A Dance with Jane Austen

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

"The period illustrations and dance diagrams are charming, but Fullerton's discussion of dance in Austen's novels is both incisive and entertaining. From the Netherfield ball in Pride and Prejudice to Anne Elliot playing the piano as her friends dance in Persuasion , Fullerton explains how dancing moves the action forward in each book and what it reveals about various characters. (She even draws heavily on the unfinished The Watsons .) By the end, readers will long to revisit the dance scenes in Austen's world and follow her heroines' practice of talking over the ball afterward with friends over a cup of tea. A beautifully illustrated exploration of dance in the life and novels of Jane Austen. " - Shelf Awareness

Drawing on contemporary accounts and illustrations, and a close reading of the novels as well as Austen's correspondence, Susannah Fullerton takes the reader through all the stages of a Regency Ball as Jane Austen and her characters would have known it.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

In Pride and Prejudice, Mr. Darcy asserts to Sir William Lucas that "[e]very savage can dance." Darcy, of course, is wrong, as Fullerton (president, Jane Austen Society of Australia; Jane Austen and Crime) proves in this engaging volume. Fullerton explores Jane Austen's "dancing life" and analyzes Austen's use of the dance in her novels, emphasizing the ballroom as a critical element in Austen's world and fiction. She reviews Austen's letters and highlights her commentary on local balls and then describes and analyzes the balls that occur in each of Austen's works. Fullerton asserts that balls are a vital arena for courtship, an important communal activity, and a stage that reveals a character's motives and nature. To educate modern readers, she discusses the dances, dress, ballroom etiquette, music, supper, and appropriate conversation at balls, not to mention modes of transportation to and from them. Verdict Very accessible, this book will appeal to both Jane Austen devotees and those interested in Regency society or today's Regency fiction.-Kathryn R. Bartelt, Univ. of Evansville Libs., IN (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.