Latest / Vox Novus with Victor Fuhrman / Caroline Jane Knight – Jane and Me: My Austen Heritage

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Caroline Jane Knight – Jane and Me: My Austen Heritage · Vox Novus with Victor Fuhrman

0:05
Speaker 1: Vox Novus, the New Voice, Vox Novus, the New Dimension,
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Speaker 1: Vox Novus thought and movement leaders who will share from
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Speaker 1: their experience and offer tools to help us navigate our
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Speaker 1: rapidly changing world. My name is Victor Furman. Welcome to
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Speaker 1: Vox Novus, the New Voice. This month marks Jane Austen's
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Speaker 1: two hundred and fiftieth birthday. Who better to share her
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Speaker 1: family's legacy than her fifth generation niece and the last
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Speaker 1: Austin descendant to grow up in Chattenhouse, Caroline Jane Knight.
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Speaker 1: She's the author of Jane and Me, My Austin Heritage.
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Speaker 1: It is the first memoir we have had from someone
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Speaker 1: in the Austin family since eighteen sixty seven. Caroline Jane
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Speaker 1: Knight is also the founder and chair of the Jane
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Speaker 1: Austen Literacy Foundation. Her website is Austin Heritage dot com.
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Speaker 1: And who better to interview Caroline than a woman who
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Speaker 1: has embraced the writings, characters, and history of Jane Austen
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Speaker 1: than my beloved wife, Laurie Sue Brockway. Laurie Sue is
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Speaker 1: a longtime journalist and author. She's also a public historian
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Speaker 1: specializing in women's history. Writing history and the intersection of
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Speaker 1: public history and spirituality. She's had the pleasure of writing
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Speaker 1: about Jane Austen's house at Chawton, and it is now
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Speaker 1: my pleasure to introduce Caroline, Jane Knight and Laurie Sue Brockway.
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Speaker 2: Thank you, thank you.
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Speaker 3: Thank you.
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Speaker 1: Caroline.
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Speaker 2: I am so so so happy you're here. You know,
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Speaker 2: I'm a fangirl. We're all devotees of Jane Austen, and
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Speaker 2: to be able to talk to a living relative who
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Speaker 2: grew up in the house that she grew up in,
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Speaker 2: the last place she was alive, is just so amazing.
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Speaker 2: And the fact that you have been willing to share
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Speaker 2: your journey to tell us so much more about the
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Speaker 2: history and to make this incredible effort to record it
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Speaker 2: and to preserve it and to allow people into Jane's
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Speaker 2: history and your whole family history is so extraordinary because
2:28
Speaker 2: we've been waiting for somebody to come and give us
2:31
Speaker 2: some more of the facts, because she gets a little
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Speaker 2: fictionalized right incurrently.
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Speaker 3: Absolutely absolutely, And of course one of the things about
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Speaker 3: Jane Austin is we actually know so little about her
2:42
Speaker 3: and because of her work, and when you read Jane's work,
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Speaker 3: I think you can. You can hear her, can't you.
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Speaker 3: The spirit of Jane comes through so strongly, And of
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Speaker 3: course we have one hundred and sixty odd letters which
2:56
Speaker 3: give us clues as well. So there are ways in
2:57
Speaker 3: which she's you can feel her, you feel you know her,
3:02
Speaker 3: but actually you can't quite grab on to her, can you.
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Speaker 3: You know, there's actually so much we don't know. We
3:07
Speaker 3: don't know what she even looked like. We don't truly
3:10
Speaker 3: know what she thought about anything, because even comments that
3:14
Speaker 3: she might have written in letters, we have no idea
3:17
Speaker 3: whether that was a running joke that she was, you know, continuing.
3:20
Speaker 3: We don't know whether she was being serious. We don't
3:23
Speaker 3: know when she was just letting off steam in a moment.
3:26
Speaker 3: So yes, it is something that that the information, as
3:30
Speaker 3: I said, that's absolutely concrete about Jane, is actually quite scarce,
3:33
Speaker 3: which does mean that it allows obviously people do have
3:37
Speaker 3: to fill in some blanks and make some assumptions to
3:41
Speaker 3: build a sort of picture of what her life was.
3:45
Speaker 3: And as a family, I think that and certainly growing
3:48
Speaker 3: up in Chawton, it's not necessarily that we I didn't
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Speaker 3: grow up with a you know, an all, we don't
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Speaker 3: have her secret diary. I mean it's you know what
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Speaker 3: I mean, don't I don't. Actually, we don't have a
4:00
Speaker 3: whole set of facts about Jane that aren't already or
4:04
Speaker 3: certainly by now, in the public domain. But I grew
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Speaker 3: up with her spirit, if that makes sense, and she
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Speaker 3: was and for anyone that's been to Chawton, and I
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Speaker 3: grew up in Chawton House, which is the big house
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Speaker 3: in Chawton, and that you know, that belonged to her brother,
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Speaker 3: and she grew up at or she lived in Chorton Cottage,
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Speaker 3: which was in the village only a few hundred meters away,
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Speaker 3: And anyone who's been to Chauton will tell you that
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Speaker 3: you can feel her there. You know, you go into
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Speaker 3: the cottage and people find it a very moving, very
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Speaker 3: moving experience to be in that cottage. You can just
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Speaker 3: imagine her, and the whole estate is exactly what you'd
4:39
Speaker 3: expect it to be, you know, if you read your
4:41
Speaker 3: Austin novels, it's exactly what you expect and you can
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Speaker 3: just imagine her there. And that's very much the sort
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Speaker 3: of the Jane that I grew up with. Was that
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Speaker 3: an extraordinary woman rather than as I said, it's not
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Speaker 3: that we have, you know, lots of secrets about her
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Speaker 3: that people don't already know, because at since Jane's time,
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Speaker 3: the family has shared what we know. James Austin Lee
5:04
Speaker 3: started that in eighteen seventy and then you know, William
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Speaker 3: Austin Lee wrote something in nineteen fourteen, and things that
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Speaker 3: have been known about Jane, the family has actively tried
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Speaker 3: to you know, always wanted that to be part of
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Speaker 3: the publics.
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Speaker 2: You know, that's amazing. I didn't even realize there was
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Speaker 2: a nineteen fourteen book. Let's give people a little context.
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Speaker 2: And by the way, I have not been to Jane
5:28
Speaker 2: Austen's house, but I have a friend who walked through
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Speaker 2: there and took a picture of the desk before they
5:33
Speaker 2: put the new wallpaper up. And I have gone through
5:37
Speaker 2: during the pandemic and afterwards I did a lot of research.
5:40
Speaker 2: I went through the virtual tour and also took guided
5:44
Speaker 2: tours to get all the information. I went through the
5:47
Speaker 2: gazillion times. They set it up so beautifully, and I
5:50
Speaker 2: could swear, even just being in New York, all the
5:53
Speaker 2: way across the pond, that I could feel her feet
5:57
Speaker 2: moving from one room to another house. The virtual tour
6:02
Speaker 2: took us from room to realm and it is so
6:04
Speaker 2: extraordinary that that exists. And of course it's a national treasure.
6:07
Speaker 2: It's been taken over by the British government. Yes, as
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Speaker 2: a heritage, say the Jane Austen House Museum.
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Speaker 3: No, Janos's House Museum is run by the Jane Notstin's
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Speaker 3: House Trust. I mean it's not, oh absolutely absolutely, as
6:21
Speaker 3: is Chautenhouse. I mean they're separate. If you don't mean
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Speaker 3: they're separate trust, they're separate buildings. But no, that Jane
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Speaker 3: Austen's House is operated, as I said, by the trust
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Speaker 3: that have always always looked after it.
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Speaker 2: Are there family members who are board members of the trust?
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Speaker 2: Or is that a totally separate entity?
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Speaker 3: Separate entity? And as I mean they said, it always
6:42
Speaker 3: has been. Jane Austen's House became a museum at the
6:45
Speaker 3: end of the nineteen forties and at that time Chortenhouse,
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Speaker 3: the big house where we were living, was our family
6:50
Speaker 3: home and was our family home till nineteen eighty eight,
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Speaker 3: till I was eighteen. I had the first eighteen years
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Speaker 3: of my life there, So you know, they weren't turned
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Speaker 3: into two public buildings at the same time. They weren't
7:03
Speaker 3: formed at the same time at all. Jane Austin's house
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Speaker 3: has been that sort of board of trustees and that
7:08
Speaker 3: sort of structure, as I said, for a very very
7:10
Speaker 3: long time.
7:12
Speaker 2: So basically Jane's parents were Cassandra and Reverend George Austen,
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Speaker 2: and she had beloved sister, Cassandra, also two years older,
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Speaker 2: and she had six brothers, and one of those brothers
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Speaker 2: was Edward Austin Knight. And that was your I would say,
7:30
Speaker 2: and here we'd say great great great great grandfather. Did
7:35
Speaker 2: I get that right?
