFroy, an Irish law student who is the nephew of her neighbor. Austen and LeFroy spend time together during his month-long visit to Steventon. He leaves in January 1796 and soon becomes engaged to someone else, ending whatever relationship they had. Austen writes affectionately of LeFroy to her sister, prompting later speculation that he is the real-life inspiration for her male characters. -
First Novel Attempt
Austen completes the first draft of First Impressions, the novel that later becomes Pride and Prejudice. -
An Indecent Proposal
Just before her 27th birthday, Jane Austen receives her only marriage proposal. A recent Oxford grad named Harris Bigg-Wither proposes to Austen while she is visiting his sisters. Realizing that the marriage would be good for her family's circumstances, Austen accepts. The next morning, however, she changes her mind and withdraws her acceptance. Bigg-Wither marries two years later; Austen never does. -
Austen Falls on Hard Times
Jane's father William George Austen dies, leaving his wife and sisters financially dependent on his sons. The Austen women first rent a house in Bath, then move in with Jane's brother Frank and his wife. -
Period: to
Career
The active period of Jane Austen career. -
First book
First published book, Sense and Sensibility -
Final Novels
Austen's final novels, Persuasion and Northanger Abbey (a rewrite of the unpublished novel Susan), are posthumously published together in one volume. A biographical note by her brother Henry publicly identifies her for the first time as the author of her previous novels.
