Austen’s wit is unbeatable, lol.

Austen admired Richardson to the extent of knowing whole scenes of his last novel, Sir Charles Grandison, off by heart. She was also a devotee of Frances Burney. Yet she betrayed, at times, her own impatience with courtship plots that are seemingly protracted solely in order to generate more pages. In 1796 she sent her best wishes via her sister, Cassandra, to a mutual friend, and in the process wryly alluded to Burney’s Camilla: “tell her I wish whenever she is attached to a young Man, some respectable Dr Marchmont might keep them apart for five Volumes”. ©