Jane Austen completed only six novels, but enduring passion for the author and her works has driven fans to read these books repeatedly, in book clubs or solo, while also inspiring countless film adaptations, sequels, and even spoofs involving zombies and sea monsters. Austen's lasting appeal to both popular and elite audiences has lifted her to legendary status. In "Jane Austen's Cults and Cultures", Claudia L. Johnson shows how Jane Austen became "Jane Austen," a figure intensely - sometimes even wildly - venerated, and often for markedly different reasons. Johnson begins by exploring the most important monuments and portraits of Austen, considering how these artifacts point to an author who is invisible and yet whose image is inseparable from the characters and fictional worlds she created. She then passes through the four critical phases of Austen's reception-the Victorian era, the First and Second World Wars, and the establishment of the Austen House and Museum in 1949-and ponders what the adoration of Austen has meant to readers over the past two centuries. For her fans, the very concept of "Jane Austen" encapsulates powerful ideas and feelings about history, class, manners, intimacy, language, and the everyday. By respecting the intelligence of past commentary about Austen, Johnson shows, we are able to revisit her work and unearth fresh insights and new critical possibilities. An insightful look at how and why readers have cherished one of our most beloved authors, "Jane Austen's Cults and Cultures" will be a valuable addition to the library of any fan of the divine Jane.

克劳迪娅·约翰逊（Claudia L. Johnson）是普林斯顿大学的英语文学教授，也是研究简•奥斯汀的专家，不仅编辑过许多她小说的再版版本，还出过有关研究专著。她著有和编有多部作品，其中包括《简·奥斯汀：女性、政治与小说》（Jane Austen: Women, Politics, and the Novel）和《模棱两可的众生：18世纪90年代的政治、性别与感伤》（Equivocal Beings: Politics, Gender, and Sentimentality in the 1790s），均由芝加哥大学出版社出版。