Our events have been selling out faster than fine muslin this year, but fret not some tickets still remain. Here's a quick list of what's left - but hurry, when they're gone, they're gone!

The Watsons with Rose Servitova

Monday 15th September - 11:30

In her talk on The Watsons, Rose Servitova explores what inspired her to complete Jane Austen’s unfinished novel - from fandom and her fascination with Austen to the challenge of capturing Austen's distinctive voice. She will discuss her writing process, her love of authenticity and why humour is key. Finally, she explains why The Watsons is ripe for screen adaptation.

Venue: Elwin Room, BRLSI, 16-18 Queen Square, BA1 2HN

Tickets £13

Austen Fantasy House Hunt: The architecture we don’t see in Jane Austen

Monday 15th September - 16:00

The streets and houses in Jane Austen’s novels are essential to defining the people who occupy them, but what about the buildings the characters never actually visit? Join Dr Amy Frost as she explores the buildings that are not described by Austen, and invites you to help construct these fictional homes. Audience participation welcome, no drawing skills required, just bring your imagination.

Venue: Elwin Room, BRLSI, 16-18 Queen Square, BA1 2HN

Tickets £13

Sense & Musicality

Monday 15th September - 19:00

Sense & Musicality explores the love story of Jane Austen and music. Through the authentic sound of historic square piano with soprano voice, Penelope Appleyard and Jonathan Delbridge delight audiences with music connected to Austen's life and works, including songs she sang herself, and bring to life moments from her letters and novels. This performance celebrates the release of brand-new song ‘Ode to Pity’ – a rare musical setting of Austen’s poetry.

Venue: Bath Abbey, Abbey Churchyard, BA1 1LY

Tickets £12

Jane Austen's Portrait - with Melissa Dring

Tuesday 16th September - 12 noon

This talk charts the extensive research made by forensic artist portrait painter, Melissa Dring, when commissioned to produce a new likeness of Jane Austen in 2001. Chasing all possible clues, not only the Austen family look, but such intimate details as Jane’s underwear, were equally crucial to the final lifelike image. This, of course, also had to convey something of Jane’s character and reveal her sparkling wit and wisdom…Did Melissa succeed? Judge for yourselves!

Venue: Elwin Room, BRLSI, 16-18 Queen Square, BA1 2HN

Tickets £13

Dye and colour in Regency life

Wednesday 17th September - 10:00

Learn about colour in Regency times. Trace the creatively described colours of fashions in the journals of the time back to the ancient art and alchemy of natural colours. This lecture will explore the fascinating sources including, plants, spices, animals and elements used. The complex processes, which sit somewhere between science and magic, used to consistently create colours across the spectrum. Exploring how these colours were named and sold through fashion journals before finally looking at the practical issues of wearing and maintaining naturally coloured clothing.

Venue: Elwin Room, BRLSI, 16-18 Queen Square, BA1 2HN

Tickets £13

Living with Jane Austen

Wednesday 17th September - 11:30

Janet Todd has been reading Jane Austen for many decades, observing how her work alters through the lens of evolving taste and cultural fashion: also through changes in herself as she passes through different periods of life.
Recently, Janet Todd has come to appreciate the bracing, humorous way Austen deals with bodies and their disorders--including her own. Engaging with the medical buzzword of the times—‘nerves’—through her characters, Austen investigates the subtle interaction of mind and body, the discomfort that seeps from one to the other. Finally, Janet Todd looks at Austen’s private letters where she exposes her own ‘nervous’ quality.

Venue: Elwin Room, BRLSI, 16-18 Queen Square, BA1 2HN

Tickets £13

250 years before Jane Austen: a short and partial version of British history

Wednesday 17th September - 14:00

In this fully illustrated talk, Director of Jane Austen’s House takes us back in time to explore the seismic political, religious, and social changes that shaped the world that Jane Austen was born into in 1775. From the Mary Queen of Scots to the South Sea bubble and beyond, we will explore ten key events that shaped both the writer and her world.

Venue: Elwin Room, BRLSI, 16-18 Queen Square, BA1 2HN

Tickets £13

The Worlds of Jane Austen - with Helena Kelly

Wednesday 17th September - 16:00

The Worlds of Jane Austen takes a fresh look at Jane Austen’s life, inspirations and legacy, drawing on the latest research in an accessible and lively way.
Despite the tranquil image of Austen that lingers in the popular imagination, her life coincided with a period of intense, immense change. The American Revolutionary War, the French Revolution, the uprising in Ireland… All through Austen’s early life, the old certainties were being subjected to challenge, new ideas were springing up – about democracy, freedom, slavery, poetry, the position of women.
Helena Kelly is the author of Jane Austen, the Secret Radical (2016).

