Friday essay: foggy, flirty and too much – Jane Austen’s menopausal women solicit compassion while making us laugh

Friday essay: foggy, flirty and too much – Jane Austen’s menopausal women solicit compassion while making us laugh

Was Jane Austen the first writer to show how it really feels to be a middle-aged woman? Before Austen, literature’s iconic perimenopausal woman was the Wife of Bath in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, who regales the medieval pilgrims with a scandalous account of her five marriages, including the fact she enjoyed sex with her last husband despite a 20-year age gap. It’s very All Fours (Miranda July’s wildly popular midlife crisis novel from 2024). Th…

How Jane Austen's Heroines Became Voices For Menopausal Women

Was Jane Austen the first writer to show how it really feels to be a middle-aged woman? Before Austen, literature’s iconic perimenopausal woman was the Wife of Bath in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, who regales the medieval pilgrims with a scandalous account of her five marriages, including the fact she enjoyed sex with her last husband despite a 20-year age gap. It’s very All Fours (Miranda July’s wildly popular midlife crisis novel from 2024). Th…