Here is another guest post from one of my fellow Austen Authors. Victoria Kincaid takes us on the search for the “novel.”
I remember the moment in college when I realized that the novel was a relatively recent writing form. Novels are so dominant today—pushing all other writing formats to the side—that it’s hard to imagine a time when they didn’t exist. But in fact, the ancient Romans and Greeks had plays and poems (some very long epic poems that seem like novels)—as well as various nonfiction forms—but nothing resembling a novel. It wasn’t until the 1700s that we start seeing something that we would consider a novel today; in fact, the very name “novel” suggests that it is a new form of writing.
The ancestors of today’s novel were Elizabethan prose fiction and French heroic romances, which were long narratives about noble characters (the word for novel in many European language is “roman”—suggesting the form’s connection to medieval romances). What distinguishes these genres from novels is that they tend to focus on larger-than-life characters, epic quests, extraordinary heroes, and unbelievable adventures—which often symbolize primal human hopes and fears. Obviously, some novels share some of these characteristics. But what distinguishes the novel from the romance is its realistic treatment of life and manners. Its heroes are men and women like ourselves, and it primarily examines human character in society (certainly a good description of Austen’s work!).
The question of what was the first English novel is the subject of some debate. Some scholars would give that title to Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (1719) (followed by his Moll Flanders in 1722). Both are rather episodic narratives stitched together mainly because they happen to one person. However, these central characters are regular people living in a solid and specific a world. Thus Defoe is often credited with being the first writer of “realistic” fiction.
Other scholars would give the title of first English novel to Pamela, an epistolary novel (told through a series of fictional letters) written in 1741 by Samuel Richardson. Pamela often gets the nod because of its psychological depth and careful examination of emotional states.
There are, however, other contenders for the title of first novel. One is Japanese author Murasaki Shikibu’s Tale of Genji (1010) which demonstrates an interest in character development and psychological observation. Another claimant is Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister (1687), a collection of fictional letters by Aphra Behn, who was the first woman in England to earn her living as a writer (she was primarily a playwright). Cervantes’ Don Quixote (1605-15) is considered an important progenitor of the modern novel.
All of this is to say that the novel was still a relatively new form of writing when Jane Austen came along. It had not been popular or widespread for even a hundred years when Pride and Prejudice was written. By then a lot of novels were being written, many of them with romantic elements and many of them written by women. Although the history of the novel often credits men with earliest examples of the genre, it is important to understand that many female authors (often forgotten today) were also part of the rise of the novel. Jane Austen did not simply spring spontaneously into being; rather, she was writing in the same tradition as Frances Burney, Maria Edgeworth, and other writers like them.
In fact, many scholars would suggest that there is a particular connection between female writers and the novel form. The history of the rise of the novel also parallels in some ways the rise of the female author. The advent of the novel made possible the publication and popularity of the Bronte sisters, George Eliot, and many other female authors who are not as well known today.
Virginia Woolf notes this confluence in A Room of One’s Own. She writes about how novels allowed women to adapt a new kind of sentence—rather than the kind of writing necessary for poetry or plays—to their own needs. “All the older forms of literature were hardened and set by the time she [womenkind] became a writer. The novel alone was young enough to be soft in her hands.” Woolf describes how women were able to use and shape a genre that did not have rigid traditions: “since freedom and fullness of expression are the essence of the art, such a lack of tradition, such a scarcity and inadequacy of tools, must have told enormously upon the writing of women.”
Throughout the book, Woolf pays tribute to Austen as a progenitor female author, and particularly calls out her the way she shaped the novel’s prose for her purposes: “Jane Austen looked at it [the traditional sentence] and laughed at it, and devised a perfectly natural, shapely sentence for her own use…” I love this image of Austen taking language, laughing at the clumsy tool she has been given, and reshaping it to her own purposes. It makes me think not only of Austen’s genius, but also the fun she must have had while she was writing—as she helped to create not only new stories, but also a new genre.
Chapter 7 gives the reader a detailed description of the conditions in which the nation suffered. Scott’s uses the suffering of the Saxons as a means to define the ‘state of the nation.’
In March 1871, Princess Louise Carolina Alberta, fourth daughter and sixth child of Queen Victoria married John Douglas Sutherland Campbell, Marquis of Lorne and heir to the dukedom of Argyll , which created quite a stir. In 1870, Lorne was marked by Queen Victoria as a possible groom for Louise, but at first, the princess was undecided upon Lorne.
“The end of her putative engagement to Lorne does not seem to have caused Louise much heartache. Soon afterwards, she was at a breakfast party hosted by the Gladstone [the queen’s longtime bête noire, Prime Minister William Gladstone] family and Lady Lucy Cavendish noted in her diary, ‘Sat by Princess Louise, who looked very pretty and was charming and well-mannered, as usual.’ Rumours now suggested Lord Cowper as the princess’s intended fiancé. At the start of October, however, all mention of Lord Cowper was at an end, and the newspapers were about to get the story they’d been longing for.” (Hawksley, Lucinda. Queen Victoria’s Mysterious Daughter: A Biography of Princess Louise. ©2013, St Martin’s Press, 119) The princess and Lorne’s chance meeting at the Gladstones’ breakfast party at Carlton House Terrace led them to a better understanding. At the time of their engagement, Lorne’s income was a paltry £4,000, but he was eventually to be 9th Duke of Argyll. Although “romantic love” was purported, it was more likely that the pair thought they could like in harmony. 
