Jane Austen Complete Works: Complete Novels (Collector's Library Editions)

Author - Jane Austen ... [Goo?] [Posters]

This Hardcover Book item from CRW Publishing Limited was reviewed on 11-Dec-2008.

Search ISBN:1904633935 offer from Abebooks or used books from Alibris. Jane Austen Complete Works: Complete Novels (Collector's Library Editions) Reference Book. Classifications : General Austen, Jane ( A ) Authors, A-Z Literature & Fiction Subjects Books Hardcover Austen, Jane ( A ) Authors, A-Z Literature & Fiction Subjects Books General AAS Austen, Jane ( A ) Authors, A-Z Li . Click the following link to view the cover of Jane Austen Complete Works: Complete Novels (Collector's Library Editions).

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1) Hardcover Book Jane Austen Complete Works: Complete Novels (Collector's Library Editions) by CRW Publishing Limited. This is an EXCELLENT collection of Jane Austen´s novels. Yes, when buying it, my brother and I chuckled over the irony of "The Complete Novels... Volume I," but neither of us was silly enough to think we were immune from having to also purchase Volume II in order to have the Complete Novels. If you are looking for quality at a reasonable price, this is the collection to buy. These books are exceptionally well made, and the type and paper quality are well above average.

Volume I Review:

I originally read Volume I years ago after having first seen the television and movie adaptations of Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. I recently decided to re-read this volume and was even more enraptured with it than I was during the first read. The plight of the Dashwood sisters and the malleability of their step-brother by his cold wife in Sense and Sensibility is made so vivid by Jane Austen´s flawless writing. What girl or woman reading Pride and Prejudice doesn´t imagine she is Elizabeth Bennet, with both her beauty and intelligence, inadvertantly making Mr. Darcy fall in love with her? My heart positively ached for Fanny Price in Mansfield Park, and I wondered how she could put up with the neglect of her rich, fancy relatives and the tyranny of her Aunt Norris and maintain such a pure heart. I am awed by the timelessness and reality of these novels. In my mind, it simply does not get any better than Jane Austen.

Volume II Review:

I also recently finished re-reading Volume II. Jane Austen´s novels certainly do transcend time. Whenever I read them I am struck by some new truth applicable either to my life or life today in general. What was true about human nature approximately 200 years ago remains true today, which makes relating to and understanding Jane Austen so easy as well as gratifying.

Like the heroine in Emma, who hasn´t known a spoiled brat whose natural vanity is the result of being blessed in everything? Emma´s superior attitude is a bit galling at times, and I positively cringed at some of her blunders, but Emma has a good heart. She makes mistakes, like we all do, but eventually she begins to understand her errors through the help of her good friend Mr. Knightly. Thank goodness for friends who love us in spite of our imperfections!

In Northanger Abbey, I am tickled to death not only by Catherine´s naivete but also by Jane Austen herself. The first half of this novel is filled with the most hilarious observations which seem to come directly from Austen, and the second half is filled with the overactive imagination of Catherine Morland, who has read perhaps too many novels. In this parody of Gothic fiction, Austen pokes fun at both herself and her audience. It is truly a delight.

When I first read Jane Austen in my mid-twenties, Persuasion was my favorite novel. It gave me hope. I felt so strongly for Anne Elliot, who at nineteen was convinced by her family to reject the man she loved because of his lack of rank and fortune. Seven years later, after he has acheived his fortune, she is thrown into this same man´s company. She must watch, agonizingly, while he courts two other young ladies. Anne´s courage and fortitude are inspiring.
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2) Hardcover Book Jane Austen Complete Works: Complete Novels (Collector's Library Editions) by CRW Publishing Limited. This hardback is a solid binding on good quality paper. It easily stands up to the many re-readings Austen´s novels deserve.¤

3) Hardcover Book Jane Austen Complete Works: Complete Novels (Collector's Library Editions) by CRW Publishing Limited. There are two similar in tone if not identical reviews on amazon.com and amazon.ca warning people away from this edition because it´s not "complete".

Clearly, they didn´t read the title past "Complete Novels" to the "Volume I" part which specified pretty precisely which of the six complete novels were part of this volume.

I´m mystified. Surely anyone who´s willing and eager (let alone able) to read Austen could understand it would take two volumes to publish the complete works? Come on, they average 300 pages apiece!

So I think the two correspondents are agents of Penguin or Oxford World´s Classics or somebody who has an interest in turning people away from the Modern Library editions.

Oh yeah, a review: the Modern Library editions are excellent. They´re complete (so you have to buy TWO books!), they´re affordable, and they´re durable.
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4) Hardcover Book Jane Austen Complete Works: Complete Novels (Collector's Library Editions) by CRW Publishing Limited. This review is not for the novels of Jane Austen, rather for the item offered here on amazon.com

Much to my surprise, after I ordered "The Complete Novels of Jane Austen (Modern Library Series)" ISBN 0679600264, only one book arrived. As pictured above, Vol I contains S&S, P&P, and MP.

The other three novels must be in Vol II, you surmise? Wrong! THAT IS ALL YOU GET !

Apparently, "complete" is a relative term, meaning "half of". At best, this listing shows ignorance. At worst, this listing is fraud.¤

5) Hardcover Book Jane Austen Complete Works: Complete Novels (Collector's Library Editions) by CRW Publishing Limited.

Jane Austen is still where she belongs, between book covers. We know the stories are good, but what isn´t immediately obvious is the many recent adaptations is what an impeccable writer of English prose she is - no posturing word-dropper, no purveyer of hoary terminology, but a fine, simple, straightforward narrator.

She is brief but telling, using tilt and tone to make us smile. She doesn´t bore with tedious flashbacks or podding descriptions of a new character´s background. And she tells us what we wanted to know, just when we want to know it. As I am wondering what became of Mr. Bingley, he turns up; as I am trying to remember what the party is doing in Bath, it becomes clear. She´s always ahead, dropping just the right number of crumbs.

Jane´s world moved slowly, and reading her takes time. Her cncerns are universal - how to fill the hours of the day, the pairing of single young men and women, the effects of money, household matters. Her ethical domain is dominated by consideration - of others´ feelings, needs, requirements. The occasional rebellious spirit is not admired, concepts such as fulfillment and freedom never enter her head. As for "needs" beyond basic physical ones - an idea that would have astonished her - she would have substituted "obligations."

But there is something about all this that keeps us going back, and back and back.¤

6) Hardcover Book Jane Austen Complete Works: Complete Novels (Collector's Library Editions) by CRW Publishing Limited. Perhaps the best loved of all English novelists. She addresses the politics, dating and courtship with an incisive intelligence that both foreshadows and outsrips many of the romantic novels of today.¤

Page Updated: Robert N. Goolsby, 8-Jan-2009, 19046339359781904633938, 960-420-851-351-CQB-58B-8

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