BY 1975, THE TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY of her birth, Austen had become a major figure in the canon of English literature. As one might expect, the bicentennial was a time of great activity among critics. Individual articles, special issues of journals, and several books appeared offering new readings of individual works, assessments of Austen's reputation, and speculations about the future of Austen studies. Most significantly, though, one can see in work published coincident with the bicentenary that the division over Austen's politics that had begun during the 1930s had become the principal focus of critics by this time. A quick review of commentary published in 1975 shows that Austen continued to be celebrated as both a conservator of traditional values and a champion of subversive causes. Before turning to a more detailed examination of ways those applying new theoretical models of criticism effected a radical revisioning of Austen's fiction, the bicentennial seems a good place to pause to get a snapshot of the critical landscape as new critical methods began to replace more time-honored ones.

Anniversary Collections

In 1975 the critical landscape was inundated with anniversary collections. John Halperin, emerging as a new voice in Austen studies, served as editor of the Cambridge University Press volume Jane Austen: Bicentenary Essays. The contributors' list reads like a Who's Who in twentieth-century Austen studies. Essays prepared especially for this volume provide a snapshot of the state of Austen criticism — from one point of view.