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Speaker 3: Yes, that's right, yes, fourth great grandfather. Yes. So he
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Speaker 3: was obviously born Edward Austin, and he's the third born son,
7:43
Speaker 3: third born child of the Austins, and Jane is their
7:46
Speaker 3: second to last born. So Edward was George and Cassandra's
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Speaker 3: third born son, third born child, and Jane was second
7:54
Speaker 3: to last. But Edward, when he was about twelve, he
7:59
Speaker 3: was actually chosen by some very rich cousins to be
8:03
Speaker 3: their heir. And the rich cousins were called the Knight
8:06
Speaker 3: family and their fourth cousins of George Austin. And it's
8:10
Speaker 3: actually the Knights that own Stephenton, where Jane is living
8:14
Speaker 3: where George is the rector and they live in the
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Speaker 3: Stevington Rectory and that property, as I said, Stevnton was
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Speaker 3: owned by the Knight family and Thomas and Catherine Knight
8:23
Speaker 3: at the end of the eighteenth century realized that they
8:26
Speaker 3: weren't going to have children and if you don't have children,
8:29
Speaker 3: you have to there has to be an heir. And
8:31
Speaker 3: they owned multiple grand estates in the south of England.
8:34
Speaker 3: They owned lots of land and buildings in London and
8:37
Speaker 3: there was quite a fortune there. And Edward Austin they
8:40
Speaker 3: thought that he was you know, even as a young boy,
8:43
Speaker 3: he obviously showed the qualities that they thought was you know,
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Speaker 3: the right sort of person to be the squire because
8:49
Speaker 3: you are taking over, you know, to inherit that sort
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Speaker 3: of thing. You're taking over an important family business. I
8:55
Speaker 3: mean you've got to be capable of sort of running that.
8:58
Speaker 3: So from about the age of fifteen Edwards started spending
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Speaker 3: his summers with the Nights and then you know, being
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Speaker 3: prepared for this, the responsibilities he was going to inherit
9:08
Speaker 3: and to move him probably into a sort of different
9:10
Speaker 3: society wasing he was moving up in how they thought
9:14
Speaker 3: about things. Then so he went on a grand tour
9:17
Speaker 3: and yes, eventually he inherited, but the condition was he
9:20
Speaker 3: had to change his name tonight and that has going
9:22
Speaker 3: to be been. That has been the condition of ownership
9:26
Speaker 3: since Chautenhouse was built in fifteen eighty five, that's when
9:29
Speaker 3: it started, and it's never been sold. It still hasn't
9:33
Speaker 3: been sold today. My family still own it, but that
9:36
Speaker 3: in those times there've been multiple times where there's be
9:39
Speaker 3: no air and another relation has got it on the
9:41
Speaker 3: condition they changed their name tonight. And that kind of
9:44
Speaker 3: creates this almost illusion of continuous ownership, doesn't it if
9:49
Speaker 3: it's the same name. Actually, there's a lot of twists
9:52
Speaker 3: and turns in that inheritance as a lot and my branch,
9:55
Speaker 3: which is you know, the last five generations where Austin's
10:01
Speaker 3: if it weren't obviously for that name change, that is amazing.
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Speaker 2: It sounds like something out of a Gene Austen novel.
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Speaker 3: Well. I grew up knowing that Chorton House was entailed
10:14
Speaker 3: to my father's older brother, Richard, and Richard is my
10:18
Speaker 3: grandfather's son from his first marriage. And then when Richard
10:23
Speaker 3: was a young boy, that marriage ended and my grandparents
10:26
Speaker 3: met and then had a second family, and my father
10:29
Speaker 3: is the eldest of that second family. And so when
10:32
Speaker 3: I grew up at Chortonhouse, Richard didn't live there. He'd
10:35
Speaker 3: left as a young boy and lived with his mother,
10:37
Speaker 3: as you'd expect. So I grew up and Richard would
10:41
Speaker 3: visit every year, and I knew that the house was
10:44
Speaker 3: entailed to him, and I knew that when my grandfather died,
10:47
Speaker 3: we would all have to leave and Richard would get
10:49
Speaker 3: the house. Now there was never Richard is not mister Collins.
10:52
Speaker 3: Let me say that right now. He is a lovely man.
10:55
Speaker 3: Richard is a gentleman, and I I love him very much.
10:58
Speaker 3: But when I first read Pride and Prejudice, when I
11:01
Speaker 3: was sort of fifteen, that sort of age, exactly, all
11:04
Speaker 3: I could see was this story, and I in my
11:08
Speaker 3: absolute naivete, and you've got to think, you know, life
11:11
Speaker 3: back in the eighties was very different.
11:12
Speaker 2: Now.
11:12
Speaker 3: We didn't have social media, we didn't have access to him,
11:14
Speaker 3: you know, we weren't as worldly wise as children are now.
11:19
Speaker 3: And in my absolute naivete at fifteen, I thought, how
11:22
Speaker 3: did she know? How did she know this was what
11:26
Speaker 3: was going to happen to us? Isn't that ridiculous? But
11:28
Speaker 3: I thought, how did she know? Because I didn't have
11:32
Speaker 3: I didn't know that that was actually I mean, it's
11:35
Speaker 3: worked like that in England, or it had worked like
11:37
Speaker 3: that in England for nine hundred years of this. You know, obviously,
11:41
Speaker 3: you know, one person inheriting everything and that by its
11:45
Speaker 3: very consequence that displaces other people. And I didn't know
11:49
Speaker 3: that at the time, or you know that that was
11:52
Speaker 3: that was just how it worked. So yes, I, in
11:55
Speaker 3: my naivete thought that Jane somehow had known that that's
11:58
Speaker 3: what was going to happen. And I didn't think she
12:01
Speaker 3: was writing to me, but somehow it just sort of
12:04
Speaker 3: felt I don't know, Yes, it.
12:06
Speaker 2: Would be a message for the future from my.
12:08
Speaker 3: Oh, exactly be aware this is.
12:12
Speaker 2: Going to happen. That's amazing. And also you know now
12:16
Speaker 2: that you bring up sort of like when fiction meets
12:19
Speaker 2: reality in some ways. There was a period of time
12:23
Speaker 2: when after Reverend Austin died where the women were really
12:29
Speaker 2: in very bad shape financially and emotionally. Jane got very depressed.
12:33
Speaker 2: She was having a hard time writing. She had time
12:36
Speaker 2: in Bath nothing you know, to the people of Bath,
12:39
Speaker 2: but she was not happy there, and I think Southampton
12:42
Speaker 2: for a while. And it wasn't until your ancestor said
12:46
Speaker 2: to his mother, do you want to live in Choughton,
12:49
Speaker 2: Why don't you take the house the cottage there. Everybody
12:52
Speaker 2: says that that's when everything changed for them. So he
12:55
Speaker 2: really kind of was the We can maybe thank him
12:59
Speaker 2: for the last books that she did, because she did
13:03
Speaker 2: editing and writing and she was so much happier in
13:05
Speaker 2: that place. And her beautiful, beautiful little writing desk is
13:08
Speaker 2: sitting in the corner of the kitchen that you know,
13:11
Speaker 2: the replica of that desk.
13:13
Speaker 3: PLA. Yes, so they had moved to Bath George when
13:17
Speaker 3: Jane was in her early twenties. George announced that he
13:20
Speaker 3: was retiring from being the rector of Steventon and moved
13:23
Speaker 3: them to Bath. But unfortunately a few years later he
13:25
Speaker 3: died in Bath and as you said, left the ladies
13:27
Speaker 3: in quite a difficult position. They stayed in Bath for
13:30
Speaker 3: a little while. They then lived in Southampton for three
13:32
Speaker 3: years with brother Frank and his wife Mary and their
13:36
Speaker 3: first first child. And then yes, Edward did say would
13:40
Speaker 3: you like a cottage either Chawton or the Godminsham estate,
13:44
Speaker 3: which is where he lived which is actually in Kent.
