Another Kind of Work From Jane Austen
By JENNIFER SCHUESSLER
Jane Austen
once referred to her novels as fine brushwork on two inches of ivory, producing
''little effect after much labor.'' But when it came to embroidery, she seems
to have preferred a somewhat broader canvas.
At least that's
how it appears from a cross-stitch sampler by Austen, to be publicly displayed
for the first time at Oxford's Bodleian Library for one day only on Thursday,
in conjunction with World Book Day. The sampler, which is in a private
collection, is dated 1787, the year Austen turned 12. (The stitching is frayed
so that it appears to read ''1797.'') It includes a simple prayer, bordered by
a few flowering bushes.
It will also be
displayed with a pencil-on-vellum portrait of Austen, the authenticity of which
has been much debated since its discovery was announced in December. The
sampler, which does not seem to have stirred equal controversy, has a note on
the back stating that an early owner was ''related to Jane Austen the
novelist'' and that she had ''received it as a memento'' of Austen's life, according
to a statement from the Bodleian.
Embroidery and
Oxford, as it happens, both come in for a brief mention in at least one of
Austen's novels. In ''Northanger Abbey'' the clergyman Henry Tilne brags to the
Gothic-novel-guzzling Catherine Morland that he has read more books than she
has, saying: ''Consider how many years I have had the start of you. I had
entered on my studies at Oxford, while you were a good little girl working on
your sampler at home!''
''Not very
good, I'm afraid,'' Catherine responds. ''But now really, do not you think
'Udolpho' the nicest book in the world?''
This is a more
complete version of the story than the one that appeared in print.
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