today's drive-by quote is something I think I need to put in a fic sometime

[ariadnes_string]

Re: the therapeutic value of reading Jane Austen:

"H.F. Brett Smith, an Oxford tutor, served in World War I as an adviser in British Hospitals. His special responsibility was the prescription of salubrious reading for the wounded, and he recommended Austen's novels to "severely shell-shocked" veterans."

(I can see this happening at Downton Abbey--perhaps not with the desired results)

Comments

[yourlibrarian]

Are you by any chance quoting from that new book "everything I learned about life, I learned from Jane Austen" book?

[ariadnes_string]

lol--no! that's the first I've heard of that book--must check it out.

I'm quoting from Claudia Johnson, "The Divine Miss Jane: Jane Austen, Janeites, and the Discipline of Novel Studies" Boundary 2 23: 3 (1996), though she's citing the research of Christopher Kent.

[yourlibrarian]

I couldn't remember the exact book name so I went to look it up:
A Jane Austen Education: How Six Novels Taught Me About Love, Friendship, and the Things That Really Matter