13:46
Speaker 3: That's quite a long way away, and they chose Chawton,
13:49
Speaker 3: and I think it was because Chawton's very close to Steventon,
13:52
Speaker 3: so she was back in familiar Hampshire countryside, which she
13:55
Speaker 3: was clearly a country girl and happier in. But the
13:58
Speaker 3: most important thing is is that they had their own home,
14:02
Speaker 3: which they hadn't had for a number of years. And
14:06
Speaker 3: it would be foolish to say that Jane didn't write,
14:09
Speaker 3: but we have no evidence of her writing between George
14:12
Speaker 3: dying and her arriving in Chawton, so there's a gap
14:15
Speaker 3: of three plus years there where there isn't, as I said,
14:20
Speaker 3: evidence of writing. And I think that when you're living
14:23
Speaker 3: in someone else's house, which was a very small house
14:25
Speaker 3: with a lot of adults and young children, and in
14:29
Speaker 3: those Southampton years, I just think Jane didn't have the space,
14:32
Speaker 3: she didn't have the time, she didn't have you know,
14:35
Speaker 3: it just wasn't possible. Whereas Chawton, absolutely they finally had
14:39
Speaker 3: their own home, they finally had the privacy and in
14:42
Speaker 3: actual fact those ladies worked together to make sure that
14:46
Speaker 3: Jane could write, so the other ladies in the house
14:49
Speaker 3: took more than their fair share of chores, so that
14:52
Speaker 3: from sort of mid morning through to the end of
14:55
Speaker 3: the afternoon, Jane was free, Her time was free, and
14:59
Speaker 3: she'd played piano for an hour or so in order
15:02
Speaker 3: to I think that was part of her creative process.
15:04
Speaker 3: I think it was part of her getting her mind,
15:06
Speaker 3: and she did. There is a quote of hers where
15:08
Speaker 3: she's talking about that she can't settle down to composition
15:11
Speaker 3: with her mind full of doses of rhubarb, and I think,
15:14
Speaker 3: you know, I think she was just sort of saying,
15:16
Speaker 3: or to me, she obviously, So I've always sort of
15:18
Speaker 3: put those pieces together and assumed that she was playing
15:20
Speaker 3: the piano used to mean as a way of getting
15:22
Speaker 3: her mind into the right place for her to be
15:25
Speaker 3: able to write. And then she'd sit down for hours,
15:27
Speaker 3: you know, for the rest of the day and write.
15:30
Speaker 3: And that gorgeous little table, as you say, that gorgeous
15:32
Speaker 3: table is tiny, but really that's because she had to
15:38
Speaker 3: move from window to window with the light, so she
15:41
Speaker 3: wouldn't necessarily sit in the same place all day. And
15:45
Speaker 3: of course there's nothing to say that she didn't Whilst
15:48
Speaker 3: we know she did write on that table, we don't
15:51
Speaker 3: know that she exclusively wrote on that table. She could
15:53
Speaker 3: have written you know that. You know, there's nothing to
15:55
Speaker 3: say that she didn't, you know, write in other places
15:59
Speaker 3: in the house as well, but certainly that was, you know,
16:01
Speaker 3: a favored spot was in that parlor, as I said,
16:04
Speaker 3: moving the table to different windows and things with the light.
16:08
Speaker 2: That's amazing. Of course she's walking around with notes and
16:12
Speaker 2: her ink and her her feather pen, and you know,
16:16
Speaker 2: today she'd have a laptop. It would be a lot easier.
16:19
Speaker 2: I was at an exhibit at the Morgan Museum, Library
16:23
Speaker 2: and Museum in September, a Lively Mind, which was a
16:26
Speaker 2: beautiful exhibit, so you know, very honoring Jane Austen two
16:30
Speaker 2: hundred and fifty years and they had a replica for
16:33
Speaker 2: a tiny desk and I'd only seen it on the
16:35
Speaker 2: virtual tour, and I really couldn't believe how tiny it was.
16:39
Speaker 2: And then I really wanted to see her turquoise ring,
16:42
Speaker 2: which lives at the Chottenus Museum, and they had it
16:46
Speaker 2: there and it was tiny, and there was dress there
16:49
Speaker 2: too that was hers and it was tiny, and I thought,
16:51
Speaker 2: oh my goodness, a tiny desk and the tiny ring
16:55
Speaker 2: and the tiny dress, they were.
16:57
Speaker 3: All I mean everybody. Yeah, they were all small people.
17:01
Speaker 3: I'm very lucky to own an extensive collection of genuine
17:07
Speaker 3: anti regency fashion and it's tiny, all of it.
17:13
Speaker 2: Wow tiny, Oh my good well.
17:15
Speaker 3: Thanks. And the ring, yes, the rings at Jane Austen's
17:18
Speaker 3: house museum. Yes, the ring is there, which is wonderful,
17:22
Speaker 3: wonderful to have her jewelry, hotel pass cross is there
17:25
Speaker 3: as well a necklace. So yes, there's some lovely, very
17:27
Speaker 3: personal items of James.
17:29
Speaker 2: I love that. When I saw it in New York,
17:31
Speaker 2: I thought, oh my goodness. I mean, it was just
17:35
Speaker 2: it is so. I think it's so important to have
17:37
Speaker 2: the real culture, the preservation of the things that you
17:41
Speaker 2: know were part of her life as much as possible.
17:44
Speaker 2: We don't have everything, but that's why the work that
17:48
Speaker 2: you're doing is just so incredibly important in this field.
17:52
Speaker 2: Do you consider yourself a Jane Austen historian?
17:57
Speaker 3: No, No, Actually, I've never thought about it like that.
18:01
Speaker 3: I mean, obviously, the the you know, the story of
18:03
Speaker 3: Jane Austen and the fact that we know so much
18:07
Speaker 3: about or what we do know about her. Some of
18:10
Speaker 3: that's come from the family, some of it has come
18:12
Speaker 3: from particularly over the last thirty years. I mean, not exclusively,
18:16
Speaker 3: but to the last thirty years. There's a lot of
18:19
Speaker 3: academic work that goes on that isn't coming from the family.
18:22
Speaker 3: So there's a lot of academics that are obviously, you know,
18:25
Speaker 3: studying archives way beyond the family archives, and they're studying materials,
18:30
Speaker 3: you know, way beyond what we would have. And I
18:34
Speaker 3: think a fantastic job has been done, you know, by
18:37
Speaker 3: the academics of the Austin world in really telling us
18:40
Speaker 3: a great story. What I think that I suppose what
18:44
Speaker 3: my mission is or how I see myself fitting into
18:47
Speaker 3: it is. I think knowing somebody from a family perspective
18:51
Speaker 3: is just different. I think that to get a really
18:53
Speaker 3: good picture, I think we need the academic side of
18:57
Speaker 3: it and what and what that has sort of brought fourth.
19:00
Speaker 3: But I also think the picture is enhanced by understanding
19:04
Speaker 3: Jane from our perspective, and you know, what Chawton is
19:08
Speaker 3: from our perspective. And I think that that also, you know,
19:13
Speaker 3: and people sort of talk about I mean, for instance,
19:15
Speaker 3: I give you an example, you know, Sir Richard Knight,
19:18
Speaker 3: who was you know, he's sixteen thirty sixteen seventy a
19:22
Speaker 3: full size marble statue of him reclines in the Chawton
19:26
Speaker 3: in the church in Chawton. Okay, so he was there
19:29
Speaker 3: when Jane was there. When he was a boy from
19:31
Speaker 3: the age of five to twenty. Christmas was banned by
19:34
Speaker 3: the Puritans in England, so he didn't have Christmas as
19:37
Speaker 3: a child. They may have been doing it behind closed
19:39
Speaker 3: bought doors, but I'm saying he what you know, they
19:42
Speaker 3: publicly weren't celebrating Christmas. So it's a family tradition that
19:46
Speaker 3: we put a sprig of holly in Sir Richard's hand
19:50
Speaker 3: in that statue. Because he's got his hand is the
19:52
Speaker 3: way he's lying, the hand that's on top of him,
19:54
Speaker 3: you can literally put something in it. And so we
19:56
Speaker 3: put a sprig of holly in his hand every Christmas
20:00
Speaker 3: so he doesn't miss any more Christmases. Now, that's something
20:03
Speaker 3: that we were doing and while Star and we played,
20:06
Speaker 3: I mean, another example would be we played Snapdragon Snapdragon,
20:08
Speaker 3: which we know that Jane and the family played. We
20:11
Speaker 3: played it every single Christmas Eve in the Great Hall,
20:15
Speaker 3: and that's where you get loads of currents. I don't
20:18
Speaker 3: know if there were currents or raisins currents. I'd imagine,
20:20
Speaker 3: you know, soaked in hot brandy and you light it
20:22
Speaker 3: and this massive blue, you know, raw of flame goes up.
20:27
Speaker 3: And those are things that by me sharing my memories
20:31
Speaker 3: of doing those things and actually having experienced that stuff
20:35
Speaker 3: firsthand myself is just giving is just you know, just
20:40
Speaker 3: giving a little bit more about what Jane might have
20:43
Speaker 3: experienced playing Snapdragon, because people can read about it and
20:47
Speaker 3: know that it happened, but they might not ever be
20:51
Speaker 3: able to actually experience that for themselves. And Snapdragon is
20:54
Speaker 3: actually a great example of something that I've seen that
20:59
Speaker 3: Snapdragon as a game, if you like, and you have
21:01
Speaker 3: to put your hands into the fire, you put your
21:03
Speaker 3: hands in the fire to get the currents and you
21:05
Speaker 3: eat them while they're flaming. So everybody's eating these flaming raisins.
