Of course I cant write about the regency era without mentioning Jane Austen. Almost everyone has either read or seen an adaptation of one of her novels. She is known as the Queen of Romance through out the world. Surprisingly she only has 6 novels...of which I have read 5 already. I have found a website with very interesting articles about her work and I am starting to think that perhaps she could be the author I choose to work off of. I will post some of the main themes and features in her works in the next post after I am done reading them. But for now from wiki: 

Jane Austen (16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist whose realism, biting social commentary and masterful use of free indirect speech, burlesque and irony have earned her a place as one of the most widely read and most beloved writers in English literature.^[1]

Austen lived her entire life as part of a small and close-knit family located on the lower fringes of English gentry.^[2] She was educated primarily by her father and older brothers as well as through her own reading. The steadfast support of her family was critical to Austen's development as a professional writer.^[3] Austen's artistic apprenticeship lasted from her teenage years until she was about thirty-five years old. During this period, she wrote three major novels and began a fourth.^[B] From 1811 until 1815, with the release of Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park(1814) and Emma (1815), she achieved success as a published writer. She wrote two additional novels, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion, both published after her death in 1817, and began a third, which was eventually titled Sanditon, but died before completing it.

Austen's works critique the novels of sensibility of the second half of the eighteenth century and are part of the transition to nineteenth-century realism.^[4][C] Austen's plots, though fundamentally comic,^[5] highlight the dependence of women on marriage to secure social standing and economic security.^[6] Like those of Samuel Johnson, one of the strongest influences on her writing, her works are concerned with moral issues.^[7]

During her lifetime, Austen's works brought her little fame and only a few positive reviews. Through the mid-nineteenth century, her novels were admired only by a literary elite. However, the publication of her nephew's A Memoir of Jane Austen in 1869 introduced her life and works to a wider public. By the 1940s, Austen was firmly ensconced in academia as a "great English writer", and the second half of the twentieth century saw a proliferation of Austen scholarship that explored many aspects of her novels: artistic, ideological, and historical. In popular culture, a Janeite fan culture has developed, centred on Austen's life, her works, and the various film and television adaptations of them.

more on the Regency

I have been doing some reserach on Byron and Shelley this past week and some of their work. Here is a few examples of Byron's work:

She Walks in Beauty

She walks in beauty like the night of cloudless climes and starry skies; And all that's best of dark and bright meets in her aspect and her eyes: Thus mellow'd to that tender light which heaven to gaudy day denies. One shade the more, one ray the less, had half impair'd the nameless grace which waves in every raven tress, or softly lightens o'er her face - where thoughts serenely sweet express how pure, how dear their dwelling - place. And on that cheek, and o'er that brow, so soft, so calm, yet eloquent, the smiles that win, the tints that glow, but tells in days of goodness spent, a mind at peace with all below, a heart whose love is innocent. and one by Shelley: LOVE'S  PHILOSOPHY By  Percy Shelley  1819  &/\&/\& The fountains mingle with the river And the rivers with the Ocean, The winds of Heaven mix for ever With a sweet emotion; Nothing in the world is single; All things by a law divine In one spirit meet and mingle. Why not I with thine? ---    See the mountains kiss high heaven, And the waves clasp one another; No sister-flower would be forgiven If it disdained its brother; And the sunlight clasps the earth, And the moonbeams kiss the sea: What is all this sweet work worth If thou kiss not me?  I have also read about these two poets personal lives which in itself is very interesting.In fact tehre was a short summer in which a group of writers including these two and Mary Shelley, Percy Shelley's wife all spent time together in Europe and created many wonderful works. I am also looking into some of the "famous" or "infamous" people of the time, including The Duchess of Devonshire. I am interested in the fact that the rich and famous led very free lives, mostly interested in their own pleasure. They did not work for a living and almost all gentleman kept mistresses openly.  This website has very interesting information:  http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~awoodley/Regency.html

History on the Regent Period

I have found a very interesting website which not only talks about the actual events of teh period but also takes into account the social status of the period. http://www.likesbooks.com/regent.html

Though there was also a great deal of information about romance novels which I'm not very interested in. The fact that all of the court was in such turmoil and corruption may explain why thepeople of this era were divided into so distinct group. The rich and nobel against the poor and common. Husband hunting during the Season was a very common thing which may explain why so many Romance Novels choose this period for their setting. s for literature, Lord Byron and Shelly are on my list to read. I have already read most of Jane Austen's work and am more or less familiar with the sweet side.