Category Archives: Books and magazines

Happy Trafalgar Day

Today is Trafalgar Day, marking the anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar on 21st October 1805, in which the Royal Navy defeated the combined French and Spanish navy. In the battle, Nelson was killed, along with thousands of seamen and officers from both sides.

Last week we were revisiting Topsham, once an important port situated by the River Exe south of Exeter. Whenever we are travelling, we try to make time to look at some of the churches and churchyards that we pass. Often these have monuments dating back four or five centuries. If these were letters or other pieces of paper in a record office, they would be considered exceptionally rare, but as gravestones or church monuments, they are seldom noticed. You do not have to travel great distances, or look very far back in time, to find interesting monuments. Right on our doorstep at Topsham, we found a monument to a seaman who had fought at the Battle of Trafalgar. At the 200th anniversary of the battle in 2005, many of these Trafalgar monuments, such as this one, were restored.

Memorial to Thomas Randle, Trafalgar veteran

The inscription reads:

THOMAS RANDLE

WHO WAS MANY YEARS

IN THE ROYAL NAVY

HAVING SERVED IN SEVERAL SHIPS

AND AS QUARTERMASTER

ON BOARD THE VICTORY

AT THE BATTLE OF TRAFALGAR

JAN. 2ND 1851

AGED 78

Thomas Randle did not originally intend to make a career in the Royal Navy. There was always a desperate need for recruits, and most men who wanted to join the navy at that time were signed up in their teenage years – some were only 10 or 11 years old. Thomas was forced into the navy by a press gang Continue reading →

Academic Jargon

We’ve never liked using obscure jargon, preferring an uncomplicated, accessible style. There is an art to writing in plain English. It might be plain, but it needs to flow and allow the reader to concentrate on the story, rather than stumble over ungainly sentences. It was therefore pleasing to receive two reviews in the same week that were from opposite ends of the earth but conveyed an almost identical message. The first one was a review of our most recent book, Eavesdropping on Jane Austen’s England (Jane Austen’s England in the US) that appeared in the Australian blog ‘Reviews on all things Austen’. The reviewer included the comment: ‘I found this book fascinating. It was easy to read (none of that academic jargon)’. The other review was for our previous book, Jack Tar, and it was written by Tony Gerard on the American blog ‘HMS Acasta’ that belongs to a wonderful re-enactment group of the British Royal Navy. ‘Were I an officer,’ he writes [he plays the role of a surgeon’s mate], ‘I’d make it required reading for all Acastas … it’s written in a nonacademic style that’s easy to read.’ We hope he gets promotion soon!

In Paperback in North America!

Our latest book is now available in paperback in the United States and Canada. It is published there by Penguin, ISBN 978-0143125723, and the jacket design is much the same as that of the hardback, using the wonderful embroidery by Sarah Cline. This time, though, even the Penguin motif has been embroidered!

The hardback in the US was called simply Jane Austen’s England, but the paperback has the added subtitle ‘Daily Life in the Georgian and Regency Periods’. The hardback can still be purchased (ISBN 978-0670785841), and it is also available in all e-book formats.

In the UK, the identical book is called Eavesdropping on Jane Austen’s England (ISBN 978-0349138602), and it recently received a generous review in Jane Austen’s Regency World (no. 70, July/August 2014). This is the official magazine of the Jane Austen Centre in Bath and is distributed to subscribers worldwide. The review starts off: ‘A marvellously entertaining catalogue of early 19th-century English life, Roy and Lesley Adkins’s bestseller is now out in paperback – and deserves a place on any Austen aficionado’s bookshelf.’ The review ends: ‘It’s a rich brew – I challenge anyone to pick it up and not still be reading an hour later, delighted by such a vivid and entertaining portrait of an era.’ Do pass the word on to any Austen aficionados who you know!

Mr Darcy’s Wet Shirt

It is tempting to imagine that Jane Austen may have made use of some of the tales that she heard Captain Benjamin Clement recounting at dinners and other social events at Chawton in Hampshire, making us grateful that he was rescued from drowning at the Battle of Trafalgar (see our blog post below on Mansfield Park 200 years). Many people in England were unable to swim, though it was becoming popular at seaside resorts, usually for health reasons.

Sea bathing using a bathing machine

Swimming was certainly not encouraged in the Royal Navy for fear of unhappy seamen swimming off to freedom. But the most famous scene in the 1995 BBC TV series of Pride and Prejudice is where Continue reading →

Jane Austen’s Regency World review

The latest issue of Jane Austen’s Regency World (for July/August 2014) has just been published, and we are very pleased that the paperback of Eavesdropping on Jane Austen’s England has been very favourably reviewed (on page 60). The reviewer, Joceline Bury, describes our book as a “marvellously entertaining catalogue of early 19th-century English life” that “deserves a place on any Austen aficionado’s bookshelf”. Considering that there are hundreds of thousands of Austen devotees worldwide, we look forward to a surge in sales! We love the final sentence of the review – “I challenge anyone to pick it up and not still be reading an hour later, delighted by such a vivid and entertaining portrait of an era”.

For those of you in the US and Canada, our book is called Jane Austen’s England there.

Jane Austen’s Regency World is regarded as the leading Austen magazine. It has over sixty pages, beautifully illustrated in colour, and is published every two months. For details on how to subscribe, see www.janeaustenmagazine.co.uk – there are subscriptions for UK only and the rest of the world.

Jane Austen in Paperback

Our latest book was published in paperback in the UK on Mayday 2014, with the title Eavesdropping on Jane Austen’s England, and this is the jacket design of that edition, based on the specially commissioned embroidery sampler done for the US edition:

The paperback is published by Abacus, price £9.99, ISBN 978-0-349-13860-2. It is categorised as ‘popular history’ if you are looking for it in bookshops – but of course it is only being sold by good bookshops! You can also borrow it from public libraries or purchase it through various online retailers. The book is still available as a hardback and it is also sold in all e-book formats. Please note that in the US Eavesdropping on Jane Austen’s England is called Jane Austen’s England, and the paperback there will be published at the end of July 2014. For more information, take a look at www.adkinshistory.com/JaneAustensEngland.aspx