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Title: What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew: From Fox Hunting to Whist-The Facts of Daily Life in Nineteenth-Century England by Daniel Pool ISBN: 0-671-88236-8 Publisher: Touchstone Books Pub. Date: April, 1994 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.65 (37 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: Enriches understanding of Regency and Victorian authors
Comment: This was a very enjoyable book. The background it provides helps me to understand the social contexts and the way of life of the folks Austen and Dickens (and their many fellow writers) wrote about.
The book is a series of small essays that offer insight into a specific topic. These essays are grouped into helpful sections such as The Public World, The Private World, and The Grim World. They are all entertaining and help those of us who know little of those times to get a handle on some basic notions.
The one caution I would offer is that a century is a long time. Fashion, technology, politics, and everything else changes many times over the decades. However, these essays seem focused on those things that would offer the most confusion to the modern reader. Just be sure to keep a close regard on the time period the specific essay is covering and match that to the period not only of the author but the period that Dickens or Austen or whomever is writing about.
This is an lively, entertaining, and informative book. But it is not foolproof. Enjoy it responsibly and you will benefit from this book every time you read a Regency or Victorian author.
Rating: 3
Summary: Misinformation for the Regency Era
Comment: A book which attempts to provide a general background to daily life in 19th century England for readers of 19th century English authors such as Jane Austen (a Regency author) and Charles Dickens (a Victorian author). This book is useful for the beginner to this period but does contains historical misinformation. It is impossible to cover a whole century in a book of this type, and thus the Regency and Victorian periods are not carefully distinguished. My warning for readers of this book is to remember that life in the Regency was often very different to life in Victorian times. For example, Poole categorically states marriage by widower to deceased wife's sister was illegal, actually it was legal in England till 1835. Kristine Hughes and Venetia Murray in their books also confuse the matter. Are they reading each other for reference instead of primary sources? I don't mind a good introductory book to a period, and this could have been one, but I really dislike it when something totally untrue for a period is presented as absolute fact. Marriage to one's sister-in-law was legal in civil law but voidable in ecclesiastical courts if anyone bothered to bring a suit, and many such marriages were made. Until 1835 and Lord Lyndhurst's act. I would double check anything that the author says about the Regency period. This book really tried to do too much to lump the earlier Regency period in with the Victorian period. Over the course of the 19th century many things changed greatly, so if using this book as a guide, remember Jane Austen was a Regency novelist and Charles Dickens a Victorian novelist and laws, social mores and fashions change greatly over a whole century.
Rating: 4
Summary: Wonderful Book on 19th century Social History
Comment: If you love to read historical novels, whether they be the classics of Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, the Bronte sisters and Anthony Trollope, or historical romances by such authors as Judith McNaught and Julia Quinn, this is a great book for you. It will also appeal to history buffs, and those with just a passing interest in the social customs and etiquette of bygone days.
Accessible and covering a broad range of topics, it's a reference book that touches on everything from social hierarchy (an Earl outranks the eldest son of a Marquis who outranks the younger son of a Duke, the eldest son of a Duke, however, ranks above an Earl and just below a Marquis), how to name your estate (what is the difference between a hall, a manor and a house?), how to play Faro (you need a machine to deal), manage the servants (especially when they're just not getting the silver bright enough) and walk with a member of the opposite sex (a gentleman, remember, always walks on the side nearest the street).
The book also includes an extensive glossary of terms of the period (just what is a costermonger and a mantua-maker?) It is also filled with literary references and citations from the great British 19th-century authors, including those mentioned above. Don't worry if you haven't read any of the books, the references are used to illustrate points, though this book may inspire you to finally pick up a few of those classics you've always been meaning to read.
My one complaint about this book is that it's just not as thorough as I would have liked. It covers a wide range of topics, and in trying to keep the book readable, it only touches the surface rather than becoming deeply involved in any one topic.
As an overall reference book, it's very good, and is very useful to anyone who might be writing a novel set in this period, or just enjoys reading books set in 19th-century England.
The closest book I am aware of to this book is "The Writer's Guide to Everyday Life in Regency and Victorian England" by Kristine Hughes, which follows in the same general reference covering a lot of topics, but without the references to classic novels. Also, the recent "An Elegant Madness: High Society in Regency England" by Venetia Murray is a collection of accounts of some of the most notorious real people of the era. And for the literary angle, "A Dab of Dickens and a Touch of Twain" by Elliot Engel offers a biographical overview of many of the authors referred to in this book.
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Title: An Elegant Madness: High Society in Regency England by Venetia Murray ISBN: 0140282963 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 28 February, 2000 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: English Society in the Eighteenth Century (Penguin Social History of Britain) by Roy Porter ISBN: 0140138196 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: September, 1990 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Everyday Life in the 1800s: A Guide for Writers, Students & Historians by Marc McCutcheon ISBN: 1582970637 Publisher: Writers Digest Books Pub. Date: March, 2001 List Price(USD): $16.99 |
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Title: Writer's Guide to Everyday Life in Regency and Victorian England from 1811-1901 by Kristine Hughes ISBN: 158297280X Publisher: Writers Digest Books Pub. Date: February, 1998 List Price(USD): $18.99 |
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Title: English WomenÂs Clothing in the Nineteenth Century : A Comprehensive Guide with 1,117 Illustrations by C. Willett Cunnington ISBN: 0486263231 Publisher: Dover Pubns Pub. Date: 01 May, 1990 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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