Jane Austen Made Me Do It Read Online Free PDF

Jane!” Again, I tried to scream.
    â€œJane! Jane! Jane! Wake up!”
    Cassandra’s voice broke through my consciousness, hurtling me out of that terrifying reality and back to the warm cocoon of my own bed. I awoke to find myself bathed in perspiration, myheart pounding, my sister’s gentle hand upon my arm as she looked at me through the moonlit darkness from the next pillow.
    â€œOh! Cassandra!” I struggled to catch my breath. “I have just had the most horrible dream.”
    â€œWhat was it about?” asked Cassandra softly.
    I told her everything, as I always did.
    â€œWell,” said she after I had finished my story, “your dream does not surprise me. Your characters have become very real to you—as real as life itself. It is only natural that you should hear their thoughts and feel their emotions as they do.”
    â€œYes, but what does it signify? I can understand why many of my lesser characters would despise me. But my heroines? I love them all! To think that four of them are so unhappy makes me absolutely miserable. Have I done a terrible thing? Am I the most vile and ignorant authoress who ever dared to put pen to paper?”
    â€œOf course not, dearest,” replied Cassandra soothingly, as she found and tenderly squeezed my hand. “If all writers were obliged to atone for the portrayals or fates of their creations, think what Shakespeare owes to Romeo and Juliet or Iago and Richard III. Should Defoe and Richardson feel remorse for the trials and tribulations they inflicted on poor Mr. Crusoe, Clarissa, or Pamela?”
    â€œOf course not. Their work has afforded me and the public untold hours of reading pleasure.”
    â€œSo it is with your books, Jane. You have told me time and again that a perfectly smooth course never makes a satisfying story, that it is an author’s job to make his or her characters suffer so that they might learn something at the end.”
    â€œTrue. Although after hearing Fanny Price’s complaints, I believe I may have erred in her creation. I ignored my own model! Her suffering did not culminate in a lesson.”
    â€œI did
try
to persuade you to let her marry Henry Crawford.”
    â€œI know.” I sighed. “I have learned
my
lesson. People do notappreciate pure goodness in a character in a novel. Even Fanny does not like herself! Given the complaints of the others, perhaps I ought to strive for a more happy medium in my next effort.”
    â€œA happy medium? What do you mean?”
    I thought for a moment. “Next time, I will create a heroine who is modest and good, but not
entirely
perfect. She will have made mistakes that she regrets.” My mind fixed on one of my greatest regrets in life: the day I was obliged to say good-bye to Mr. Ashford. “Marianne asked for a second chance. Well then—I will fill this new character with longing and regret for a lover she was persuaded to refuse many years past, and I will give her a second chance to make things right.”
    â€œA lovely idea. Who will this lover be? A clergyman or a landed gentleman?”
    â€œNeither.” New ideas spilled into my brain with lightning speed. “In my dream, I saw a young officer in the Pump-room—a naval captain with sad eyes. Perhaps he was regretting his lost love. I will write about
him
, and thus honor Frank and Charles and all men of that worthy profession.”
    â€œA naval captain! I approve of this notion.”
    â€œI think I shall set the book primarily in Bath.”
    â€œBath? But Jane, you hate Bath.”
    â€œThat is precisely why it is the ideal location.” I sat up, hugging my pillow to my chest, my heart pounding with rising excitement. “My heroine will be obliged to quit her beloved home in the country and remove with her family to Bath—just as we did when papa retired—and she will despise it as much as I did. Think of the drama! Imagine all the