Reception history of Jane Austen their class, instead of their moral failures being presented as a product of the social system. Writing about the work of Johnson, Irvine wrote that for her, Austen was a radical because it is women like Emma Woodhouse, Mrs. Elton and Mrs. Churchill who really run Highbury society, undercutting traditional gender roles, but Irvine questioned whether this really made Austen into radical, noting it was the wealth and status of the gentry women of Highbury that gave them their power. Irvine argued it was just as possible to see "Emma" as a conservative novel that upholds the superiority of the
Jane Austen her moderate success and little fame during her lifetime. A significant transition in her posthumous reputation occurred in 1833, when her novels were republished in Richard Bentley's Standard Novels series, illustrated by Ferdinand Pickering, and sold as a set. They gradually gained wider acclaim and popular readership. In 1869, fifty-two years after her death, her nephew's publication of "A Memoir of Jane Austen" introduced a compelling version of her writing career and supposedly uneventful life to an eager audience. Austen has inspired a large number of critical essays and literary anthologies. Her novels have inspired many films, from 1940's "Pride