The History of England (Austen)

[1] Austen mockingly imitates the style of textbook histories of English monarchs, while ridiculing historians' pretensions to objectivity.

Her History cites as sources works of fiction such as the plays of Shakespeare and Sheridan, a novel by Charlotte Turner Smith and the opinions of Austen's family and friends.

Along with accounts of English kings and queens which contain little factual information but a great deal of comically exaggerated opining about their characters and behaviour, the work includes material such as charades and puns on names.

Mary, Queen of Scots, in particular plays an important role in Austen's History, which also acts as a vindication of the executed cousin of Elizabeth I.

Francis Austen's granddaughter, the then-owner of "Volume the Second", in 1922 permitted Chatto & Windus to publish the entire notebook under the name Love and Friendship.