Jane Austen on Nature: The Novels as Pastoral Literature

Jane Austen's heroines respond to the power of the natural world, seeking comfort in nature's calm or referencing trees and "verdure"--meaning fresh greenness and fertility--in relation to their awakening self-knowledge and, in most, their sexuality.

This book focuses on interactions between Austen's heroines and uncontrollable forces of nature. Gender and nature are interwoven; some upper-class, usually male characters exploit nature as they exploit women. In the fragment Sanditon, Austen satirizes resort developers who commodify both nature and women. This work demonstrates how Austen transformed the Regency novel through pastoral language and structures, illuminating themes of greed, the inequality of institutions and cultural norms, and the emotional development of young women in the early nineteenth century.