Austenescape, or, Taking Liberty

• Published in: Persuasions : the Jane Austen journal (Print version) 2023-01 (45), p.15-27
• Main Author: Johnson, Claudia L
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Austen, Jane (1775-1817); Hate speech; Novels; Oppression; Political discourse; Racism; Reading; Science fiction & fantasy; War
• ISSN: 0821-0314

With the fictional Lord Pippin and his "phony war" in mind, let's turn to the consolation actual lovers of Jane Austen took in thinking about her world during the very real Blitz of the very real World War II. In face of the utter corruption of political language and civil discourse, the ascendancy of "alternative truth," the specter of insurrection here and war abroad, the resurgence and the apparent legitimation of racism and antisemitism and all hate-speech, to say nothing of bee-colony collapse, pandemic, and global warming, along with the social and economic losses all of these cause-all, all of which seem to signify that the world is indeed going to hell in a handbasket-I wonder: what's so bad about escape? A quick look at the OED reveals that escape dates to the fourteenth century and carries no pejorative implication: "To gain one's liberty by flight; to get free from detention or control, or from an oppressive or irksome condition." Another way of asking this question: when we escape to Pride and Prejudice-for this novel has preeminently been a site of escape-what might we be escaping to? I used to think that I would never care to escape to Austen's world because life is so precarious for her heroines, some of whom verge on desolation.