Sanditon. The Watsons

Unfinished fiction

These two short works show Austen experimenting with a variety of different literary styles and exploring a range of social classes and settings. Written in the last months of Austen’s life, the uncompleted novel Sanditon is set in a newly established seaside resort, with a glorious cast of hypochondriacs and speculators,and shows the author contemplating a changing society with a mixture of scepticism and amusement. The Watsons is a delightful fragment, whose spirited heroine Emma Watson finds her marriage opportunities restricted by poverty and pride.