Autumn's Going Strong--and GIVEAWAY!

Do you love the fall? What's your favorite season?

We've lived in Ohio for 19 years. For most of those years I've looked forward to September since it was always my favorite month, weather-wise. 

I now realize that October in Ohio equals September on Long Island. (It only took me a decade and a half to get it!) But now I know. My favorite month, weather-wise, is  OCTOBER. 

How about you?  Leave a comment telling me your favorite season or month and why, and I'll enter you in a drawing for a free DVD, "Becoming Jane." (Christmas season doesn't count--we're talking weather-wise--unless that season's weather is your favorite.) For a bonus entry, send a friend to the blog! When she/he mentions you, you'll get another entry. 

DRAWING ENDS NOVEMBER 9

"Becoming Jane" stars Anne Hathaway and James McAvoy, and I found it delightful. I don't necessarily like it when filmmakers play with Jane Austen's life, but this flick works. It's both intelligent and joyful. 

Unlike "Miss Austen Regrets"--another film supposedly about Jane's life--this script did well at capturing Jane's sense of fun as well as her sharp wit. "Miss Austen Regrets" missed the mark, showing Jane as a bitter spinster, when in fact, her letters and even her books do not convey a sense of personal bitterness. 

Admittedly, there are letters we've never seen, as Jane's sister destroyed many of them. But Jane was writing until only a few months before her death, and I just don't get a sense of bitterness in what she left us. 

This is a great DVD to have in one's collection of period flicks!  

  But first, enjoy another Autumn poem.

 Bits and Pieces

By Joan Leotta

Cool, crisp air and its brilliant

fire hues

are hard to find where

heat simmers until well

into December.

Here, long still-hot

days of October and November

allow early darkness to eat

out the green,

leaving mottled brown

arrayed on branches until

storms wash them

down onto my lawn.

Yet, now and again,

bits and pieces of

autumn glory appear—

a vine, a baby tree hiding

in my palmetto grass,

burst into red

or bright yellow,

defying heat,

                                                                    proclaiming, 

“Fall is here.”

Joan Leotta is an award-winning writer and spoken word performer who lives on the North Carolina coast. Her chapbook, Languid Lusciousness with Lemon is available on Amazon. Please check out her blog, What Editors Want You to Know at www,JoanLeotta.wordpress.com

"Bits and Pieces" originally published in RPG Digest; used by courtesy of E.B.(Gene) Alston, and the author. 

Don't forget to leave a comment to enter the drawing! 

AVAILABLE NOW: The Pulse Effex Box Set!

SAVE 50% OFF THE PRICE OF INDIVIDUAL BOOKS

Please note: Due to mailing costs, giveaway is for US residents only, sorry. International commenters can win an ebook, choosing from any of my books.  

For My Fellow Jane Austen Lovers:

Kindle Fire Giveaway!

This is, perhaps, more about Jane fan-fic than Austen herself, but I couldn't pass up letting you know about a current giveaway by Indie Jane, a blog that highlights new fiction based on Jane's books or characters. 

 Stop by and enter to win a New Kindle Fire, pre-loaded with a selection of fan-fiction. Please note: I cannot verify that all of these books are as clean as JA's, but for anyone to aspire to write in the Austen tradition, I would hope that keeping it clean would be a prerequisite. In the event that you win and don't enjoy any of the books that are pre-loaded, you can just delete them from your device. I have a Kindle, but I'd love the Kindle Fire as it has color! By posting the giveaway here I get an extra entry, so it's a double benefit. I share the giveaway with you while earning an entry.

Good luck in the contest!

Warmest Blessings,

Linore

What are you reading, lately? For a quick read in one sitting, try my short story, Coach and Four: Allisandra's Tale. Romantic suspense from the days of Charles II. (England, late 1600s.)

