French Revolution Émigrés in England, a Guest Post from Lona Manning | ReginaJeffers’s Blog

Caricatures of England and France: the effete French dancing master meets sturdy John Bull. The punchline of this cartoon is a [pretty lame] pun. The English tax collector wants to collect tax on hops (used for making beer) and he understands that the dancing master “deals [in hops] very extensively.”

Did you ever read The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy? It’s a romantic and thrilling classic about the French Revolution. I’d like to share some of my research about the real lives of the refugees from that time…

Source: French Revolution Émigrés in England, a Guest Post from Lona Manning | ReginaJeffers’s Blog

People with Disabilities in Jane Austen’s England, a Guest Post by Elaine Owen | ReginaJeffers’s Blog

York Vs York: Changing Attitudes in Regency England In April, Elaine Owen shared this piece on Austen Authors. I thought it worthy of a second look.  Jane Austen did not write about disabled people…

Source: People with Disabilities in Jane Austen’s England, a Guest Post by Elaine Owen | ReginaJeffers’s Blog

Fight Against Slavery Carried on Beyond Austen’s Life, a Guest Post from Collins Hemingway | ReginaJeffers’s Blog

William Wilberforce spent his life seeking to abolish slavery. He succeeded in ending the buying and selling of slaves, but died six months before slavery itself began to be phased out.

This piece is Part I of a two-part series from my fellow Austen Author, Collins Hemingway. In this one, Collins takes a closer look at the slavery issue during Jane Austen’s time.  Slavery was…

Source: Fight Against Slavery Carried on Beyond Austen’s Life, a Guest Post from Collins Hemingway | ReginaJeffers’s Blog

A Regency Romance

Edmund Leighton: On the Threshold (1900). Manchester Art Gallery. Image source: Wikipedia

What explains the enduring appeal of the Regency Romance?(Question arises from the latest audio book I’ve narrated, already successfully released in USA 10 days ago, by a subsidiary of over-mighty Amazon).

Why has that period in history lent itself more than any other to our fantasies about courtship and social acceptance? The origins of its potency lie older and deeper than the comedies of manners written prolifically by Georgette Heyer, the doyenne of Regency Romance fiction, and the costume rom-coms of the film and movie industries of…

Source: A Regency Romance

English Historical Fiction Authors: In and Out of Jane Austen’s Window

Originally posted on English Historical Fiction Authors

We do love our period costume dramas, don’t we?

I mean, what could be more restful than slipping back into a slower age, a more peaceful idyllic age, when horses clip-clopped their ways across the country, the corn was green in the fields, they wore elegant clothes that looked soft and weren’t all black, and society was stable and one found one’s Captain Wentworth or John Thornton in a garden of yellow roses? Or driving a high-perch phaeton with scarlet-wheels, wearing an eight-caped greatcoat, with a team of matched greys?

And that must be how it was, mustn’t it, because Austen for one never mentions a world beyond that charming and charmed existence, does she?

But here’s the thing, we tend to forget that…

via English Historical Fiction Authors: In and Out of Jane Austen’s Window.