Jane Austen in 41 Objects and The Limits of Biography // Professor Kathryn Sutherland

Despite all the biographies written, Jane Austen is in significant ways unknowable. Her family did their best to obliterate all personal traces and, instead, to recreate her as a cosy Victorian spinster aunt living in shy retirement in the Hampshire countryside. Their portrait was clearly untrue; but what is true? Jane Austen in 41 Objects summarises a life in 41 objects, acknowledging that no life can be fully known or recorded. At the same time, objects – material things – help us get a handle on someone, to feel close. Objects are points of connection with another person and prompts for the imagination. Each one suggests an entrance into a possible view on a life: a muslin shawl, a wallpaper fragment, a London front door, a writing table, a theatre bill, even Mr Darcy’s shirt. These are objects with their own stories. In a sense, then, Jane Austen’s life becomes a moment in the lives of these objects. Professor Kathryn Sutherland is in conversation with Samuel Fanous, Head of Publishing at Bodleian Library Publishing, discussing this book and the limitations of biography. This talk is hosted by the Friends of the Bodleian. Speaker Professor Kathryn Sutherland is a Senior Research Fellow at St Anne's College, Oxford. Recent publications include Why Modern Manuscripts Matter (OUP, 2022), a study of the politics, the commerce, and the aesthetics of literary heritage culture; and an edition of Jane Austen's manuscript fiction, Lady Susan, The Watsons, and Sanditon (OUP, 2021. She is a patron of Jane Austen's House in Chawton, a trustee of Friends of the Nations' Libraries, and a trustee of the British Library Collections Trust. Samuel Fanous is Head of Publishing at Bodleian Library Publishing.