Folger Shakespeare Library: Shakespeare Unlimited

250 years after her birth, Jane Austen is more popular than ever, with the publication of new editions of her novels and numerous new film adaptations in production. But what does it mean to read and edit Jane Austen today through the lens of colonialism, cartography, and race? Scholar Patricia A. Matthew, who recently edited new editions of three Austen novels, joins us to explore the ongoing fascination with Jane and share new research about the Regency era. How wealth from Caribbean sugar plantations and slavery shaped the world depicted in Austen’s novels—and how today’s readers can confront the economic and imperial histories embedded in Regency-era fiction. During her fellowship at the Folger Shakespeare Library, Patricia Matthew examined archival materials, including legal texts, maps, travel logs, and legal documents, to gain a better understanding of colonial sugar plantations in the Caribbean. She looked at how empire and enslavement wealth from the new world, slavery, and race informed (or didn’t