ANNE HATHAWAY HAPPENS UPON JANE AUSTEN’S LOVE LIFE

Anne Hathaway discovered Jane Austen wasn’t a spinster after all.

Like most of us Anne Hathaway only knew the legend of Jane Austen from her famous novels and the movies that were inspired and adapted from them.

The 18th century novelist wrote about marrying for love in Pride and Prejudice, a notion that was unheard of in that time but never married herself, and so carried the reputation through the years of being an old maid which Anne discovered was not the case.

“In doing my research I found out the notion that Jane Austen was a stuffy old spinster is completely wrong. She was a fun woman. She was very provocative and she had a fantastic personality. She was really, really clever. And sometimes she wasn’t the easiest person to get along with and I thought this is so much more interesting than she was a proper lady.”

In the film Becoming Jane, it is revealed that Austen did in fact experience undying passion with an Irish lawyer named Tom LeFroy played by James McAvoy.

“And there was indeed a man in Jane’s life called Tom LeFroy that she did have a questionable relationship with and I just thought, ‘Oh my God, what’s wrong with me that I’ve never asked these questions before, that I’ve never wondered what Jane Austen’s life was about. I think one of the reasons is because you’re so satisfied with her work that you feel like you do know her. But it was wonderful to get to discover who she really was.”

Jane Austen wrote of her affections for LeFroy in letters to her sister Cassandra which many Janites believe inspired the character of Mr. Darcy in her novel Pride and Prejudice.