In her earliest writings, a precocious, alarmingly assured Jane Austen views the adult world with wide, clear eyes, cheekily amused at the emotions, pomposity, intrigues and bustle of family and friends. Composed between the ages of eleven and seventeen, they reveal a child''s excitement in language and its imaginative possibilities. Most pieces are ebullient and anarchic; many are surreal, displaying gluttony, drunkenness, matricide, theft and excess, combined with total self-absorption. The cheerful characters roar through their transgressions without a shred of shame or responsibility. This edition prints all of Austen''s childhood works, from the earliest comic pieces to the later, more psychologically realistic ''Catharine, or the Bower'', which anticipates themes in the adult novels. The volume also includes the comical illustrations her sister Cassandra contributed to ''The History of England''. Prefaces and explanatory endnotes supplied by Janet Todd illuminate cultural, historical and literary context, bringing Jane Austen''s world to life.
