Rating: 
Summary: Not a book I would recommend at all
Review: I have read at least 4 or 5 biographies of Jane Austen, and this one was a waste of paper. Ms. Myer spends a great deal of time reporting verbatim what Jane Austen says in her letters. Having read Jane Austen's letters, (which are readily available in many editions), they are much more interesting than Ms. Myer's transcription of them. Whether she intended it or not, Ms. Myer comes across as petty and spiteful. This book was not a pleasant read as to content. Also, it was not very well written. I was highly disappointed in it.
Rating: 
Summary: A nice try but better books on Austen exist
Review: I think Valerie Grovesnor Myer has made a nice stab at trying to write to a biography of Austen and she succeeds relatively well. The only trouble biographies of Austen are all drawn from the same material - very little new material has been turned up in recent years and so biographers are forced to reinterpret the old sources to find a new angle. And that really is what this author has done - with only moderate success.She has 24 chapters, mostly chronological although really the complaint that this is mostly about Austen's family than Austen herself bears through - especially in the first nine chapters. To make her book different again Myer has attempted to find biographical incidents from Austen's own life to explain incidents in her novels. Not a bad thing to do - but I found it overpowering at times - as though she were just going from one incident to another - and sometimes I felt her examples used weren't good ones. For instance she likened Jane Austens' brother Edward's adoption by the Knights as being like Fanny Price's living with the Bertrams in her 'Mansfield Park'. Which is not at all the same situation. In the novel Fanny lived with the family but was never adopted by them. In real life, Edward adopted the new surname of Knight and eventually inherited a large estate and fortune from it. The whole situation in fact reminds one of Frank Churchill in 'Emma' - Frank Weston is adopted by his aunt, Mrs Churchill, adopts her name and becomes her heir. It seems that is a much better example - why did Myer use the much less satisfactory one? Another point is that she shows that she has read various books on Austen (for instance Deidre Le Faye's collected letters of Austen) but doesn't seem to have done much research outside of those on the history of the period. Myer cites a letter from Austen to her neice Fanny Knight in which she talks of the whole race of 'Pagets'. Myer has clearly used the footnote which is in Le Faye's edition of the letters to explain this remark about Austen's dislike of the Pagets - explaining about Lord Paget's (later Marquess of Anglesey) elopement with Lady Charlotte Wellesley. What both Le Faye and Myer miss is that the year before this elopement there was another High profile Paget elopement when Lord Paget's brother eloped with Lady Boringdon. A little extra research on Myer's part would have revealed this fact. I found the book interesting though for Myer's interpretation, but I wouldn't pick it by choice. If you are looking for a really good biography of Jane - Park Honan's is much better - or Claire Tomalin's. There are other great books on the history of the time you can read - Maggie Lane is great - and Deidre Le Faye's collection of letters is fabulous. So there is a lot of much better material out there. But if this is all you can get hold of - well it would do in a pinch.
Rating: 
Summary: intended for Austen beginners
Review: I was instructed by my publisher to avoid literary criticism and aim at an audience who knew nothing about Austen. The book was INTRODUCTORY for people who knew nothing of Jane's letters
Rating: 
Summary: Not satisfying
Review: I would buy this book if it were on a discount table because of the scraps of information about country life in the late Georgian period and if I could not get a copy of Jane Austen's letters; but I would rather buy a book about each than this book about both. It's hardly a dime novel; it's a list of her visits her family and her friends. The prose sounds like: Jane went here. Jane wrote to her sister who was staying there. Jane disliked one sister-in-law. Jane liked another sister in law. I think the reason a sillouette of Jane is on the cover is that the reader is treated to a bio of a shadow person. There is nothing in Jane's life above the daily commonplace lot here; yet there must have been something within Jane or in the way Jane saw her surroundings that was not commonplace to her because Jane's novels are not commonplace to us. As to any - ahem - kennel comparisons: a Jane Austen novel is like a well prepared pitcher of lemonade - enough sugar and water to soften the juice but not enough to subdue it. Why shouldn't her family letters be the same? I don't think this author dislikes Jane. I know many tart tongued women and enjoy their conversation (when I'm not the subject of it). They're usually very wise and dicerning. This book cried out for foot/end notes that tied the above scraps of info to a source - either to a letter or a book in the Selected Bibliography (why "selected"?) so they can be verified. It's not good for study purposes.
Rating: 
Summary: The suffering artist....
