With all the Austen characters in Longbourn, my intention was to take what was established in Pride and Prejudice, and just push the logic along a little further. I think Austen shows his laziness as seriously problematic and neglectful: he should have taken Lydia in hand years ago. I think we get a rather cozier version of him in the film and TV adaptations than we do in the novel itself. Actually I don't think I stray far from Austen's depiction - I just push it along a little further. He's very partial, and very jaded, has a sour sense of humour. Are you prepared for the reactions of readers who may not like your versions of the characters? And not the witty, ultimately loving jerk we're used to. I don't think I'm spoiling too much here by saying that your Mr. What if all you have to call your own is the dress that you stand up in, and the labour of your own two hands. But what if you don't have a penny, let alone a thousand pounds what if you don't even have a father, or a home to call your own.

In an email interview, Baker tells me that readers are already well-acquainted with the Bennet girls' predicament: 'Though their father is a gentleman, they face an uncertain future: they only have a thousand pounds in the four percents, their home will revert to a cousin when their father dies the pressure's on to marry well. When first we meet her, Sarah is musing on the reality beneath that pretty muslin as she pumps up the laundry water in the predawn chill: 'The young ladies might behave as if they were smooth and sealed as alabaster statues underneath their clothes,' she thinks, 'but then they would drop their soiled shifts on the bedchamber floor, to be whisked away and cleansed, and would thus reveal themselves to be the frail, leaking, forked bodily creatures that they really were.' But what goes on behind the scenes? Who irons those dresses and prepares those suppers? Writer Jo Baker's new novel, Longbourn, imagines the world below stairs: When clean dresses and food and shoe roses for the Netherfield ball appear like magic in Pride and Prejudice, it's because they've been prepared at great effort in Longbourn.Īnd it's usually Sarah the housemaid who prepares them.

And no house is more familar and comforting than Longbourn, home to Elizabeth and Jane Bennet. The world of Jane Austen - gracious country houses, empire-waist dresses, card parties and suppers and genteel raillery and a touch of social anxiety - is familiar literary ground. Your purchase helps support NPR programming. Close overlay Buy Featured Book Title Longbourn Author Jo Baker

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