Rachel Brownstein: 2 books

From the first publication of Pride and Prejudice to recent film versions of her life and work, Jane Austen has continued to provoke controversy and inspire fantasies of peculiar intimacy. Whether celebrated for her realism, proto-feminism, or patrician gentility, imagined as a subversive or a political...

Rachel Felix (1821-58), the homely daughter of poor Jewish peddlers, was the first stage actress to achieve international stardom - and the last person one would have expected to resurrect the cultural patrimony of France. Yet her passionate, startling performances of the works of Racine and Corneille...