Thank you, Sarah, for making all this possible. What begins must eventually end and it is now time for the “last post.” Sarah’s “Invitation to Mansfield Park” has sparked a wonderful set of blog posts and an ongoing debate. Her work has been published in Persuasions and The Jane Austen Report, and in the collection of essays I edited for the Jane Austen Society following their 2005 Halifax conference, Jane Austen and the North Atlantic. She was invited to speak at two Jane Austen Society (UK) conferences, in Halifax in 2005, and in Bermuda in 2010. She has done extensive original research about the life of Jane Austen’s naval brother Captain Charles Austen and his associations with his sister’s novels, and she has presented her research at JASNA AGMs in Quebec City, Philadelphia, and New York. There are so many good things to read in this new issue of Persuasions On-Line, including essays by Theresa Kenney, Kathryn Davis, and Elaine Bander, all of whom contributed to “An Invitation to Mansfield Park ,” and the 2013 Jane Austen Bibliography by Deborah Barnum, who was also a contributor.įor many years, Sheila Kindred taught in the Philosophy Department at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax. Read about why we think Hilary Mantel is wrong to say that “No one who read it closely was ever comforted by an Austen novel” – you can find our essay at this link.Ī July morning (2014) at the Birch Cove estate in Halifax (now Belcher’s Marsh Park), where Lady Sherbrooke and Mary Wodehouse read Mansfield Park in 1815. This past year, we focused on our breakout session for the 2014 JASNA AGM, “Among the Proto-Janeites: Reading Mansfield Park for Consolation in Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1815.” I’m pleased to report that we had a wonderful time presenting the paper in Montreal and discussing the story of Lady Sherbrooke and Mary Wodehouse with our audience – many thanks to everyone who attended! – and that the paper has just been published in Persuasions On-Line.

Sheila and I meet regularly for tea to discuss our research and writing and our plans for upcoming JASNA meetings. It’s a great pleasure to give the last word in this series to Sheila Johnson Kindred, my friend and frequent collaborator on Austen-related projects, and my fellow co-chair of the Programs Committee for JASNA Nova Scotia. Happy holidays, everyone, and thank you very much for celebrating Mansfield Park with me this year! For more details, open Your Invitation to Mansfield Park.

Thirty-ninth, and last, in a series of guest posts celebrating 200 years of Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park.

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