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 and Prejudice" to more recent productions like "Sense and Sensibility" (1995), "Emma" (1996), "Mansfield Park" (1999), "Pride & Prejudice" (2005), and "Love & Friendship" (2016). There is little biographical information about Jane Austen's life except the few letters that survive and the biographical notes her family members wrote. During her lifetime, Austen may have written as many as 3,000 letters but only 161 survived. Many of the letters were written to Austen's older sister Cassandra, who in 1843 burned the greater part of them and cut pieces out of those she kept. Ostensibly, Cassandra destroyed or censored her sister's letters