Love and Friendship and Other Early Works

Entertaining, but definitely among my least favourite books by Jane Austen. It's a parody of sentimental novels (like "Pamela" by Richardson) popular during Jane Austen's youth. The characters are therefore unbelievably silly, although it's still fun to follow their unlikely adventures which include the typical fainting fits, overturned carriages, long-lost relations, and a lot of other melodrama typical for this genre. You can tell the novel was written for entertainment only and not meant to be taken seriously. That's what I expected "Northanger Abbey" would be like before I read it, actually, since it's often labeled a satire of sentimental and Gothic novels.

I can't say that this is one of my favorites of Austen's. It was very quick, and very short, and funny in an over-the-top way, but I find that I much prefer her subtlety. Considering how young she was when writing this though, it's pretty damn impressive.

"Run mad as often as you chuse; but do not faint--"

Words to live by. ;)

This collection of early satire from Jane Austen was quite enjoyable, if a bit different from her other more popular works. The title story, Love and Freindship was probably my favorite story. I loved the over-the-top emotional outbursts of the characters. I could even picture the two flighty girls at the heart of the story as sort of Kardashian-Lohan-esque. Self centered girls ruled by their emotions, gliding through life on the backs and feelings of others all in the name of being true to their Sensibility.

The most impressive aspect of this collection is that these stories were written by a 14-year-old Austen. Her grasp not only of the social nuances of her culture of the time but of the subtle grace of writing good satire at that show more age is impressive. I very much liked this collection of stories and it gave me a greater appreciation for the talents of this much loved author. show less

I was not actually aware of Austen's "juvenilia" until I started collecting her works. What a treat!

This volume, first published in 1922, contains in order of placement and quality, Love and Freindship [sic], Lesley Castle, The History of England, Collection of Letters, and Scraps.

Written by a very young Jane, these short and/or incomplete works are absurd and ridiculous: the classic Austen wit unbounded by necessity of realism, form, or substance.

These bits and pieces are good simply for a laugh, as young ladies shriek, faint, and "run mad" at the least bit of excitment, a family sits around discussing at length whether the person pounding on the door is in fact knocking and wants to get in, and the kings and queens of England are show more summarily roasted for their assorted failings and follies. I just breezed through this one, reading bits aloud to anyone who happened to be in the vicinity. show less

June 2016: reread of "Love and Freindship"
This epistolary novella deserves the title often bestowed upon it of Juvenilia - the spelling errors (I don't really know why they have been preserved!) combined with the melodramatic plot are juvenile! The satire though shows Austen's budding talent. I had to laugh several times, especially as whenever Laura didn't know what to do, she fainted!

I decided to reread this because of the new film "Love and Friendship" only to discover that the movie is actually a dramatization of "Lady Susan", not "Love and Friendship"!

Cori Samuel did a fine job with the narration in the LibriVox recording.

Let's cut this little lady a little bit of slack, shall we? She was, after all, some 14 or 16 years of age when she wrote these collected fragments. The humor can be a little forced and puerile, but for heaven's sake! The centerpiece "History of England" is, in many ways, the weakest of young Ms. Austen's efforts. Of more flavor is something like "THE FIRST ACT OF A COMEDY," which is positively surrealistic as it sets the scene for a farcical disaster of the "Comedy of Errors" type. All very slight, but nothing of which to be ashamed. Write on, young woman, you may go far.

I'm still not entirely sure what I think about this one. You can definitely see where pieces were pulled out and put into her later works. And it's meant to be a reverse point piece again, but it wasn't entirely a favorite, but I did love reading it anyway.