Friday 28 March 2014

Will the real Jane Austen please step forward...

Molesey-based author Nicholas Ennos has an interesting theory about who really wrote Jane Austen's famous novels! He will be at Molesey Library to give a talk on Tuesday April 29th, so please come along, ask a question and see if you are convinced.

Jane Austen: genius or fraud?
It was recently announced that Jane Austen’s portrait will appear on the Bank of England’s next £10 note, a further accolade for one of our finest and best-loved novelists. But are we actually celebrating the right woman? According to Molesey-based author, Nicholas Ennos, the answer is NO!

After 10 years’ research, Nicholas has recently published his book, Jane Austen – A New Revelation, which sets out to challenge whether a poor, uneducated woman like Jane with no experience of sex or marriage could really have been the author of works such as Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility.

Much supporting evidence – including the language, style of writing and locations used in the novels - is presented to support his challenge to the authorship of the novels, published anonymously at the time but later attributed to Jane Austen. But, if not Jane, then who? Nicholas is convinced that we need look no further than Eliza de Feuillide, Jane’s Austen’s cousin and later sister-in-law.

In contrast to Jane, a retiring spinster, Eliza was a married lady of the highest intellect whose education was supervised by her natural father, Warren Hastings - Governor General of India, politician, linguist, translator, poet and man of letters.

Eliza’s exciting life began in Calcutta and took in the court of Marie Antoinette, the execution of her first husband by guillotine during the French Revolution, travels through France, and connections with many of the leading literary figures of the London of the day. Nicholas argues that Eliza had the talent and experience to author the novels but that her illegitimate birth prevented her from publishing them under her own name, something which would have brought shame upon her family.

Whilst continuing with his day job as a solicitor, Nicholas continues his research and is passionate about his championship of Eliza de Feuillide as a major, if unrecognised, contributor to English literature. We are delighted that Nicholas has agreed to come along to Molesey Library on April 29th 2014 at 7.30pm to
tell us more about his intriguing ideas and controversial conclusions.

Tickets for the event are £5 – which includes a glass of wine or soft drink – and they can be purchased at Molesey Library. Alternatively, you can send a cheque (made payable to Friends of Molesey Library) with a stamped addressed envelope, to Author Event, Molesey Library, Walton Rd, West Molesey KT8

And there's more...

Nicholas Ennos’s talk on Tuesday April 29th will be the first in a series of author events which Molesey Library is planning to hold this year. Two further dates for your diary are:

  • Tuesday June 24th - Travel Writing and Novels by Jonathan Buckley 
  • Tuesday September 30th - The Pursuit of Motherhood by Jessica Hepburn 

Further details of these and other future events will be sent out in due course.
By Carol Parker

1 comment:

  1. Dear Carol Parker---
    I wonder if you'd be so kind as to give me Nicholas Ennos's email address, or alternatively to forward this email to him?
    . . I watched 'Sanditon' in a half-hearted way, and would like (if you write one) to post a review by you on my site. Unaltered, your copyright, with a link. The thing appears to be complete BS, and it seemed the least I can do. Email me at e.g. raetowest@protonmail.org (I have several emails). Either way is no problem. I used to live in Ashford, Middx and have rather sad memories. Sigh.
    Regards
    Rae West (of big-lies.org)

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for your comments. We will review and post them to the website if appropriate.