“At the end of the day, they’re just sticks,” Ms. Straub said. The curators quote a letter from the director of Jane Austen’s House Museum, who in 2008 implored Janeites not to direct their heirs to scatter their ashes on the grounds. Jane Austen’s House Museum, which now owns the ring, declined to lend it to the Folger, forcing the exhibition to make do with a gold copy. “That one sort of broke my heart,” Ms. Straub said of the box, among several items on loan from Goucher College, a major American repository of Austenalia. PhotoEven beyond sheer literary genius, the curators argue, Shakespeare and Austen have a lot in common — starting with their scantily recorded intimate lives, which leave tantalizing holes to fill.

Source: New York Times August 04, 2016 19:22 UTC