21:09
Speaker 3: And it's something that I have seen it recreated in
21:13
Speaker 3: Sanderton in there's another adaptation that does it as well,
21:16
Speaker 3: and they get it so wrong. I'm sorry, movie makers.
21:20
Speaker 3: I mean, I love all the work that's out there,
21:21
Speaker 3: but the recreation of snap Dragon is just not what
21:25
Speaker 3: it was at all. They've completely not got how that
21:29
Speaker 3: works or what it is. And either it might be
21:32
Speaker 3: health and safety, I have to say because it's a nowadays,
21:34
Speaker 3: health and safety probably wouldn't approve. But I'm just giving
21:38
Speaker 3: a very small example of how I had, you know
21:41
Speaker 3: what I mean, me and my family, and there's my generation.
21:45
Speaker 3: I'm the youngest, but then there's the generation above, so
21:48
Speaker 3: my parents and their generation. So we have between us,
21:50
Speaker 3: you know, let's say, the last fifty years of Chorton
21:52
Speaker 3: House as a family home, and the collective experience that
21:57
Speaker 3: we have, as I said, it will it is, you know,
22:01
Speaker 3: it is giving a different perspective on what some of
22:04
Speaker 3: Jane's life may have been. And also the other thing
22:08
Speaker 3: that I think that people are interested in, and really
22:11
Speaker 3: what I'm playing back to you is actually, if I'm honest,
22:12
Speaker 3: what people tell me, if you know what I mean,
22:15
Speaker 3: these are the things that people tell me that they're
22:17
Speaker 3: sort of getting out of what I'm doing. And the
22:21
Speaker 3: other thing that people tell me is of course that
22:25
Speaker 3: not only were we Janos's family, and we were, you know,
22:28
Speaker 3: her legacy impacted our lives in chalk And very much,
22:31
Speaker 3: and people are interested in that, you know, how her
22:33
Speaker 3: legacy has impacted our lives. But also we're talking about
22:38
Speaker 3: the last fifty years of a nine hundred year long
22:43
Speaker 3: system in England of these manners of the lords, of
22:45
Speaker 3: the manner of that kind of thing. And when we
22:48
Speaker 3: look back in history and we're trying to assert things,
22:51
Speaker 3: we're sort of looking for these tiny snippets. Aren't we
22:53
Speaker 3: to kind of build up a picture of what life
22:56
Speaker 3: may have been like in one of these great manners
22:58
Speaker 3: in eighteen hundred or in whatever. And I just feel
23:01
Speaker 3: that we've actually got a chance to for the last
23:03
Speaker 3: fifty years, to actually paint that picture, you know, for
23:06
Speaker 3: future generations, and not just leave, you know, not let
23:10
Speaker 3: us all die and not have shared that information, because
23:15
Speaker 3: it is, as I said, a window actually into what
23:18
Speaker 3: are the last fifty years like when it's all going wrong,
23:22
Speaker 3: when we're going to lose the estate, you know, what
23:24
Speaker 3: is that actually like for the family that are going
23:26
Speaker 3: through that and that, you know, watching things being sold off,
23:31
Speaker 3: watching you know, the sort of you know, the end
23:33
Speaker 3: of it all. So I think there's a social history
23:36
Speaker 3: sort of element of what I'm doing as much as
23:38
Speaker 3: there is, you know, for Jay Knights and for the
23:40
Speaker 3: Jane Austin community.
23:42
Speaker 2: I love that that's important. And we're going to talk
23:44
Speaker 2: a little bit more about how you're trying to preserve
23:47
Speaker 2: an archive of this legacy in your life, the projects
23:50
Speaker 2: you're taking on.
23:52
Speaker 1: And our guest is Jane Austen's fifth generation niece, Caroline
23:57
Speaker 1: Jane Nike. We'll be back with more of Caroline after
23:59
Speaker 1: these on the Own Times Radio Network.
24:03
Speaker 4: Free your Mind with ome Times Radio i own FM.
24:08
Speaker 4: Ome Times Magazine is one of the leading online content
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24:35
Speaker 2: I'm back with Jane Austen's niece, Caroline Jane Knight, and
24:41
Speaker 2: we are going to talk a little more about your
24:43
Speaker 2: experience with your Austin ancestry and especially I know we
24:48
Speaker 2: talked about preserving that history, but tell us a little
24:50
Speaker 2: bit about what happened in your own life and family
24:53
Speaker 2: when you were living in Chaughton. When you loved living
24:57
Speaker 2: in Chaughton, it was just part of your life and
24:59
Speaker 2: you did have to leave. What was that like? It
25:01
Speaker 2: seems like it was a little bit traumatic, like some
25:03
Speaker 2: of Jane's experiences in the places she lived in before Chatten.
25:10
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it was something that I found it
25:12
Speaker 3: absolutely heartbreaking, heartbreaking to leave, and of course people, I mean,
25:18
Speaker 3: I was incredibly lucky, incredibly lucky to grow up there
25:22
Speaker 3: and there's no you know, there's no sob story here.
25:24
Speaker 3: You know, I'm very very privileged to have had that experience.
25:28
Speaker 3: But when it all came to an end, I mean,
25:29
Speaker 3: part of what I loved about living in Chawton was
25:32
Speaker 3: not only of course living in this amazing house and
25:35
Speaker 3: having a huge garden you know, and grounds and things,
25:39
Speaker 3: and as children that was amazing and we just had
25:41
Speaker 3: the best, you know, wonderful upbringing there, but I also
25:44
Speaker 3: felt part of something.
25:46
Speaker 5: You know.
25:46
Speaker 3: Granny ran a tea room from the Great Hall, so
25:48
Speaker 3: I worked in that all through my teen years. So
25:50
Speaker 3: I was always talking to Jane Austin lovers, who had
25:53
Speaker 3: a lot of people who had come from America, you know,
25:56
Speaker 3: to come to Chawton. And we also we hosted every
26:00
Speaker 3: year the Village Fate, the Horticultural Show, the Jane Austin
26:03
Speaker 3: Society of the UK. Their AGM was at the house
26:07
Speaker 3: every year, so this huge, big sort of white tent
26:10
Speaker 3: would appear and five hundred people would come, you know,
26:14
Speaker 3: and and and listen to these speeches and things like that.
26:17
Speaker 3: So I just I really felt part of this legacy
26:22
Speaker 3: of of you know, and part of Chawton, and being
26:26
Speaker 3: Caroline jan Knight from Chorton House was my identity. That's
26:30
Speaker 3: that's what I That's what I you know, that's who
26:33
Speaker 3: I what's who I am. But it's something that so
26:36
Speaker 3: when it all came to an end, and I always
26:38
Speaker 3: knew it would, it was never that was never hidden
26:40
Speaker 3: from us as children that you know it, And it
26:43
Speaker 3: was obvious to see, you know, the parts of the
26:45
Speaker 3: house that we didn't really use anymore, like what would
26:48
Speaker 3: have been the old service quarters and you know what
26:50
Speaker 3: I mean, the original house kitchen, stuff like that. The
26:53
Speaker 3: servants had gone decades before I was born, just because
26:56
Speaker 3: them plan need run out of money and so I
26:59
Speaker 3: knew that, you know, financially, it just wouldn't be possible
27:03
Speaker 3: for us to stay anymore. So I had always known that.
27:05
Speaker 3: But it just as I said, I found it a
27:08
Speaker 3: very very difficult, very difficult time. Was having to, you know,
27:12
Speaker 3: say goodbye to Chawton and having to you know, see
27:16
Speaker 3: Granny have to leave, and you know, and it's something
27:21
Speaker 3: that my reaction to that was actually too and this
27:24
Speaker 3: is my eighteen year old reaction to it, was I
27:26
Speaker 3: left Chawton absolutely determined that I was going to be
27:30
Speaker 3: independently successful. You know, that I am never going to
27:33
Speaker 3: be toughed out of my home again when I don't
27:35
Speaker 3: want to be. You know, it really sort of set
27:37
Speaker 3: me on this path of you know, I need independence.
27:40
Speaker 3: I need to be financially independent on my own. And
27:45
Speaker 3: I didn't tell a soul for twenty five years that
27:49
Speaker 3: I had this connection with Jane Austin. I built a
27:52
Speaker 3: life and I had a great career. You know, I've
27:54
Speaker 3: had a great career. I ended up in Australia where
27:58
Speaker 3: I now live as CEO a big marketing agency here,
28:01
Speaker 3: and I'd lived here for probably five years, and nobody
28:05
Speaker 3: knew that I had anything to do with Jane Austin
28:07
Speaker 3: or Chorten. It was a very difficult, very difficult thing.
