ELENA FERRANTE ON HOW SHE CAME TO EMBRACE JANE AUSTEN
This article was published on Elle.com
The fact that Jane Austen, in the course of her short life, published her books anonymously made a great impression on me as a girl of fifteen. It was the surly English teacher who told us this, and I was tempted to ask why, but I soon abandoned the idea, out of timidity. Meanwhile, I read Pride and Prejudice, but it didn't interest me. At the time, I was enthralled by the great male adventure novels, with their stories that ranged all over the world, and I wanted to write such books myself: I couldn't resign myself to the idea that women's novels were domestic tales of love and marriage. I was past twenty when I returned to Jane Austen. And from that moment not only did I love everything she had written but I was passionate about her anonymity…