 

What Jane Austen and Thomas Aquinas Have In Common

This past weekend I gave a presentation for a local chapter of JASNA (The Jane Austen Society of North America) on the theme of "The Faith of Jane Austen." I don't wish to recap all of my points here, but I came across a statement by (St.)Thomas Aquinas which summed up perfectly what Austen's attitude about faith was, as expressed (0r not expressed, I should say) in her books:

"To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible." Aquinas

The first half of this statement was particularly true for Jane when it came to writing her books. She mostly sidesteps the issue of religion, operating on the assumption that most of her audience were members of the Anglican church, just as she was. Being an Anglican in her day meant that you had familiarity with (and implicit agreement with) the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Faith, which school children had to study. Certainly, all of the genteel class, like the Austen family themselves, would have been thoroughly familiar with the articles, (which summarize the beliefs of the church). Children, in fact, were supposed to memorize it in whole or in part, including some of the psalms and collects from the Book of Common Prayer--the primary book of reading for adherents. Anglicanism was the "Church of England," the state religion, and so of course Jane
assumed that most of her readers were familiar with its teachings.

Jane's thrust in her books was to go beyond mere "religion," mere elemental outward tokens of an assumed faith, to sift the motives of her characters. Like Christ, she examines the heart.

Religion was necessary, and church is mentioned in passing often enough so that we know, for instance, that Mr. Darcy attended services, as indeed, all of her sympathetic characters do. Even the ones she is critical of are assumed to do the same. Additionally, these issues didn't present challenges for her personally--Austen doesn't bother with elemental faith issues because they were settled for her (she was devout), but also because she didn't feel an explanation was necessary. The important thing was to know how deeply people were, or were not, living the virtues of a life based on that faith, on their religion.

She was not afraid to poke fun at clergymen or others who were hypocrites, as she had no fears of such undermining the validity of her beliefs. Such people were moral failures in one way or another, and Jane was particularly able to spot them, for she grew up surrounded by models of what true churchman were. She knew better than most, what a proper clergyman was; she had a father and two brothers who served as models; she had cousins and uncles in the profession; she had neighbours and friends of the clergy. She was surrounded by models, both good and bad, and she knew how to show both types in her fiction.

No less than three of her six major works have clergymen as their heroes.The other three have men who are as morally developed as a clergyman should be, at least by the end of the novel (Darcy, Ferrers) if not at the beginning (Knightley). (Edward Ferrers is not yet fully developed in his social manners, but he has behaved with undeniably heroic virtue.)

Every sentence I've written here could be expounded upon at length, and I wish I had the time to do it! But right now I don't. However, let me add that for most of her life, Jane did not like or approve of evangelicals, another reason her works are singularly NOT evangelistic in nature; but she had no less a sincerity of faith than they; and by the end of her life, she reassessed her position, saying,

"I am by no means convinced that we ought not all to be evangelicals, and am at least persuaded that they who are so from reason and feeling must be happiest and safest."

Note that "reason" and "feeling" are keywords in Austen. Reason and feeling=sense and sensibility, and only a balance of the two can make a person fully moral and actualized. One of Austen's themes is that decisions or behaviour based ONLY upon reason, or ONLY upon feelings, can be unfortunate at best, or disastrous at worst.
However, the person who acts upon a proper balance of both, (and with an implicit moral understanding based on their knowledge of God) will be acting wisely, and will get the best results in life.

During my presentation, I discussed how Austen always shows her sympathetic characters questioning their behavior (manners) based not on a modern idea of asking "Who am I?" but on the basis of who they are in society. This is an enormous distinction. In a sense it is, "to whom much is given, much is required." If you are truly noble, it is not your title that will determine it but your manners and actions. If you are truly Christian, it is not your outward vocation, but your motives and actions that will prove it.

I find myself thinking that Austen, in this light, has much to teach us today about the way we should live. Much to teach me. Who we are in society--our society, our personal circles of family, friends, and co-workers, should in large part determine how we behave. For example, are you a mother? Take care of your children. A wife? See to your husband. A manager? Treat those under you with compassion and mercy. The values in Austen's books will always be with us and always be relevant: they come from the Judeo-Christian ethic, the Bible.

This has been a jumble of thoughts about themes that I enjoy exploring in Jane Austen. There is much more to be said on any of them, of course. What about you? Care to comment? Have you found that the "manners and morals" of Austen have spoken to you in your life? I'd love to hear about it.