Jane Austen fan fiction

Cover of Old Friends and New Fancies, by Sybil Brinton, considered to be the first work of Austen fan-fiction. (1913)
Pride & Prejudice-fiction

Jane Austen fan fiction is the collection of numerous sequels and spin-offs produced by authors who have either used the plot of Austen's original novels, or have extended them, to produce new works of fiction. Austen's posthumous popularity has inspired fan fiction that runs the gamut through numerous genres, but the most concentrated medium has remained the novel.[1] According to Pucci and Thompson in their 2003 survey on the contemporary evolution of Jane Austen's work, at the turn of the 20th century (over 150 years after the final publication of her first collected works), over one hundred sequels, rewritings, and continuations of her novels had been published.[2]

Pride and Prejudice accounted for the majority of published Austen-inspired books, at 900 total, and all six novels and three minor works are represented in published Jane Austen fan fiction (JAFF). The number of unpublished Austen-inspired stories on various JAFF sites at least doubles that number. They have continued to remain popular well into the 21st century, with modern adaptations reaching as high as third on The New York Times Best Seller list[3] However, opinions remain mixed in regard to the liberties taken by authors when modifying or adding to the existing canon of Austen literature. While audiences have responded well commercially to various novels, critics have argued that transposing new work onto of the frame provided by Austen adulterates the genre.[4][5] For example, while Dr. Lynda A. Hall is wary of how JAFF and adaptations of Jane Austen's novels distort the public's understanding of the original texts, she also believes that there is value in studying popular culture's representations of Austen's works.[6]

  1. ^ Todd, Janet. Jane Austen in Context (The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Jane Austen). New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Print.
  2. ^ Pucci and Thompson, Jane Austen and Co.: Remaking the Past in Contemporary Culture. Albany, New York: State University Of New York Press, 2003. Print.
  3. ^ "Jane Austen in zombie rampage up the book charts". the Guardian. 9 April 2009. Retrieved 30 November 2022.
  4. ^ Andrew Wright,Jane Austen Adapted. Nineteenth-Century Fiction, Vol. 30, No. 3, pgs 421–453. Print
  5. ^ "Review: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith". ComicMix. 28 April 2009. Retrieved 12 September 2017.
  6. ^ Hall, Lynda A. (Winter 2019). ""Flipping the Jane Austen Classroom"". Texas Studies in Literature and Language. 61 (4): 416–433. doi:10.7560/TSLL61406. S2CID 211677125 – via Project Muse.