28:11
Speaker 3: But then in twenty thirteen, the two hundred year annivers
28:15
Speaker 3: of Pride and Prejudice just changed everything. It was just
28:18
Speaker 3: I was forty three. By this point, it had been
28:20
Speaker 3: twenty five years since we'd left Chortonhouse, and I just thought,
28:26
Speaker 3: you know, it's time. You know. It was just it
28:28
Speaker 3: was the start of just a sort of a chain
28:30
Speaker 3: of events that just brought me back to it and
28:34
Speaker 3: actually made me realize, if you know what I mean,
28:36
Speaker 3: that that I am Caroline j Knight from Chortenhouse, not
28:40
Speaker 3: I was Caroline Jay Night from Chortenhouse, if that makes sense.
28:43
Speaker 3: And it's sort of you know, and I started to slowly,
28:47
Speaker 3: you know, get involved with the Austin community and just
28:49
Speaker 3: realize that I have something to add, something to add
28:51
Speaker 3: to it.
28:52
Speaker 2: Yes, and that is really extraordinary, is that when you
28:55
Speaker 2: wrote your book, You're really amazing book that I just
28:57
Speaker 2: that everybody get because it's really wonderful. Jane and me
29:02
Speaker 2: my Austin Heritage.
29:04
Speaker 3: Thank you so yes, so exactly. So at that time
29:08
Speaker 3: I decided that I decided I needed to write a
29:11
Speaker 3: book because nobody, nobody, I mean were people knew about
29:15
Speaker 3: Chorton House by this point because it after we left
29:19
Speaker 3: my uncle Richard, I mean, he did such a good
29:22
Speaker 3: job in finding a way of keeping the house, but
29:26
Speaker 3: finding a way of making it viables. So I realized
29:29
Speaker 3: at that time that, as I said, so many people
29:31
Speaker 3: know Chorton House. Now it's a public building, still owned
29:34
Speaker 3: by my uncle Richard, but it's on a long lease
29:37
Speaker 3: to a charitable trust that was formed and the house
29:40
Speaker 3: was restored and it's now, as I said, open to
29:42
Speaker 3: the public and loved by people all over the world.
29:44
Speaker 3: But I realized that nobody knew, of course, what had
29:47
Speaker 3: actually happened to the Knight family, you know, what happened
29:50
Speaker 3: to the family that we're living there. And I thought, well,
29:53
Speaker 3: I know that, and I think that as I said
29:56
Speaker 3: that those sort of last years, they're part of the story.
30:00
Speaker 3: And I thought, well, I need to actually, you know,
30:02
Speaker 3: I need to explain it. I need to let people
30:05
Speaker 3: in and actually understand what our lives were, what our
30:08
Speaker 3: relationship is with this heritage and things like that. So
30:12
Speaker 3: I did decide that I was going to write the
30:13
Speaker 3: book in twenty thirteen. It took three years to do it.
30:18
Speaker 3: It was not easy, I have to say, it was
30:20
Speaker 3: not easy. But I realized as I was doing it,
30:23
Speaker 3: which I didn't realize before I did it, but I
30:25
Speaker 3: realized I was I was doing it. Actually what a
30:27
Speaker 3: cathartic process. It was for me because of course, when
30:30
Speaker 3: you're writing something, you have to get it straight in
30:32
Speaker 3: your own mind, don't you to be able to you know,
30:34
Speaker 3: explaining things to other people, you have to actually know,
30:37
Speaker 3: you know, you have to think about what you're saying.
30:39
Speaker 3: So it's something that it was a very you know,
30:43
Speaker 3: very upsetting at times. I certainly had my moments and
30:46
Speaker 3: you know, had a few cries along the way, and
30:48
Speaker 3: it certainly but by the end of it, I actually
30:51
Speaker 3: think i'd you know, largely come you know, made peace.
30:54
Speaker 3: I think with it all and sort of understood, you know,
30:59
Speaker 3: or certainly started move on. And now I absolutely love it.
31:03
Speaker 3: I think I'm the luckiest person in the world. I
31:04
Speaker 3: really do. I love it. I mean I love that
31:07
Speaker 3: I get to, you know, be part of sharing and
31:10
Speaker 3: you know, sharing our heritage and continuing Jane's legacy. And
31:15
Speaker 3: as I said, I just think I'm the luckiest person
31:16
Speaker 3: in the world. I absolutely love it.
31:17
Speaker 2: Now it's amazing that you had the courage to go
31:22
Speaker 2: through that experience to you know, take ownership again of
31:27
Speaker 2: who you are and your heritage. And I know that
31:32
Speaker 2: you know, part of what we do in history they
31:35
Speaker 2: say there's a thing called a silence in the archives,
31:38
Speaker 2: especially when it comes to women's history. People look for
31:42
Speaker 2: the information. It's like there's nothing here in the archive
31:46
Speaker 2: about a particular thing. So, like you were saying before
31:50
Speaker 2: about Jane, we don't really know a lot about her
31:53
Speaker 2: because we don't have all that in the archives. So
31:57
Speaker 2: it sounds like one of the things that you can
31:59
Speaker 2: do with all your you know, the wisdom you've required
32:04
Speaker 2: about sharing the information and the stories that you have,
32:09
Speaker 2: is you were talking about creating your own archive. Is
32:12
Speaker 2: it through your.
32:14
Speaker 3: Well, I've naturally, I mean I've been you know, all
32:16
Speaker 3: started with my book. And even though of course I
32:18
Speaker 3: grew up at Chorton and I'd heard a lot of
32:20
Speaker 3: the stories. For the purposes my book, of course, I
32:23
Speaker 3: fact checked and I researched, and I made sure that
32:26
Speaker 3: I knew what was a childhood something. I mean, because
32:29
Speaker 3: then there were things I was told in my childhood
32:31
Speaker 3: that weren't right. It doesn't mean I didn't include them
32:33
Speaker 3: in the book. I just wanted to know what was
32:35
Speaker 3: right and what wasn't. So that sort of started me
32:37
Speaker 3: off on this path of research. But I've also collated
32:40
Speaker 3: and as I said that was, but that was about
32:42
Speaker 3: really verifying you know, what I already knew. But I
32:46
Speaker 3: over the time because as Jane Olson's niece, I've been right,
32:48
Speaker 3: and I write every week, I share a story online
32:51
Speaker 3: from the family, or I share an artifact, or I
32:53
Speaker 3: share some photographs of events that might have happened in
32:56
Speaker 3: the you know, at Chorlton House or us just living there,
32:59
Speaker 3: whatever it may be. That I've actually naturally collected an
33:03
Speaker 3: awful lot of material around the last fifty years at Chortenhouse.
33:09
Speaker 3: And I've done that because, as I said, I've been
33:12
Speaker 3: doing it as part of you know, obviously, as you research,
33:15
Speaker 3: you collect things, don't you and i'd have I don't know,
33:17
Speaker 3: but I mean we might even be into the thousands
33:19
Speaker 3: in terms of the number of photographs that I've sort
33:22
Speaker 3: of pulled together from you know, what I had anyway,
33:25
Speaker 3: but my parents and and sort of you know, other people.
