Best known for her novels Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Mansfield Park, and Emma, published anonymously, Jane Austen commented, critiqued, and illuminated the life of the British gentry at the end of the 18th century. But did Jane's writings highlight anything about her own spirituality? In this celebratory book, Paula Hollingsworth explores Jane Austen's gentle but strong faith and the effect it had both on her life and her writing. Drawing on Jane's life story, her letters, her friendships, her books, and the characters portrayed, Paula shows the depth of Jane Austin's spirituality. Many people take the superficial view that because she made fun of some individual clergymen-Mr. Collins in Pride and Prejudice being the most obvious example-therefore she must have made fun of faith itself. In fact, one has only to read Mansfield Park and to see the commitment of Fanny and Edmund Bertram to realize that this was far from the case. Her letters, the memoirs of her family, and her epitaph in Winchester Cathedral give a much clearer idea of her faith.