Objections to the marriage were expected from the European states, which did not condone marriages between royalty and commoners; however, the Prince of Wales’s objection was not. As the eldest son and Victoria’s assumed heir, Albert Edward (Bertie) not only objected to his sister marrying a commoner, but he also objected to Lorne for the Campbell family were prominent Liberals. Moreover, Lorne sat in the House of Commons as a supporter of Gladstone. According to Jerrold M. Packard in Victoria’s Daughters (©1998, St. Martin’s, 146), “It is likely, however, that Bertie’s most fundamental objection to his sister’s marriage purely concerned Lorne’s rank, a complaint founded on what were at the time rational grounds. In fact, all sorts of problems would inevitably have to be sorted out: Lorne’s precedence, the unedifying specter of Louise and her spouse being distantly separated at official functions, the Argylls’ deep involvement with banking and commerce (which might generate conflicts of interest, not to mention smacking of actually working for a living), even whether Louise herself might have to give up her own royal status.” 
The royal family did not expect objections from the public sector. By the time of Louise’s marriage, Victoria’s popularity had dipped considerably for she was sore to make public appearances after Prince Albert’s death. However, in order to force Parliament’s agreement to both Louise’s dowry of £30,000 (+ £6,000 a year for life) and £15,000 for life for Prince Arthur (who had come of age at the same time as the wedding), Victoria agreed to open Parliament (a duty she had forgone since Albert’s death). Louise stood on the steps during this duty. 
Bold Outlaw breaks down the “fyttes” as follows: “The Gest is divided into eight sections, known as Fyttes. Here’s a breakdown of the main action….
“And there’s much debate over which Edward the king is meant to be. In the early 19th century, Joseph Hunter found the king’s journey in the Gest is similar to that of Edward II’s. There was even a Robyn Hood serving as a porter in this king’s court. However, other details point to the reign of Edward III. Professor Stephen Knight stated in his 1994 study of Robin Hood that the king may have been Edward IV, who was likely the king at the time of composition.
“Another particular of a thatcher’s tool box is the shearing hook which looks like a left-handed scythe, except it’s right-handed and is used to shear the ears off the reeds. When Holloway has finally, and painstakingly, worked his way up to the ridge of the roof he has to pin the thatch down tightly with some spars. He creates a double layer of thatching at the ridge and covers this with thatching wire (like chicken wire but with a smaller mesh) to protect it from lumbering crows.
nd when he thinks he has lost Anne forever, he stalks off in a fit of jealousy. For all this I blame him, but then comes that letter …
(To read the entire letter, visit Woodland Heritage, which reproduced the letter. Reproduced with the kind permission of “The Mariner’s Mirror” – Journal of the Society for Nautical Research. Go 
Yet I write Regencies, and in Regency times, gentlemen were as obsessed with their horses as today’s men are with their cars or motorbikes. In fact, in two of my books, including the latest release, the hero breeds horses for sale. 
If you wanted to sell, or to buy, a horse, you might go to a local horse fair. Or, if you lived in London, you’d drop down to Tattersall’s on Hyde Park Corner. It had been founded in 1766 by a former groom of the Duke of Kingston, and held auctions every Monday and on Thursdays during the Season. Tatersall’s charged a small commission on each sale, but also charged both buyers and sellers for stabling.
My hero in 
Meet the Author Jude Knight
When Viscount Avery comes to see an invalid chair maker, he does not expect to find Min Bradshaw, the woman who rejected him 3 years earlier. Or did she? He wonders if there is more to the story. For 3 years, Min Bradshaw has remembered the handsome guardsman who courted her for her fortune. She didn’t expect to see him in her workshop, and she certainly doesn’t intend to let him fool her again.
Lieutenant Rick Redepenning has been saving his admiral’s intrepid daughter from danger since their formative years, but today, he faces the gravest of threats–the damage she might do to his heart. How can he convince her to see him as a suitor, not just a childhood friend? 
Rede, the Earl of Chirbury wants the beautiful widow, Anne Forsythe, from the moment he first sees her. Not that he has time for dalliance, or that the virtuous widow would be available if he did. 
The London Docks, located at Wapping, were the second dock system to be built in London. A large range of items were traded at the London Docks, including: tobacco, marble, bark, rubber, whalebones, iodine, mercury, wool, wax, paper, hemp, coir yarn, rattans, jute, skins, coconuts, sausage skins, rice, fruit, olive oil, fish oil, nuts, sugar, coffee, cocoa, spices, chutney, brandy, wine, rum, and sherry. 