33:29
Speaker 3: So it's just something that yes, I'm now at a
33:31
Speaker 3: point where I think there's an archive that already exists,
33:35
Speaker 3: but it's very rudimentary. You know, it's very rudimentary because
33:39
Speaker 3: it's only been my own storage of these things. But
33:42
Speaker 3: I really think that there's a you know, it's almost
33:45
Speaker 3: like there's a time capsule there of these you know,
33:48
Speaker 3: a few decades living in this manor house that yes
33:52
Speaker 3: had been Edward Austin's was where, you know, a house
33:54
Speaker 3: that Jane knew and loved and slept in and you
33:59
Speaker 3: know eate in and all the rest of it and
34:01
Speaker 3: enjoyed the walks. And I'm sitting on, as I said,
34:05
Speaker 3: all of this material, and so I'm my next sort
34:09
Speaker 3: of iteration of what I'm you know, my mission of
34:11
Speaker 3: sort of sharing and preserving the family heritage is I
34:15
Speaker 3: actually want to turn that into an archive that other
34:18
Speaker 3: people will be able to access and use. So it's
34:21
Speaker 3: going to take some time. I mean, you know, archiving
34:24
Speaker 3: is not a quick process, is it, And there's a
34:26
Speaker 3: lot of you know, a lot of precision that has
34:28
Speaker 3: to happen. But I think that you know, I've got
34:31
Speaker 3: a good few years left in me yet, so I'm
34:34
Speaker 3: sure that you know, over the years, I will be
34:37
Speaker 3: able to do that. And it's something that, as I said,
34:40
Speaker 3: I'd like to get to a point where there is
34:41
Speaker 3: a digital archive is what I'm talking about. But a
34:44
Speaker 3: digital archive where you know, researchers and academics will of
34:47
Speaker 3: course be able to you know, view materials, and we'll
34:49
Speaker 3: also do things like you know, exhibitions, you know, just
34:53
Speaker 3: like I mean, I'm sort of viewing it like you know,
34:55
Speaker 3: it's an online museum, isn't it. It's that sort of
34:58
Speaker 3: you know, where there'll be a collection that, as I said,
35:01
Speaker 3: represent the last fifty years at Chauton House and obviously
35:06
Speaker 3: our stories about our family, you know, our stories about
35:09
Speaker 3: our ancestors, our stories about Jane. And I just thought
35:14
Speaker 3: that that would be not only of interest to people today,
35:18
Speaker 3: but it's also it's for future generations, you know, my
35:21
Speaker 3: ancestors who wrote and I have here a first edition
35:26
Speaker 3: of Montague Knight's book from nineteen thirteen, and this is
35:30
Speaker 3: called Chaughton Manner and its own as a family history,
35:33
Speaker 3: and this goes through all the different branches of the
35:35
Speaker 3: family and their lineage and their history, and it gives
35:37
Speaker 3: you loads of really interesting information. And me, one hundred
35:41
Speaker 3: years later, this is gold to me, you know, the
35:45
Speaker 3: fact that he went to the trouble, that is just
35:48
Speaker 3: gold that this exists. So I think that I have
35:51
Speaker 3: the material. Anyway, There's lots more to add, but I've
35:55
Speaker 3: got a very good start and I just think that
35:57
Speaker 3: would just be a great thing to leave for future
36:00
Speaker 3: generations so that they're not you know, there's at least
36:03
Speaker 3: one period of time where there is you know, quite
36:05
Speaker 3: quite a good, you know, comprehensive picture of daily life
36:08
Speaker 3: at Chortenhouse.
36:09
Speaker 2: That's amazing. And to digitize it. You know, fortunately museums
36:14
Speaker 2: and heritage organizations have gotten very good at digitization and
36:18
Speaker 2: we know how to scan and file and put the
36:22
Speaker 2: data on there and you know, find the right format
36:26
Speaker 2: for it. And there's a lot of different processes available.
36:29
Speaker 2: And the fact that you want to do exhibits online
36:32
Speaker 2: exhibits which make it available to people all over the world.
36:35
Speaker 2: If somebody can't walk through chart now, so they can't
36:38
Speaker 2: go to England, they can experience what you experienced and learned.
36:43
Speaker 2: They are in the world. So that's a beautiful project.
36:46
Speaker 2: That's amazing.
36:47
Speaker 3: I'm excited and it's a project I mean, of course,
36:50
Speaker 3: these things, I mean, you know, these cost money. I
36:53
Speaker 3: mean it's not you know, doing a project like that.
36:55
Speaker 3: There will be you know, obviously there's yes, an awful
36:57
Speaker 3: lot of work to do. So it's actually some thing
37:00
Speaker 3: that I am what I'm going to do and what
37:04
Speaker 3: am I'm already doing because I said, I've sort of
37:06
Speaker 3: been doing this for a while anyway, but just unofficially
37:10
Speaker 3: if you like, as I said, creating this archive and
37:13
Speaker 3: telling stories. But I already tell stories, as I said,
37:16
Speaker 3: every week online. And I'm actually inviting people to become
37:20
Speaker 3: a subscriber, which is ten dollars a month, but basically
37:25
Speaker 3: that subscription, I mean, there are you can get more
37:27
Speaker 3: involved if you want to, but you know, ten dollars
37:29
Speaker 3: a month, and it's that that will fund this putting
37:34
Speaker 3: together the archive, and of course what I'm the stories
37:37
Speaker 3: I'm going to tell are going to be what I'm
37:39
Speaker 3: discovering through you know, I'll be sharing, you know, the
37:42
Speaker 3: journey of putting the archive together, as well as the
37:44
Speaker 3: family stories because I to date have really only shared
37:49
Speaker 3: I mean obviously in a book. Yes it's comprehensive, but
37:51
Speaker 3: there's an awful lot more to say, isn't there. There's an
37:53
Speaker 3: awful lot more memories that didn't make it into one book.
37:57
Speaker 3: And I have other family members that have a different perspective.
38:00
Speaker 3: You know, I'm one person with one view, but I
38:03
Speaker 3: was a child, you know, my version of things is
38:06
Speaker 3: an eighteen year old version of things and you know,
38:09
Speaker 3: up to a eighteen Whereas, of course the experience, particularly
38:12
Speaker 3: when I'm talking about, you know, some of the challenges,
38:15
Speaker 3: real challenges in those later years when you know parts
38:20
Speaker 3: of the house need work and there's no you know,
38:22
Speaker 3: the finances aren't there to do it, and you know
38:24
Speaker 3: some of the challenges that they're sort of were. Obviously
38:28
Speaker 3: other members of the family have different experiences to add
38:31
Speaker 3: to this. As I said, this sort of view of
38:34
Speaker 3: daily life at Chordenhouse.
38:36
Speaker 2: We'll be back with more after these words on the
38:39
Speaker 2: Old Times Radio Network.
38:42
Speaker 6: Humanity Healing International is a small nonprofit with a big dream.
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39:12
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39:22
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39:42
Speaker 2: Hi there, I am back with Jane Austen's niece, Caroline
39:47
Speaker 2: Jane Knight, and we are going to talk more about
39:51
Speaker 2: her Austin family heritage and especially let's talk a little
39:55
Speaker 2: bit about the Jane Austin Literacy found and which you founded.
40:01
Speaker 2: And you also are the CEO or on the board.
40:04
Speaker 3: Yes, so I'm founder and chair. So the Jane Notston
40:08
Speaker 3: Literacy Foundation came about at that to twenty thirteen, that
40:12
Speaker 3: two hundred year anniversary of Pride and Prejudice. That moment,
40:15
Speaker 3: as I said, that sort of was the first domino
40:18
Speaker 3: to fall in terms of as a sort of chain
40:21
Speaker 3: of events that made me decide to really reconnect with
40:24
Speaker 3: this part of my life and that I had something
40:26
Speaker 3: to add here and as well as writing the book,
40:29
Speaker 3: the other thing that sort of came immediately was I thought,
40:31
Speaker 3: there's a philanthropic opportunity here. If there are you know,
40:35
Speaker 3: hundreds of thousands of people around the world, if not millions,
40:37
Speaker 3: that love Jane Austin, then I'd already been on the
40:41
Speaker 3: board of some educational charities, you know, that sort of
40:44
Speaker 3: that I was, you know, experiencing that area, and I'd
40:47
Speaker 3: already set up businesses, and I was used to sort
40:49
Speaker 3: of leading things and setting them up. And of course
40:51
Speaker 3: I've got this connection to Jane and this childhood at Chawton,
40:55
Speaker 3: and I thought, well, I think that I could set
40:58
Speaker 3: up a charity. See was the obvious thing to do.
41:02
Speaker 3: You know, there was never a question about what it
41:04
Speaker 3: was going to do for me. And I think that's
41:06
Speaker 3: partly because Jane was an advocate for education herself, and
41:12
Speaker 3: you know, there's obviously some wonderful quotes in her work
41:14
Speaker 3: about the value of education and how important it is.
41:17
Speaker 3: But it's also something that I grew up in a
41:20
Speaker 3: household where my father and brother were dyslexic, and in
41:23
Speaker 3: the nineteen seventies that wasn't a you know, in eighties,
41:26
Speaker 3: that was very you know, when I first heard the
41:29
Speaker 3: word dyslexia for them, it was the first time I'd
41:32
Speaker 3: ever heard the word. It wasn't something that we knew about.
41:35
Speaker 3: So even though it's not something that I have myself,
41:38
Speaker 3: I've seen very close up the difference it makes when
41:42
Speaker 3: literacy is not easy for people. And whilst both of
41:47
Speaker 3: my brother and my father can read and write now
41:50
Speaker 3: because there's specialist teaching and in later years that sort
41:53
Speaker 3: of happened, my father certainly when I was young, found
41:57
Speaker 3: reading and writing very challenging. So it's something but also
42:00
Speaker 3: is part of my you know, to do something for
42:03
Speaker 3: literacy is personal as well as it being something that
42:06
Speaker 3: I think is absolutely right for the you know, for
42:09
Speaker 3: Jane Austin. And of course the Jane Austin community is
42:13
Speaker 3: full of teachers and writers and avid readers, so everyone everyone.
