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The Daily Jane Austen

A Year of Quotes

Edited and with a Foreword by Devoney Looser
It is a truth universally acknowledged that Jane Austen is eminently, delightfully, and delectably quotable. This truth goes far beyond the first line of Pride and Prejudice, which has muscled out many other excellent sentences. So many gems of wit and wisdom from her novels deserve to be better known, from Northanger Abbey on its lovable, naive heroine—“if adventures will not befal a young lady in her own village, she must seek them abroad”—to Persuasion’s moving lines of love from its regret-filled hero: “You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late.”
 
Devoney Looser, a.k.a. Stone Cold Jane Austen, has drawn 378 genuine, Austen-authored passages from across the canon, resulting in an anthology that is compulsively readable and repeatable. Whether you approach the collection on a one-a-day model or in a satisfying binge read, you will emerge wiser about Austen, if not about life. The Daily Jane Austen will amuse and inspire skeptical beginners, Janeite experts, and every reader in between by showcasing some of the greatest sentences ever crafted in the history of fiction.

208 pages | 4 1/2 x 7 1/4 | © 2019

A Year of Quotes

Fiction

Literature and Literary Criticism: British and Irish Literature

Reviews

"A pleasure perhaps indirectly offered by The Daily Austen is the opportunity it provides to think again about the notorious misquotation of Austen’s works, without proper consideration of the original context—and the equally rampant misattribution of witticisms to her, as in the frequent instances when lines spoken in contemporary films are credited to her. Before reading all of the wonderful quotations shared in Looser’s book, the reader is poised to learn a great deal from the foreword. It is a gem both for its guidance in thinking about the act of Austen quotation and for its contextualization of quotation as an eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century practice. . . . Looser has compiled a compendium of Austen snippets that invite readers to come for the Austen treasure-trove, but stay for a deeper reflection on Austen’s 'creative genius.'"

Eighteenth-Century Studies

"Delightful. . . . Some [quotations] are the briefest little bons mots, others provide a satisfying chunk of Austen to illuminate your day. And just to put the icing on this delicious little cake, editor Devoney Looser has provided a witty and affectionate foreword. I'll be buying this gem for all the Austen fans in my life."

Jane Austen's Regency World

 "Pocket-sized at 4.5 x 7.2 inches, slip this into your reticule and pop it out when you need an escape from the dental drill. I can think of nothing better to put me in my happy place."

Austenprose

"Before I even power up, I read a quote from Austen scholar Devoney Looser’s The Daily Jane Austen . . . . This is a must for any Janeite’s desk, bedside table, kitchen counter . . . or wherever you start your day."

The Quill Ink

"This slim volume is the perfect stocking stuffer for the Janeite in your life. . . . At under 200 pages, it packs a lot of pleasure in a fast read."

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