Jane Austen’s Moral Universe

Jane Austen is the most moral of writers, but what is her morality? What values does she espouse and promote? That is not an easy question, given the elusiveness of the authorial mind and the gap between life and art, but I propose to deal with an easier subject: what moral ideas I have derived from reading her works. I also shall describe how her books strike me, hoping (but not claiming) that this corresponds to her intentions and…