42:19
Speaker 3: Of course, getting behind literacy as a cause is not
42:22
Speaker 3: a hard sell to anybody in this community. So I've
42:25
Speaker 3: set up this organization. We have volunteers all over the
42:28
Speaker 3: world and we fund literacy projects in developing communities in Asia,
42:33
Speaker 3: Africa and Digital Australia. Here in the UK. We've done
42:37
Speaker 3: a couple of projects in the US and we'll be
42:39
Speaker 3: doing more in the US and actually this year, so
42:42
Speaker 3: about three years ago when we sat down and said,
42:44
Speaker 3: what are we going to do in twenty twenty five?
42:46
Speaker 3: What is the big thing? This is Jane Austin's two
42:49
Speaker 3: hundred and fiftieth anniversary of her you know, of her birth.
42:53
Speaker 3: What are we going to do? And having met so
42:55
Speaker 3: many Americans when I was young at Chortenhouse and no
43:00
Speaker 3: knowing how much Jane Austin is loved in America, you know,
43:05
Speaker 3: and to be honest, how much opportunity there is in
43:07
Speaker 3: America for the Jane Austin Literacy Foundation Because of that loving,
43:11
Speaker 3: I said, we need to open in America. That's what
43:13
Speaker 3: I want to do in twenty twenty five. And actually
43:16
Speaker 3: it was only in October this year that I was
43:19
Speaker 3: over in the States and I launched the Jane Austin
43:22
Speaker 3: Literacy Foundation North American Friends at an event in Colonial
43:26
Speaker 3: Williamsburg is where we did that. So the Jane Austin
43:29
Speaker 3: Literacy Foundation North American Friends, as I said, now exists
43:33
Speaker 3: as its own charity in America, which allows people to
43:37
Speaker 3: both get tax relief on donations but also obviously volunteer
43:41
Speaker 3: on a local basis to support the growth of that organization.
43:45
Speaker 3: As I said, to support literacy around the world.
43:48
Speaker 2: That is amazing. And how would people get in touch
43:51
Speaker 2: with you in the or with the organization in the States.
43:56
Speaker 3: So the website is Jane Austin l F for Literacy Foundation,
44:02
Speaker 3: Jane Austin, l F, NAF, North American Friends NAF dot org. So,
44:09
Speaker 3: Jane Austin l F NAF dot org.
44:12
Speaker 2: What are the kind of things you need other than
44:14
Speaker 2: it's always great to have donations, Is there anything else
44:17
Speaker 2: that you need? You're looking for a new volunteers programs.
44:20
Speaker 3: Run absolutely so right at this very moment, we are
44:26
Speaker 3: I mean it's brand new, so we are exactly we're
44:28
Speaker 3: resource building and that means we need volunteers. And on
44:32
Speaker 3: the website there is a dedicated page to volunteering which
44:35
Speaker 3: sort of and you can sort of tick what your
44:36
Speaker 3: skills are and sort of you know, and it's clear
44:38
Speaker 3: sort of what we need. And that right now is
44:41
Speaker 3: where we are is building the resources in the States
44:45
Speaker 3: and obviously from there that will enable us to you know,
44:48
Speaker 3: start doing more, more more programs in America. So go
44:52
Speaker 3: to the website, and as I said, there's a volunteer
44:54
Speaker 3: page on there, and that would be a great place
44:56
Speaker 3: to start in terms of supporting the organization as well
44:59
Speaker 3: as of course as donations, as you say.
45:02
Speaker 2: And it's so great to have access through you to
45:05
Speaker 2: all this history and projects and ways that people could
45:09
Speaker 2: get involved. And then with the archive that you're wanting
45:13
Speaker 2: to create and exhibits, you're also making this history available
45:18
Speaker 2: to the world. I know it's a long term project
45:21
Speaker 2: for you, and it's going to be a while, but
45:22
Speaker 2: it's really it's wonderful because obviously a lot of what
45:27
Speaker 2: we know about Jane comes from pop culture or reading
45:31
Speaker 2: the books, watching the movies, or pop culture. She really
45:35
Speaker 2: is one of the world's most beloved, best selling authors
45:40
Speaker 2: of all time, and there's a lot of ways that
45:44
Speaker 2: we have come to know her. New generations learn about
45:48
Speaker 2: her years later. Somebody's thirteen year old child is going
45:52
Speaker 2: to pick up her book on Jane's two hundred and
45:54
Speaker 2: fiftieth anniversary. She's touched millions and millions of people. We've
45:58
Speaker 2: gotten to the point where in this world of Jane Austen,
46:02
Speaker 2: we have the books and articles, movies, histories, classes, historic exhibits,
46:09
Speaker 2: we have different versions of romance books. There's a gazillion
46:14
Speaker 2: different ways that people have re envisioned the Pride and prejudice,
46:19
Speaker 2: or Sense and Sensibility or Emma and Jane's characters have
46:25
Speaker 2: really become tropes themselves. Her storylines, enemies to lovers they
46:31
Speaker 2: call it, or the love triangle have all become tropes
46:36
Speaker 2: in our culture. And there's also I'm sure you heard
46:39
Speaker 2: of the Jane Austen version of Pride and Prejudice with zombies.
46:46
Speaker 2: What do you think? I mean, I know we don't
46:48
Speaker 2: know that much about Jane in a way, but what
46:50
Speaker 2: do you like if you had to kind of channel her?
46:52
Speaker 2: What do you think she would think of all this?
46:54
Speaker 2: Two hundred and fifty years later, after she had a
46:57
Speaker 2: struggle for a byline her first book said by a
47:00
Speaker 2: lady and she couldn't even have her name on it?
47:03
Speaker 3: Right, Well, she could have done, She could have done.
47:05
Speaker 3: That was her choice. I mean, Fanny Burney was writing
47:08
Speaker 3: under her name. I mean, she could have written as
47:10
Speaker 3: Jane Austin. There wasn't but it was her choice not
47:12
Speaker 3: to do that. So I think that but that in
47:15
Speaker 3: itself might help us answer the question a little bit,
47:19
Speaker 3: because she didn't have to write anonymously, but she chose to.
47:25
Speaker 3: And does that indicate that she didn't want but as
47:31
Speaker 3: you said, she wrote anonymously and that was a choice.
47:34
Speaker 3: She didn't have to do that. So I think that's
47:37
Speaker 3: interesting in itself. I mean, was that because we have
47:41
Speaker 3: I mean, we have certainly we have no indication that
47:43
Speaker 3: it was family pressure that was making her do that.
47:47
Speaker 3: So does that actually indicate that Jane she certainly wanted
47:51
Speaker 3: to be a writer, and she certainly wanted to her
47:53
Speaker 3: books to be well read. So I think the fact
47:56
Speaker 3: that she is, you know, absolutely a global superstar in
47:59
Speaker 3: term of her work, I think she'd be absolutely thrilled
48:05
Speaker 3: whether or not if she were alive today, would she
48:09
Speaker 3: lean into the social media site I mean, all of
48:12
Speaker 3: the publicity that you know, and the publicity machine if
48:16
Speaker 3: you like, the authors you know, have to sort of
48:19
Speaker 3: get involved in in order to promote their work. I
48:22
Speaker 3: don't know whether Jane would sort of lean into that
48:25
Speaker 3: side of things and love that or not. I think
48:28
Speaker 3: in terms of I mean, it's difficult to know what
48:30
Speaker 3: she'd think about all the adaptations, I'm sure. I mean,
48:34
Speaker 3: I don't see how she could be anything other than
48:37
Speaker 3: flatted and overjoyed that her work is so loved, that
48:41
Speaker 3: she inspires so much creativity, you know, people don't just
48:45
Speaker 3: read her work. They respond to it, don't they. They
48:48
Speaker 3: get involved in it. They you know, they really engage
48:51
Speaker 3: in it. And I think for any author, that's just,
48:55
Speaker 3: you know, that's just more than most of us would
48:57
Speaker 3: ever dream of to sort of get that kind of
48:59
Speaker 3: reaction to her work. There are obviously things, you know,
49:02
Speaker 3: and I think about it myself, you know, about adaptations
49:05
Speaker 3: that come out and what do I like and what
49:06
Speaker 3: do I don't, and and I absolutely absolutely recognize that
49:10
Speaker 3: they're not all for me. I'm not that you know.
