The Jane Austen Society of North America

Jane Austen’s Works

Jane Austen wrote six novels, which continue to captivate readers almost 200 years after her death: Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Northanger Abbey, Mansfield Park, Emma, and Persuasion. The novels, as well as her juvenilia and unfinished works, are available in numerous modern editions. Facsimiles of all of Austen’s surviving manuscripts are available online. Her collected letters are published by Oxford University Press, The Letters of Jane Austen, edited by Deirdre Le Faye (2011).

All essays and book reviews on this web site about Austen and her writing can be searched online. Maps of real and fictional places in Austen’s novels are posted on this site. A concordance to Austen’s six novels and Lady Susan, The Watsons, and Sanditon is available through this link.

The following is a chronology of Austen’s writing and the publication of her novels through 1817, the year she died.

Chronology of Austen’s Works

c.	1787-1793	Short works, collectively called the Juvenilia, written.
c.	1794	Lady Susan written, but without a conclusion.
c.	1795	“Elinor and Marianne” written (later revised as Sense and Sensibility).
	1796	“First Impressions” begun (later revised as Pride and Prejudice).
	1797	“First Impressions” completed and offered by Austen’s father to a publisher, but rejected sight unseen.
c.	1798-1799	“Susan” written (later retitled “Catherine” and posthumously published as Northanger Abbey).
	1803	“Susan” sold to a publisher, but never published.
c.	1804	The Watsons begun but not finished.
	1805	Lady Susan completed.
	1810	Sense and Sensibility accepted for publication.
	1811	Sense and Sensibility published. Extensive revision of “First Impressions” as Pride and Prejudice begun. Mansfield Park begun.
	1812	Pride and Prejudice purchased by publisher.
	1813	Pride and Prejudice published. Mansfield Park completed and accepted for publication. Second editions of Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility published.
	1814	Mansfield Park published. Emma begun.
	1815	Emma completed and published (1816 shown on title page). Persuasion begun.
	1816	Persuasion completed. “Susan” repurchased from publisher and revised as “Catherine.” Second edition of Mansfield Park published.
	1817	Sanditon begun but not finished. Northanger Abbey and Persuasion published together posthumously with “Biographical Notice” by Henry Austen (1818 shown on title page).