Jane Austen was an English novelist known primarily for her six novels, which implicitly interpret, critique, and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots often explore the dependence of women on marriage for the pursuit of favourable social standing and economic security. Her works are an implicit critique of the novels of sensibility of the second half of the 18th century and are part of the transition to 19th-century literary realism. Her deft use of social commentary, realism and biting irony have earned her acclaim among critics and scholars.
Barbara Mary Crampton Pym was an English novelist. In the 1950s she published a series of social comedies, of which the best known are Excellent Women (1952) and A Glass of Blessings (1958). In 1977 her career was revived when the critic Lord David Cecil and the poet Philip Larkin both nominated her as the most underrated writer of the century. Her novel Quartet in Autumn (1977) was nominated for the Booker Prize that year, and she was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
Arthur Evelyn St. John Waugh was an English writer of novels, biographies, and travel books; he was also a prolific journalist and book reviewer. His most famous works include the early satires Decline and Fall (1928) and A Handful of Dust (1934), the novel Brideshead Revisited (1945), and the Second World War trilogy Sword of Honour (1952–1961). He is recognised as one of the great prose stylists of the English language in the 20th century.
The English novel is an important part of English literature. This article mainly concerns novels, written in English, by novelists who were born or have spent a significant part of their lives in England, Scotland, Wales, or Northern Ireland. However, given the nature of the subject, this guideline has been applied with common sense, and reference is made to novels in other languages or novelists who are not primarily British, where appropriate.
Brideshead Revisited: The Sacred & Profane Memories of Captain Charles Ryder is a novel by the English writer Evelyn Waugh, first published in 1945. It follows, from the 1920s to the early 1940s, the life and romances of Charles Ryder, especially his friendship with the Flytes, a family of wealthy English Catholics who live in a palatial mansion, Brideshead Castle. Ryder has relationships with two of the Flytes: Lord Sebastian and Lady Julia. The novel explores themes including Catholicism and nostalgia for the age of English aristocracy. A well-received television adaptation of the novel was produced in an 11-part miniseries by Granada Television in 1981. In 2008, it was adapted as a film.
William Lygon, 7th Earl Beauchamp,, styled Viscount Elmley until 1891, was a British Liberal politician. He was Governor of New South Wales between 1899 and 1901, a member of the Liberal administrations of Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman and H. H. Asquith between 1905 and 1915, and leader of the Liberal Party in the House of Lords between 1924 and 1931. When political enemies threatened to make his homosexuality public, he resigned from office to go into exile. Lord Beauchamp is often assumed to be the model for the character Lord Marchmain in Evelyn Waugh's novel Brideshead Revisited.
Kathleen Agnes Cavendish, Marchioness of Hartington, also known as "Kick" Kennedy, was an American socialite. She was the second daughter of Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. and Rose Fitzgerald, a sister of U.S. President John F. Kennedy and Senators Robert F. Kennedy and Ted Kennedy, and the wife of the Marquess of Hartington, heir apparent to the 10th Duke of Devonshire.
Sir Andrew Jonathan Bate, CBE, FBA, FRSL, is a British academic, biographer, critic, broadcaster, scholar, and occasional novelist, playwright and poet. He specializes in Shakespeare, Romanticism and ecocriticism. He is Regents Professor of Literature and Foundation Professor of Environmental Humanities in a joint appointment in the Department of English in The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and the School of Sustainability in the Global Futures Laboratory at Arizona State University, as well as a Senior Research Fellow at Worcester College, Oxford, where he holds the title of Professor of English Literature. Bate was Provost of Worcester College from 2011 to 2019. From 2017 to 2019 he was Gresham Professor of Rhetoric in the City of London. He was knighted in 2015 for services to literary scholarship and higher education. He is also Chair of the Hawthornden Foundation.
Mansfield Park is the third published novel by the English author Jane Austen, first published in 1814 by Thomas Egerton. A second edition was published in 1816 by John Murray, still within Austen's lifetime. The novel did not receive any public reviews until 1821.
