Gentle Readers, I am spending July 4th with my family. We will picnic, eating a variety of collations, both hot and cold, and enjoying time with our extended family, including mothers, fathers, children, nieces and nephews, grandparents and great grandchildren.
Box Hill, view from the train. Image @Tony Grant
Because I am a Jane Austen aficionado, I am reminded of Emma’s picnic on Box Hill, which couldn’t be further from the closeness that my family will feel on the day we celebrate America’s birth.
View from Box Hill, Emma 2009
The wretchedness of a scheme to Box Hill was in Emma’s thoughts all the evening. How it might be considered by the rest of the party, she could not tell. They, in their different homes, and their different ways, might be looking back on it with pleasure; but in her view it was a morning more completely misspent, more totally bare of rational satisfaction at the time, and more to be abhorred in recollection, than any she had ever passed. – Emma, Jane Austen, Chapter 44
No one was quite satisfied with Emma’s planned outing, least of all Miss Bates, Mr. Knightley, and Emma. The Eltons wandered off bored and disappointed, and Miss Fairfax keenly felt the insults that Emma and Frank Churchill hurled her way.
Box Hill, Emma 2009. Fabulous view.
Yet Box Hill was a beautiful location, with a view that wouldn’t quit. It is still a tourist destination, and a place that offers peace and quiet to those who would enjoy its beauty. Unlike Emma, I am prepared to enjoy my picnic with my family. Happy July 4th, all!
Jane Austen's World 
Happy 4th of July to you, Vic! Thanks for the Emma images!
First, thank you for the information you’ve put together about Jane’s life and times. It helped me in my background research before writing a two-woman play with my co-actor about an imaginary episode in the life of Jane and Martha Lloyd. This was inspired by a cookbook our director found in a second-hand bookshop, compiled by Martha. Although centred on a fictional event, the play includes much that is factual about Jane, her family & friends in Chawton, Hampshire, their way of life & the times in which they lived. It draws on Austen’s works – especially Persuasion – and Martha Lloyd’s collected recipes.
The play was first performed in July 2010 in Geneva, Switzerland, and theatres in nearby France and then at the June 2011 Festival of European Anglophone Theatrical Societies in Meyrin, Switzerland. It will have two performances at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, on 26 and 27 August 2011, and one on 28 August at nearby St Andrews, Scotland. I can send a little flyer if you’d like to post it.
P.S. I recently discovered, thanks to the UK Daily Mail, that as well as being related to the Duchess of Cambridge, I and Kate Middleton are also both related to Jane Austen!
Beautiful pictures…Thank you
What lovely views… and a good time of year to be wearing those muslins!
Two links to Box Hill:
http://beta.nationaltrust.org.uk/box-hill
and
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Box_Hill,_Surrey