Love or Friendship?

Up for auction is a picture of the boy who apparently made Jane Austen's young heart go pitty-pat.



His name is Tom Lefroy and when Austen met him she noted that he was "a gentlemanlike, good-looking, pleasant young man." Which hardly sounds the height of passion, but at the close of their brief encounter she wrote: "At length the day is come on which I am to flirt my last with Tom Lefroy ... my tears flow as I write at the melancholy idea."

This is the basis of the film Becoming Jane, which I have yet to see.

For anyone who hasn't read the Austen juvenalia, there's very nice edition of Love and Freindship available from the wonderful Hesperus Press. And it was through Hesperus that I found out that Jane has a myspace page!

Comments

Anonymous said…
Toronto Lady,

Becoming Jane is dreadful, to be avoided, stay in and watch a game of snooker instead. A film that gave rise to the urge to shriek "give over" and a desire to investigate the wallpaper in the bathroom instead.

Better still venture to Kung-Fu Panda and listen for the literary line "We do not wash our pits etc...etc." Distinctly Austen...when washing of the pits must indeed have been a challenge.

Mrs O'K xxx

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