You will have much pleasure being in London. ..Their departure took place in the first week of January. The Middletons were to follow in about a week. The Miss Steeles kept their station at the park, and were to quit only with the rest of the family.
Sense and Sensibility
London Season
Elinor and Marianne agree to Mrs Jennings in her house in London, ‘in one of the streets near Portman Square’. Marianne spends the visit in hope of seeing Willoughby, and when she finds out he is engaged to someone else, the visit is ruined. Mrs Jennings’ attempts to cheer her up with Constantia wine, dried cherries, olives and sweetmeats which go unheeded. She longs to return to the countryside to wallow.
Most people went to London just after Christmas, but along with the continuous improvement of roads and travel, the season shifted to the middle of January.
The London season coincided with the sitting of Parliament, beginning at some point after Christmas when fashionable families would move into their London houses. The men would attend Parliament, whilst the women shopped, visited, and found husbands for themselves or their daughters. It lasted until early summer, when the ‘beau monde’ would return to their country estates, escaping the city’s stifling heat and pungent smells.
The season was a whirlwind of court balls and concerts, private balls and dances, parties and sporting events. On a typical day, ladies would rise early to go riding in Hyde Park, before returning home to breakfast and spending the day shopping, dealing with correspondence and paying calls.The Season.
Jane Austen’s House Museum
Jane first visited London with her brothers in 1796, and when Henry and his wife Eliza moved from Brompton to 64 Sloane Street, she often returned to London to visit their home in 1811 and 1813 which you can still see today. She preferred Henry and Eliza’s second London home in Covent Garden, having visited them at 10 Henrietta Street in both the summer of 1813 and March 1814.
Following the death of Eliza in 1813, Henry moved to 23 Hans Place where Austen stayed during her 1814 and 1815 London visits. While editing Emma and negotiating with her publisher in 1815, Jane returned to Chawton only to be called back when Henry was very ill. This was her last visit to London before she passed away 19 months later in 1817.
A Day in London with Jane Austen
Below are all the things that should be on your list as a Jane Austen fan in London, and make the most your time. Jane loved the parks, and you can stroll through Kensington Gardens where Elinor Dashwood’s walk is interrupted with gossip about her sister from Anne and Lucy Steele.
The Theatre Royal Drury Lane, a place where Jane loved to visit, is where John Willoughby learns of Marianne’s illness from Sir John Middleton in Sense & Sensibility‘s. He lodges at Conduit Street in Mayfair.
1. Portrait Gallery
This is where you can see the famous portrait of Jane Austen made by her sister Cassandra. Plus hundreds of portraits of many famous contemporaries including those of Warren Hastings, Nelson, Queen Caroline and George IV, and those of the actors and actresses that Jane Austen loved to see on the theatre stage.
2. National Maritime Museum, Greenwich
Jane’s two brothers Frank and Charles were in the Navy, and Jane uses naval references throughout her novels. You can write down a list of ships she mentions, and see many of their paintings hanging in the National Maritime Museum.
One gallery charts the history of the East India Company, linked to Jane’s aunt Phila, and her lover, Warren Hastings, Eliza’s famous (god)father. The Nelson Gallery is dedicated to the hero of Trafalgar, Lord Nelson, which both brothers missed. Another gallery charts the history of the slave trade, and the plantations in the West Indies Jane talks about in Mansfield Park. You can learn a lot about life on board a ship, and remember what Anne Elliot and Mrs Croft thought about that in Persuasion, inspired by Jane’s sister-in-law Fanny, more of whom you can find at Chatham Boatyard.
3. British Library
Mr Austen bought Jane a portable writing desk for her 19th birthday, and here’s where you can see it on display alongside her reading glasses. They also have other displays, and at the moment are showing the unused chapters of Persuasion. Visit the British Library.
4. The Wallace Gallery
On 24 May 1813, Henry took Jane to see a much talked about art exhibition at the British Institution in Pall Mall, London. The show was a selection of Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792) works, England’s celebrated portrait painter.
No visual record of this show is known to have survived, although it attracted hundreds of daily visitors during its three-month run. Many details of the exhibit can be found in the original 1813 Catalogue of Pictures, a one-shilling pamphlet purchased by visitors as a guide through the three large rooms where hung 141 paintings by Reynolds.
Jane is looking for a portrait of her Elizabeth Bennet, and thinks there is ‘no chance of her in the collection of Sir Joshua Reynolds’s Paintings which is now shewing in Pall Mall, & which we are also to visit,‘ and she jokes ‘I dare say Mrs D. will be in Yellow.’ (Letters, 212)
The Wallace Gallery has an extensive collection of Joshua Reynolds works, or see an artist impression at the What Jane Saw website.
5. Shop at Twinings Tea on the Strand
Jane was in charge of the breakfast in Chawton Cottage that included keeping the key for the tea chest. When visiting Henry in London, she purchased tea from Twinings Tea Shop in the Strand, and would have walked through this doorway which dates from 1787.
The pair of Chinese men is a reminder that all imported tea came from China, until the East India Company introduced large plantations in the 1820s. Paintings, prints and tea caddies are on display inside.
Jane also mentions in a letter that she visited Wedgwood China Shop with Edward and her niece Fanny. This shop has since closed, though you can still find their china in Harrods and Selfridges
6. Westminster Abbey
You can also find a tribute to Jane Austen in the celebrated Poets’ Corner of Westminster Abbey. Jane is buried in Winchester Cathedral, and has a memorial tablet in recognition of her place among Britain’s greatest writers. Surrounded by Shakespeare, Dickens, Chaucer, Wordsworth and many more, it’s a wonderful reason to visit the Abbey.
Lovely Links
Find Jane Austen events in London click HERE
TAGS
Jane Austen, Jane Austen 250, London, Twinings Tea, Joshua Reynolds, Henry Austen, Sloane Street, St Paul’s Cathedral, Covent Garden, Westminster Abbey, Wallace Gallery, Portrait Gallery, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich.
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