James Austen: Jane's Literary Influencer?

 

The Loiterer Vol II, 1790

I'd heard of The Loiterer. It's the sort of name that sticks in your brain, and it had popped up numerous times in various Austen biographies I'd read. "I'll read that one day", I'd said to myself. Well I've now finally taken the time to delve into its pages to find out what it's all about.

It turns out that one of her older scholarly brothers, James Austen, created a new weekly periodical while he was a Fellow at Oxford University in his twenties. His intention was to create "a very well-bred and polite paper" which provided "a rough, but not entirely inaccurate Sketch of the Character, the Manners, and the Amusements of Oxford, at the close of the eighteenth Century". It was sold in Oxford, London, Birmingham, Bath and Reading for 3 pence an issue, and ran from January 1789 to March 1790. 

I didn't really know much about this literary brother who was ten years Jane's senior, but it turns out that as well as The Loiterer he was also an (unpublished) poet. Poetry was seen at the time as much more serious, respectable and intellectual than novel writing. And Claire Harman's view below makes me both melancholy and curious:

“His seniority, his sex and his choice of the art of poetry over prose meant that even after his sister had become a highly praised novelist, he was…still regarded as the writer of the family.” 

 

James Austen

The Loiterer consists of 60 issues, most of which were written by James, nine by his brother Henry Austen, and a handful by friends at Oxford University and an unknown correspondent. They mainly focus on topics that would appeal to young Oxford students (or "gownsmen" as one article pleasingly refers to them) - hunting, drinking, money, class, and social commentary - and most articles are witty and satirical. We get a mixture of essays and supposed letters to the editor. My personal favourite reads:

"DEAR MR. LOITERER, I have long had a great desire to see how my name would look in print; by inserting this, therefore, in your entertaining work, you will confer an everlasting favour, On your constant reader, and sincere admirer, TOM WITTY"

That one was particularly daft. The second issue was also one of my favourites where James wrote spoof newspaper articles imagining what papers would be like if everyone had to tell the honest truth:

"Monday. – The House met this day at four, and the Minister, according to his promise of last week rose to open the Budget. He informed the House, that he very much disliked the subject of Finance at all times, but that it was particularly disagreeable to him at present, as the expenditure of the last year had exceeded the revenue by some hundred thousand pounds...owing...chiefly to the enormous pensions he was obliged to grant to his friends;...and he was therefore resolved to lay on no new taxes which might draw odium on his administration, foreseeing that he should be well able to stand three or four years longer, at which time he purposed accepting of a Peerage, and enjoying the remainder of his life...  

He was answered by Mr. ––, who began by assuring the House, that...as for the calculations contained in the honourable Gentleman's speech, he knew not whether they were true, or false, as he had not listened to one single syllable...being entirely taken up in considering what answer he should make, as he well knew it was expected he should say something."

 

Pitt addressing the House of Commons, 1793
(National Portrait Gallery, London)

Much of the humour found in The Loiterer is very tongue-in-cheek. It jokingly makes fun of the world James sees and the people he encounters in it. And the sharp social commentary, using humour at people's folly to gently instruct (rather than a heavy didactic and moralising tone) strikes me as very similar to Jane's style.

It makes me realise the powerful influence her family and home environment must have been. She was raised within a close-knit domestic circle of intelligent, witty, well-read people who shared common literary tastes, styles and humour. And her early experiences within this family, being exposed to not only those literary tastes, but also to seeing an older brother having his works published, must have influenced and inspired a teenage Jane.

Because while James was busy publishing these articles, 13-year old Jane was back at home in Steventon busily writing her second volume worth of burlesque Juvenilia, all of which are also tongue-in-cheek, daft, and similarly poke fun at people and things. In fact, the style of her Juvenilia is suspiciously analogous to one of the letters printed in issue 9 of The Loiterer. This letter is a fictional complaint from a female reader asking for more romantic content and it is more frivolously frothy than all the other periodical content. The letter writer (calling herself Sophia Sentiment) hilariously damns the paper by calling it "the stupidest work of the kind I ever saw" and instead makes a request for future issues:

"Let us see some nice affecting stories, relating the misfortunes of two lovers, who died suddenly, just as they were going to church. Let the lover be killed in a duel, or lost at sea, or you may make him shoot himself, just as you please; and as for his mistress, she will of course go mad; or if you will, you may kill the lady, and let the lover run mad; only remember, whatever you do, that your hero and heroine must possess a great deal of feeling, and have very pretty names."

This satirical portrayal of romance novels could just as easily be found within Jane's Juvenilia and, like so much of her early writing, makes me laugh out loud. 

We'll never know whether Jane actually wrote this article and whether this was in fact the first time her writing appeared in print. But there's one more unusual fact about this issue. This was the only issue to be advertised in the Austen's favourite newspaper, the Reading Mercury. Coincidence?

Advert for issue no. 9, Reading Mercury, 6 April 1789
(The British Newspaper Archive)

It's fascinating to think that Jane was so encouraged in her early writing by her family that she was given the opportunity to print some of her work. But even if she wasn't, it's clear that being in such a literary-minded family, inspired and guided by her older brother James, had a profound influence on her writing.