Message-ID: <19926383.1075846761684.JavaMail.evans@thyme>
Date: Thu, 11 May 2000 04:55:00 -0700 (PDT)
From: susan.scott@enron.com
To: benjamin.freeman@enron.com
Subject: How can you not be a fan?
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Today we remember Jane Austen, the British writer born on this date in 1775=
.=20
Austen depreciated herself as a "miniaturist" and a domestic novelist of=20
restricted scope, but her literary legacy is large. She was also able to la=
y=20
self-deprecation aside, however, and in Northanger Abbey she declared that=
=20
novels -- her chosen genre -- are works in which "the greatest powers of th=
e=20
mind are displayed, in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, t=
he=20
happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and=
=20
humour are conveyed to the world in the best chosen language."=01(

Austen's work brims with general statements that are contradicted by the=20
people in her stories. For instance, Pride and Prejudice opens by noting th=
at=20
"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of=
 a=20
good fortune, must be in want of a wife." The book then describes Mrs.=20
Bennett, mother of a household full of marriageable daughters as "a woman o=
f=20
mean understanding, little information, and uncertain temper." As Austen=20
acquaints us with the tale of each daughter's engagements, she=20
wonders,                    "For what do we live, but to make sport for our=
=20
neighbors and  laugh at them in our turn?"As Austen acquaints us with the=
=20
tale of each daughter's engagements, she wonders, "For what do we live, but=
=20
to make sport for our neighbors and laugh at them in our turn?"