Austen, Jane

Jane Austen, England's first major female novelist, wrote and set her novels during the Regency period, when George III was too mad, and his son the Prince, who admired Austen's novels, too young to rule the country. Her six novels are best loved for their irony and perfection of form.
Jane Austen perfected the English novel of the previous century in much the same way that Henry James perfected the Victorian novel. She never married and died in 1817 at age 41. ;