Surely, as one of the greatest writers of English literature, Austen had among the quietest of backgrounds. Perhaps only Shakespeare arose from less apparently salutary cultural soil, and part of his reward for his self-made efforts comes from those who would attribute his plays to Francis Bacon, or Christopher Marlowe, or Edward De Vere, Earl of Oxford. Jane Austen's works, too, at least early in her career, were occasionally attributed to another—sometimes to a male writer. There was speculation that her fiction was written by one of her Oxford-educated brothers, although the title page of her first published novel, Sense and Sensibility (1811), proclaimed the author was "a lady." Her anonymity persisted throughout her life. Obituaries revealed her authorship of the novels, but the title page of her posthumous book Northanger Abbey and Persuasion (1818) merely indicates that these novels are by the author of Pride and Prejudice (1813) and Mansfield Park (1814). Her brother Henry's "Biographical Notice" in Northanger Abbey and Persuasion confirms the truth.
During her lifetime, some people knew; some did not. For instance, while some friends and relatives were unaware that she had written the novels, her authorship was well known enough for an emissary of the Prince Regent (later George IV) to approach her with the request that her forthcoming work, Emma (1816), should be dedicated to his majesty.
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