Venue: Elwin Room, BRLSI, 16-18 Queen Square, BA1 2HN

Tickets £13

Almost Austen - Musical Performance

Wednesday 17th September - 18:00

Following a sold out run at the Edinburgh Fringe, Almost Austen returns to the Jane Austen Festival:
Catherine is a modern girl in love with Jane Austen's world. She can't believe her luck when she meets her very own 'Mr Tilney'. Through passages from Northanger Abbey and songs from Musicals and Opera, we follow Catherine's romantic ups and downs as real life and fantasy collide.
Performed by Louise Geller and accompanied on piano by James Hall.

Venue: The Mission Theatre, 32 Corn St, Bath BA1 1UF

Tickets £22

Reading with Delight: Jane Austen or Hannah More?

Wednesday 17th September - 19:00

Austen’s friends were ‘reading with delight Mrs. H. More’s recent publication’. Evangelical author Hannah More, far more popular than Jane Austen, helped reform her society’s moral values and promoted education for women and the poor and abolition of slavery. Why is Hannah More forgotten today, while Austen still delights readers around the world?

Brenda S. Cox will compare and contrast these authors, concluding with a book signing for Fashionable Goodness: Christianity in Jane Austen’s England. Regency costume very welcome but not mandatory.

Venue: Bath Abbey, Abbey Churchyard, BA1 1LY

Tickets £13

Regency Rum Bluffers: “Desert Island Austen” - singing workshop

Thursday 18th September - 11:00

Imagine Jane on a desert island - what music would she choose? What luxury would she take? What book would she choose? Join this group session to sing the songs Jane might chose and speculate with us on what book and which luxury she would choose. As always, no previous singing experience is needed and the songs will be taught by ear, so there is no need to be able to read music.

Venue: The Mission Theatre, 32 Corn St, Bath BA1 1UF

Tickets £25

Murder Most Austen

Thursday 18th September - 12:30

The past decade has seen a significant rise in Jane Austen detective fiction retellings. But what is it about Austen’s work that lends itself to the detective genre? What makes the Austen heroine qualified to solve a murder?
Join crime writer and crime fiction scholar Dr Lucy Andrew for a talk exploring the influence of Austen’s work on the development of detective fiction and the motives behind the current Austen crime wave.

Venue: Elwin Room, BRLSI, 16-18 Queen Square, BA1 2HN

Tickets £13

Dormouse to Donkey Carts - The Carriages of Jane Austen's Era

Thursday 18th September - 14:00

Amy Bracey has been driving horse-drawn carriages since she was knee high to a grasshopper and her love for them became a career when working for the National Trust, cataloguing their carriage collection. She is Project Curator for The Carriage Foundation, an educational charity, and advises museums and individuals across the globe on the care, conservation, history and research of horse-drawn carriages.
This illustrated presentation will explore the modes of transport mentioned in Austen's novels and what they represented in the subtle language of her writings.

Venue: Elwin Room, BRLSI, 16-18 Queen Square, BA1 2HN

Tickets £13

Dancing with the Stars (Georgian Style)

Friday 19th September - 11:30

Jane Austen. The Duchess of Devonshire. The Prince Regent. What do these lives have in common? They were ‘fond of dancing and excelled in it’. From learning from famous dancing masters, to performing at the assembly rooms and in the homes of the fashionable Bon Ton in London, join Dr Hillary Burlock as she explores the triumphs and trials of Georgian celebrities in the ballroom.

Venue: Elwin Room, BRLSI, 16-18 Queen Square, BA1 2HN

Tickets £14

Love and Friendship - film showing

Sunday 21st September - 18:30

Whit Stillman’s sparkling, critically-acclaimed adaptation of Jane Austen’s early, posthumously-published novella ‘Lady Susan’ stars Kate Beckinsale, radiant as the scheming and scandalous widow Lady Susan Vernon out to secure suitable husbands for herself and daughter. Beckinsale has a ball, creating an unforgettable comic character dressed in arguably the most splendid costumes ever created for Austen on film. "The funniest, most deliciously venomous Jane Austen movie ever made" – Empire Magazine.

Venue: Widcombe Social Club, Widcombe Hill, Bath BA2 6AA

Tickets £8 - £10