The only time I ever really suffered in body or mind, the only time that I ever fancied myself unwell, or had any ideas of danger, was the winter that I passed by myself. As long as we could be together, nothing ever ailed me, and I never met with the smallest inconvenience.

About Jane Austen

Portrait of Jane Austen

Jane Austen ( OST-in, AW-stin; 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English writer known primarily for her six novels, which implicitly interpret, critique, and comment on the English landed gentry at the end of the 18th century.

More quotations from Jane Austen

The enthusiasm of a woman's love is even beyond the biographer's.

Here and there, human nature may be great in times of trial; but generally speaking, it is its weakness and not its strength that appears in a sick chamber: it is selfishness and impatience rather than generosity and fortitude, that one hears of. There is so little real friendship in the world! and unfortunately, there are so many who forget to think seriously till it is almost too late.

She felt that she could so much more depend upon the sincerity of those who sometimes looked or said a careless or a hasty thing, than of those whose presence of mind never varied, whose tongue never slipped.

I have no pretensions whatever to that kind of elegance which consists in tormenting a respectable man.

But when a young lady is to be a heroine, the perverseness of forty surrounding families cannot prevent her. Something must and will happen to throw a hero in her way.