Pride & Prejudice

Jane Austen began writing the novel which later became Pride and Prejudice in October of 1796 and finished it by August of the following year; she was then twenty-one years old. Little is known of this early version of the story beyond its original title: First Impressions. No copy of that original is known to exist. Three months after Miss Austen completed work on the book, her father offered it to a publisher in the hope that it would make it into print. The publisher refused without ever having seen the manuscript.

Fortunately for all of her admirers, whether Austen was discouraged or not by her first rejection, she continued to write; though, it was not until the winter of 1811, fully fourteen years after finishing First Impressions, that she again picked up that manuscript and began revising it into the version we know today as Pride and Prejudice. This occurred in the wake of her first publishing success--the publication of Sense and Sensibility on 30 October 1811. Pride and Prejudice was far more fortunate than its earlier incarnation; it was accepted for publication and was presented to the world on 28 January 1813.

Jane Austen's name was never attached to any of her published novels during her lifetime, and the title page of Pride and Prejudice read only: BY THE AUTHOR OF "SENSE AND SENSIBILITY."

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