I have always been fascinated by how Jane Austen depicts the physicality and health of her characters. All of her novels contain references to physical condition, ailments, or advice on wellbeing – indeed, the word “health” appears more than a hundred times throughout her six best-known works. These are not conventional medical descriptions, but they do display surprising accuracy and narrative consistency.
The prominence of health and illness in Austen’s novels begs the question: What if the drama of her writing lay not in romance… but in the common cold?
