An early battle in the history of feminism was the fight for women’s right to study Greek and Latin. Women who learned those languages were ridiculed, called “Amazons” after the mythical warrior women who fought with men. In this hostile climate, Jane Austen’s father and two of her brothers quietly defied convention by secretly teaching her the classical languages.
In this talk I shall give my evidence for thinking both that Jane Austen knew Latin and that she wanted her education to be known.