49:13
Speaker 3: There are different target audiences, and increasingly these movies are
49:17
Speaker 3: being made for a younger audience. They're not being made
49:19
Speaker 3: for me. And things like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies,
49:24
Speaker 3: which I watched it, I mean perfectly, okay, even know
49:26
Speaker 3: what I mean. It was a good movie. I didn't
49:27
Speaker 3: I didn't hate it in any way at all. But
49:29
Speaker 3: I'm not the target audience for it. I didn't necessarily
49:32
Speaker 3: love it as much as I may. You know, the Persuasion,
49:37
Speaker 3: the Amanda Root and Kieren Hins Persuasion is just absolutely
49:40
Speaker 3: has such a ded place in my heart. I love
49:43
Speaker 3: that movie, you know. But but to be kind, but
49:45
Speaker 3: I am target market for that one, you know, And
49:48
Speaker 3: I think that one of the things I know about
49:49
Speaker 3: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies was there was a whole
49:52
Speaker 3: bunch of new people that were brought to Jane Austin
49:55
Speaker 3: because of that movie. And each of these movies, whether
49:58
Speaker 3: I like them or not, and to them, I think
50:00
Speaker 3: are absolutely great. I think a work that's been done
50:02
Speaker 3: has been wonderful, and some of the most recent ones,
50:05
Speaker 3: I mean, I thought the twenty twenty Emma was lovely.
50:08
Speaker 3: I thought that was a really, you know, really great
50:11
Speaker 3: fun version of Emma. So there's some great work that's
50:14
Speaker 3: been done, and I think that I think that Jane
50:18
Speaker 3: would probably have the same sort of view, if you
50:20
Speaker 3: know what I mean that really, when you get to
50:22
Speaker 3: that sort of success, it's just amazing and fantastic that
50:25
Speaker 3: so much is being done. I'm sure there'd be the
50:27
Speaker 3: odd production that she wouldn't you know, that wouldn't be
50:30
Speaker 3: to her taste, that she wouldn't like, But I don't
50:33
Speaker 3: think she'd get to hung up on that. I don't
50:36
Speaker 3: think she'd get too worried about that. But as I
50:38
Speaker 3: said the bit, that's more a question for me that
50:40
Speaker 3: I sort of think about is that bit about her
50:43
Speaker 3: writing anonymously and why did she do that? And is
50:47
Speaker 3: that an indication that she actually was shy and didn't
50:51
Speaker 3: want she didn't want people to know, rather than because
50:55
Speaker 3: she couldn't or it was going to bring you know,
50:58
Speaker 3: shame to the family or anything like that, because by
51:00
Speaker 3: all accounts, her family were incredibly proud of her talent.
51:04
Speaker 3: You know, they knew how talented she was, and there's
51:08
Speaker 3: no indication, so that I think is a really interesting
51:10
Speaker 3: and who knows, as I said, how she would react
51:13
Speaker 3: in the modern day of authorship if she were alive.
51:16
Speaker 2: Now speaking of Emma, this is the wonderful mister Knightley,
51:20
Speaker 2: a kind of a shout out to your family and
51:24
Speaker 2: your beloved great greet great grandfather.
51:28
Speaker 3: Well, so there is a family theory, if that's the
51:32
Speaker 3: right word, that Emma's set in Chawton, you know, Highbury
51:37
Speaker 3: is Chawton, and that sort of comes about because you know,
51:40
Speaker 3: there's sort of I mean, obviously Jane doesn't do big descriptions,
51:44
Speaker 3: but you know there are bits in Emma that let
51:47
Speaker 3: you know how mini minutes walk it is from one
51:50
Speaker 3: property to another or whatever. And we think that Chortenhouse
51:53
Speaker 3: was the inspiration for don wal Abbey. When she did
51:56
Speaker 3: the bits of description about donmal Abbey. I'm not saying
51:58
Speaker 3: she's describing Chautenhouse, but I'm saying in terms of its
52:01
Speaker 3: location in the village, and we think that that was
52:04
Speaker 3: don wal Abbey. We know that we know the house proutings,
52:07
Speaker 3: which we think his Heartfield and Chawton. You see, Chawton
52:12
Speaker 3: actually has Southfield Farm, Eastfield, Westfield around it. Those are
52:17
Speaker 3: what the surrounding bits of Chawton are called. And Emma
52:21
Speaker 3: wood House's houses Hartfield isn't it in between east West
52:25
Speaker 3: at north and Southfield. So there's all these sort of
52:28
Speaker 3: clues we think we know which is miss Bates Cottage.
52:31
Speaker 3: And up behind Chawton House there is a hill that
52:34
Speaker 3: they would have picnicked on, and I know that she
52:37
Speaker 3: called it box Hill, but Jay never used real she
52:40
Speaker 3: never and box Hill was a place in Guildford, outside Guildford,
52:43
Speaker 3: but she never used real place names for the place
52:46
Speaker 3: of things that she was writing about. So Bury Hill,
52:49
Speaker 3: which goes up behind Chawton House could have very well
52:52
Speaker 3: been where they went for the picnic. So there's certainly
52:55
Speaker 3: and mister Knightley, as you said, you know, which, if
52:58
Speaker 3: you think about mister Knightley, most of her heroes are
53:01
Speaker 3: quite flawed, aren't they, most of the you know, most
53:04
Speaker 3: of and he isn't He is one that is actually written.
53:08
Speaker 3: He's already in many ways, you know, a well formed gentleman,
53:12
Speaker 3: isn't he. He doesn't have to grow into it. He
53:13
Speaker 3: doesn't have to. He's already there. So I absolutely Emma
53:17
Speaker 3: is the first novel I would have been aware of
53:19
Speaker 3: as a child. I knew the name's Lizzie in Darcy.
53:22
Speaker 3: Of course, I've known since before I was born. I mean,
53:24
Speaker 3: because of all of the visitors and of course those
53:26
Speaker 3: names though they've been people to me my whole life.
53:29
Speaker 3: But Emma, because of the Nightly and because of what
53:31
Speaker 3: my family sort of told me about that novel, is
53:35
Speaker 3: the one that I sort of connected to because in
53:37
Speaker 3: a way we were in it, if you know what
53:39
Speaker 3: I mean. And that's absolutely what I believed as a
53:43
Speaker 3: child is Nightly. It's not a coincidence. Nightly is absolutely
53:47
Speaker 3: a you know, and both for her brother, but also
53:49
Speaker 3: because you know, if it weren't for you know, she
53:51
Speaker 3: grew up as I said, in property owned by the
53:53
Speaker 3: Night family. You know, her brother ended up being a Knight.
53:56
Speaker 3: That's how she ended up in Chawton. Edward's Knight who
54:00
Speaker 3: was so he inherited from Thomas and Catherine Knight. And
54:04
Speaker 3: Catherine Knight was very fond of Jane and very supportive
54:08
Speaker 3: of her writing, so she knew that she was writing
54:11
Speaker 3: and she actually gave Jane a small annual allowance of
54:15
Speaker 3: money to support Jane. So you know, the Knight family
54:19
Speaker 3: were a prominent feature in Jane's life and had actually
54:23
Speaker 3: been supportive in different ways of her life and career.
54:28
Speaker 3: So absolutely it's not a coincidence.
54:30
Speaker 2: This is amazing and you are amazing, And here we
54:34
Speaker 2: have an inside scoop on a Jane novel that everybody
54:39
Speaker 2: loves to hear how it maybe relates to the family
54:43
Speaker 2: interherited and all the people in her life. And it's
54:47
Speaker 2: been such a pleasure and an honor to speak with you.
54:49
Speaker 2: I thank you so much for being with us today
54:52
Speaker 2: and for the work that you're doing and for helping
54:56
Speaker 2: us all celebrate Jane's two hundred fiftieth birthday December sixteenth.
55:03
Speaker 2: She's a Sagittarius girl and this is her birthday month,
55:07
Speaker 2: and I know you've been doing a lot of work
55:10
Speaker 2: for on her behalf and for the family, so we
55:13
Speaker 2: thank you so much for being here, and I just
55:16
Speaker 2: want to just again. Our guest is Caroline Jane Knight.
55:20
Speaker 2: She's Jane Austen's niece, and I'm going to ask you, Caroline,
55:25
Speaker 2: share one more time with us your website and where
55:28
Speaker 2: people should look for you so they can find out
55:31
Speaker 2: more about the work you're doing.
55:33
Speaker 3: So you can find me. My website is Austin Heritage
55:36
Speaker 3: dot com and I can also be found on Facebook,
55:40
Speaker 3: Instagram and substack as Jane Austen's niece. And I'm telling
55:44
Speaker 3: stories from Chawtam every week and.
55:47
Speaker 2: They are really fun. I subscribed It's wonderful. I'm joining
55:51
Speaker 2: it in pictures. Thank you for joining us on Vox Novis.
55:55
Speaker 2: I am Lorie Sue Brockway. I am honored to be
55:59
Speaker 2: here with you. Have wonderful week everyone.
56:01
Speaker 3: Happy birthday, Jane, Happy birthday, Jane
56:21
Speaker 4: M.