1
An egg boiled very soft is not unwholesome.
Emma
(1816) ch. 3
2
One has no great hopes from Birmingham. I always say there is something direful in the sound.
Emma
(1816) ch. 36
3
Let other pens dwell on guilt and misery. I quit such odious subjects as soon as I can.
Mansfield Park
(1814) ch. 48
4
"Oh! it is only a novel!…only Cecilia, or Camilla, or Belinda:" or, in short, only some work in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour are conveyed to the world in the best chosen language.
Northanger Abbey
(1818) ch. 5
5
From politics, it was an easy step to silence.
Northanger Abbey
(1818) ch. 14
6
Every man is surrounded by a neighbourhood of voluntary spies, and where roads and newspapers lay every thing open.
Northanger Abbey
(1818) ch. 34
7
"My idea of good company, Mr Elliot, is the company of clever, well-informed people, who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company." "You are mistaken," said he gently, "that is not good company, that is the best."
Persuasion
(1818) ch. 16
8
Men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story. Education has been theirs in so much higher a degree; the pen has been in their hands.
Persuasion
(1818) ch. 23
9
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.
Pride and Prejudice
(1813) ch. 1
10
In his library he had been always sure of leisure and tranquillity; and though prepared…to meet with folly and conceit in every other room in the house, he was used to be free of them there.
Pride and Prejudice
(1813) ch. 15
11
For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours, and laugh at them in our turn?
Pride and Prejudice
(1813) ch. 57
12
3 or 4 families in a country village is the very thing to work on.
letter to Anna Austen, 9 September 1814
13
The little bit (two inches wide) of ivory on which I work with so fine a brush, as produces little effect after much labour?
letter to J. Edward Austen, 16 December 1816
14
Pictures of perfection as you know make me sick and wicked.
letter to Fanny Knight, 23 March 1817
15
I am going to take a heroine whom no-one but myself will much like.
on starting Emma
J. E. Austen-Leigh
A Memoir of Jane Austen
(1926 ed.)