Austen, Jane, novelist. Born in 1775 at Steventon, Hampshire, England, of which parish her father was rector. Her principal products are "Pride and Prejudice" (composed 1796, published 1813), "Sense and Sensibility" (1811), and "Emma" (1816). They are distinguished for originality, naturalness, and fidelity of delineation, qualities in which the literature of her time was most deficient. She died at Winchester in 1817.

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