Review: Just above her grave in Wincester Cathedral is written, "In the beginning was the word..." I am convinced that no one has ever written English prose narrative as well as Jane Austen. In her book, 'Jane Austen, Obstinate Heart' Valerie Grosvenor Myer takes the reader behind the scenes into the private life of this remarkable author. Using correspondence, diaries, and the memoirs of Jane Austen and her family and friends, Ms. Myer constructs a biography that helps the reader understand Austen's day-to-day existence 200 years ago--the environment that formed her and inspired her creative process. She lived a life of genteel poverty--barely made genteel by the kindness of her brothers and friends. She worked hard--in an age when the mangle was just invented, irons were heated on the fireplace, and woman's work was never done, she and her mother and sister could not always get the help they needed. She worried about money, reworked old clothes to make them last, lacked good food at times, was cold at times, and wanted for many material comforts. And yet, she managed without the aid of a computer or even a typewriter, to produce six of the world's greatest novels. This book will appeal to women more so than men because it concerns issues that have affected women more. Most women have faced some form of discrimination or deprivation, or know of the deprivation of other women--lack of food, lack of clothing, fear, depression, an inability to control one's reproductive life, and poverty. Austen was aware of women's struggles--her own and those of family and friends. She watched five sisters-in-law succomb to early deaths owing to childbearing. Austen's books center on the struggles of heroines to make lives for themselves in what is essentially a man's world. Although this book doesn't discuss Austen's books in any depth, it certainly illuminates the links between the life of the author and her characters. It's an excellent book. It made me cry.
Rating:
Summary: The suffering artist....
Review: Just above her grave in Wincester Cathedral is written, "In the beginning was the word..." I am convinced that no one has ever written English prose narrative as well as Jane Austen. In her book, 'Jane Austen, Obstinate Heart' Valerie Grosvenor Myer takes the reader behind the scenes into the private life of this remarkable author. Using correspondence, diaries, and the memoirs of Jane Austen and her family and friends, Ms. Myer constructs a biography that helps the reader understand Austen's day-to-day existence 200 years ago--the environment that formed her and inspired her creative process. She lived a life of genteel poverty--barely made genteel by the kindness of her brothers and friends. She worked hard--in an age when the mangle was just invented, irons were heated on the fireplace, and woman's work was never done, she and her mother and sister could not always get the help they needed. She worried about money, reworked old clothes to make them last, lacked good food at times, was cold at times, and wanted for many material comforts. And yet, she managed without the aid of a computer or even a typewriter, to produce six of the world's greatest novels. This book will appeal to women more so than men because it concerns issues that have affected women more. Most women have faced some form of discrimination or deprivation, or know of the deprivation of other women--lack of food, lack of clothing, fear, depression, an inability to control one's reproductive life, and poverty. Austen was aware of women's struggles--her own and those of family and friends. She watched five sisters-in-law succomb to early deaths owing to childbearing. Austen's books center on the struggles of heroines to make lives for themselves in what is essentially a man's world. Although this book doesn't discuss Austen's books in any depth, it certainly illuminates the links between the life of the author and her characters. It's an excellent book. It made me cry.
Rating:
Summary: The suffering artist....
Review: Just above her grave in Wincester Cathedral is written, "In the beginning was the word..." I am convinced that no one has ever written English prose narrative as well as Jane Austen. In her book, 'Jane Austen, Obstinate Heart' Valerie Grosvenor Myer takes the reader behind the scenes into the private life of this remarkable author. Using correspondence, diaries, and the memoirs of Jane Austen and her family and friends, Ms. Myer constructs a biography that helps the reader understand Austen's day-to-day existence 200 years ago--the environment that formed her and inspired her creative process. She lived a life of genteel poverty--barely made genteel by the kindness of her brothers and friends. She worked hard--in an age when the mangle was just invented, irons were heated on the fireplace, and woman's work was never done, she and her mother and sister could not always get the help they needed. She worried about money, reworked old clothes to make them last, lacked good food at times, was cold at times, and wanted for many material comforts. And yet, she managed without the aid of a computer or even a typewriter, to produce six of the world's greatest novels. This book will appeal to women more so than men because it concerns issues that have affected women more. Most women have faced some form of discrimination or deprivation, or know of the deprivation of other women--lack of food, lack of clothing, fear, depression, an inability to control one's reproductive life, and poverty. Austen was aware of women's struggles--her own and those of family and friends. She watched five sisters-in-law succomb to early deaths owing to childbearing. Austen's books center on the struggles of heroines to make lives for themselves in what is essentially a man's world. Although this book doesn't discuss Austen's books in any depth, it certainly illuminates the links between the life of the author and her characters. It's an excellent book. It made me cry.
Rating:
Summary: Actually "0" Stars
Review: This book is not worth buying or spending time on. I have read several biographies on Jane Austen and some phrases of the book seem directly lifted from these. Besides this, it is sloppy with inappropriate word usage such as "bitchy" to describe Austen in one paragraph. One would think a biographer of Jane Austen would be inpired to write with as much polish as one could but this biographer seems to have written with haste and little depth of thought.
Rating:
Summary: Actually "0" Stars
Review: This book reads like a dime novel in search of a discount. Facetious, petty and juvenile. It will soon end up rightfully in the 70% discounted bin alongside autobiography of Dick Cavet
Rating:
Summary: a dreadfull schoolgirl account
Review: This book reads like a dime novel in search of a discount. Facetious, petty and juvenile. It will soon end up rightfully in the 70% discounted bin alongside autobiography of Dick Cavet
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