Dido Elizabeth Belle was a free black biracial British gentlewoman. She was born into slavery and illegitimate; her mother, Maria Belle, was an enslaved Black woman in the British West Indies. Her father was Sir John Lindsay, a British career naval officer who was stationed there; later knighted and promoted to admiral. Lindsay took Belle with him when he returned to England in 1765, entrusting her upbringing to his uncle William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield, and his wife Elizabeth Murray, Countess of Mansfield. The Murrays educated Belle, bringing her up as a free gentlewoman at their Kenwood House, together with another great-niece, Lady Elizabeth Murray, whose mother had died. Lady Elizabeth and Belle were second cousins. Belle lived there for 30 years. In his will of 1793, Lord Mansfield provided an outright sum and an annuity to her.
Mansfield Park is a 2007 British television film directed by Iain B. MacDonald and starring Billie Piper, Michelle Ryan, and Blake Ritson. Adapted from Jane Austen's classic 1814 novel of the same name, the film is about Fanny Price, who is sent by her poor mother to live with wealthy relatives at their Mansfield estate. By the age of eighteen, Fanny is in love with her sensitive cousin who is studying to be a clergyman. Her feelings for him and her moral sense prevent her from accepting a marriage proposal from a much wealthier suitor.
The Sweet Dove Died is a novel by Barbara Pym, first published in 1978. The title is a quotation from a poem, "I Had a Dove", by John Keats.
Henry Crawford is one of the main characters in Jane Austen's 1814 novel, Mansfield Park. He is depicted as a man who, though not conventionally handsome, has great charisma. He is lively, witty and charming, a great asset at dinner parties, and admired by nearly all. Henry and his sister bring a fresh energy to the rather dour and oppressive atmosphere of Mansfield Park. At Sotherton his potential for disruption begins to emerge.
Edmund Bertram is a lead character in Jane Austen's 1814 novel Mansfield Park. He is Sir Thomas's second son and plans to be ordained as a clergyman. He falls in love with Mary Crawford who constantly challenges his vocation. Edmund goes ahead with ordination. At the end of the novel he marries Fanny Price.
Mary Crawford is a major character in Jane Austen's 1814 novel, Mansfield Park. Mary is depicted as attractive, caring and charismatic. The reader is gradually shown, often through the eyes of Fanny Price, a hidden, darker side to Mary's personality. Her wit disguises her superficiality and her charisma disguises her self-centredness. Edmund Bertram, an earnest young man and destined for the clergy falls deeply in love with her. Only at the end of the novel does reality overcome his romantic fantasies and he leaves her with deep regret.
The Temple at Thatch was an unpublished novel by the British author Evelyn Waugh, his first adult attempt at full-length fiction. He began writing it in 1924 at the end of his final year as an undergraduate at Hertford College, Oxford, and continued to work on it intermittently in the following 12 months. After his friend Harold Acton commented unfavourably on the draft in June 1925, Waugh burned the manuscript. In a fit of despondency from this and other personal disappointments he began a suicide attempt before experiencing what he termed "a sharp return to good sense".
Belle is a 2013 British period drama film directed by Amma Asante, written by Misan Sagay and produced by Damian Jones. It stars Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Tom Wilkinson, Miranda Richardson, Penelope Wilton, Sam Reid, Matthew Goode, Emily Watson, Sarah Gadon, Tom Felton, and James Norton.
Eimer Ní Mhaoldomhnaigh is an Irish costume designer. Much of her career has been in Irish and British-Irish productions, such as Michael Collins (1996), The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006), Brideshead Revisited (2008), Ondine (2009), The Guard (2011), Calvary (2014), The Rhythm Section (2020), Foundation (2021), and The Banshees of Inisherin (2022). She has been nominated eleven times for Best Costume Design from the Irish Film & Television Academy, winning for The Rhythm Section. Other nominations include Emmy, Critics Choice, and Satellite Awards. Eimer was elected to AMPAS in 2020.
Daisy Florence Dunn is an English author and classicist.
Jane Mulvagh is an Irish-born journalist and social historian, specialising in British history. She is best known for her history of Madresfield Court, the English country house upon which Evelyn Waugh based his novel Brideshead Revisited.
