{"id":6606,"date":"2026-09-04T17:54:57","date_gmt":"2026-09-04T17:54:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/?p=6606"},"modified":"2026-09-04T17:55:57","modified_gmt":"2026-09-04T17:55:57","slug":"elementary-my-dear-austen-why-jane-austen-has-turned-to-crime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bars.ac.uk\/blog\/?p=6606","title":{"rendered":"\u201cElementary, My Dear Austen\u201d: Why Jane Austen Has Turned to Crime"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a Jane Austen fan will wonder what happens to her characters beyond the scope of the novels. When asked by her nieces and nephews about what the future had in store for the secondary characters that hadn\u2019t received as much attention in the \u2013 by then published \u2013 Pride and Prejudice<\/em>, Austen is said to have told them a couple of things: Kitty married a clergyman, and Mary had to settle for marrying one of her uncle\u2019s clerks. The answer \u2018after the disappearance of her friend, Caroline Bingley found herself investigating a murder and uncovering a plot to smuggle goods traded by the East India Company,\u2019 isn\u2019t likely to have been one of the answers Austen gave her nieces and nephews. Yet, that is the precise scenario put forward by the recent novel by the Australian writers Kelly Gardiner and Sharmini Kumar, Miss Caroline Bingley, Private Detective<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The last few years have seen a surge in Austen-themed crime novels. One of the first of these was P. D. James\u2019s Death Comes to Pemberley<\/em> (2011), in which Wickham, by then six years into his marriage to Lydia, is accused of the murder of his friend Denny. Since then, other authors have been drawn to reimagining Austen\u2019s characters as sleuths and detectives. In the Young Adult series Jane Austen Murder Mystery<\/em> by Tirzah Price, Lizzie and Darcy \u2013 reimagined as competing solicitors \u2013 investigate a murder. In the Mr Darcy & Miss Tilney<\/em> series by Claudia Grey, it\u2019s the descendants of Lizzy and Darcy and Catherine and Henry from Northanger Abbey<\/em> who investigate the mysterious death of Wickham himself. BARS spoke to Lucy Andrews <\/a>earlier this year, as she discussed transforming Emma<\/em>‘s Harriet Smith into a detective in her novel, A Very Vexing Murder. <\/em>In novels like Jessica Bull\u2019s Miss Austen Investigates<\/em> it\u2019s Austen herself who takes up the mantle and solves a murder. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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