Fans of Jane Austen mark 250 years since the birth of the writer with a wave of holidays: NPR

During her lifetime, Jane Austen was relatively unknown. The title page of Sense and Sensility, his first novel published, simply said that it was “by a lady”, and her other books also kept her secret name. But today, Austen is one of the most loved writers in Great Britain, with a portrait of his face even appearing on part of the United Kingdom’s currency-the note of ten pounds.

Austen was born in the village of Steventon, Hampshire, in December 1775 – and this year, there are events through Great Britain to mark 250 years since birth.

The most common among celebrations are the “bullets”, with dance during the period, as the parties represented in the novels of Austen. Such a Georgian costume ball took place in June in St Albans museum and gallery. Sitting 20 miles north of London, St Albans is in the county of the Hertfordshire, the framework of the most famous novel of Austen, Pride and Prejudice. The guests of the St Albans ball were invited to wear a period of the 17th century – with long -up dames and hayon men.

Libby Curzon, who runs a small dance business called Ms. Bennet’s Ballroom. Curzon teaches the dance of the period to beginners and appointed his business according to the mother of the family in pride and prejudices, who dreams of finding her daughters an appropriate husband.

Curzon says that at the time of Austen, people would have learned the dances before going out to dance in ball. “They wouldn’t have had someone like me telling them what to do at night,” she said. “They would have all been supposed to know what to do, and it would have been really shocking … if you made a mistake during the dance.”

The dance teacher said that his courses and balls can be romantic, just like the books of Austen, with couples often meeting his events. “It’s not like taking a look and sliding left or right,” she said. “You must actually move with them, hold your hand, determine how to dance and … give visual contact,” she added. “So it helps these small arrows of cupid.”

Dance teacher Libby Curzon, “Mrs. Bennet’s Ballroom”, teaches dances participants at a Georgian costume ball to celebrate 250 years since the birth of Jane Austen. St Albans museum and gallery, England, June 7, 2025.

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One of the participants of St Albans Ball was Gauri Davies, who is from Australia, but lives nearby. Davies rereads Jane Austen Books every year and explained that going to the ball with her husband Peter was an event of “bucket list” for her, because she likes the stories of Austen and identifies with some of the characters.

“I think she really comes to the heart of romance,” said Davies. “She talks about different classes, different quantities of privileges, people from different family horizons and all these themes are still so relevant today.”

Jane Austen died young – in 1817, when she was only 41 years old – which means that she could only finish six novels. But more than two hundred years later, new adaptations of his work are regularly done and redone for the scene and the screen.

This year, the British actors Emma Corrin, Jack Lowden and Olivia Colman are shooting a new adaptation in six parts of Pride and Prejudice for Netflix. This adaptation is one of the many – including a 2005 Keira Knightly film, and a famous BBC television series with Colin Firth from 1995. The author’s own history of the life also fascinated the filmmakers: this year, a new BBC drama entitled Miss Austen imagined the life of Jane Austen, next to her sister Cassandra.

In addition to that, Austen’s intrigue constantly inspires new fictitious stories, because his work has influenced the whole kind of romantic comedy. This year has seen the release of the French romantic comedy Jane Austen destroyed my life, as well as the fourth film of the Bridget Jones franchise, the first episode of which was initially inspired by pride and prejudices.

In the West End of London, a musical from the film of the 1990s, Cluless, also began to run this year, with an intrigue that is inspired by the novel by Austen Emma. The conspiracies of Austen have traveled around the world: the films Aisha and Bride and Prejudice, both located in India, are also derived from Jane Austen.

Through Great Britain, there are parties and conferences spread throughout the year. Maybe the biggest event of its kind is Jane Austen festival in September in BathA ten -day celebration that will welcome thousands of faithful. Fans around the world plan their own tributes. THE Jane Austen Society of North America (Jasna) has 2,000 members and organizes its own events in the United States and Canada.

The dancers take advantage of a Georgian costume ball celebrating 250 years since the birth of Jane Austen at the museum and the St Albans gallery, in England, June 7, 2025.

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Jasna also runs tours in England, including two special trips this year. They visit sites such as the birthplace of Jane Austen, his grave in the cathedral of Winchester and Bath, a city where it lived for five years – as well as the sites of novels. Jasna’s president Mary Mintz says that he went to Jane Austen in Chawton, Hampshire, to see the writing where she wrote her books, is particularly powerful.

“You can see his writing table there and know that this is where these incredible novels that have endured for so long were composed,” said Mintz, stressing that Austen wrote all his work in Longhand, sometimes hiding him from the guests who visited. “Seeing everything Jane Austen has touched is a very moving experience … It can be very emotional and it generates a lot of respect for what she has accomplished.”

Mintz believes that Austen’s work is a precious document of the changing role of women in society. “Above all, I think she is interested in the economic fate of women in her time of time, because women were property, their property belonged to men of their lives,” said Mintz. “And although she can face the intrigue of marriage, she is perfectly aware of the fact that women of her time had to get married in order to have economic viability to survive.”

Of course, love stories and family intrigue are also important. “His stories go even deeper than romantic history or wedding intrigue, it is a question of creating universal links with others,” added Mintz. “What do people want the most in life? They want to find someone to love and who loves them.”

John Mullan is the English teacher at the University College of London and author of the book What Matters in Jane Austen? Mullan thinks that even if some could reject Austen as a simple romantic writer, she is one of the great literary people.

“I think only Shakespeare compares to her in this regard, that if you have read one of her novels, when you reread it, it’s like an entire rediscovery,” said Mullan. “You see things that are not in your head, they are on the page, they are in his invention that you had not noticed before.”

Mullan says that Austen also compares himself to William Shakespeare in his world renown. “I have traveled a lot by giving discussions on Jane Austen in many different countries, and it is the second just behind Shakespeare, and not always in second position, in its scope, insofar as people have heard of it, know something about its plots – and very often, if they added people at all, added.

Producer Biba Kang contributed to this report.