Catherine Anne Hubback (7 July 1818 – 25 February 1877) was an English
novelist
A novelist is an author or writer of novels, though often novelists also write in other genres of both fiction and non-fiction. Some novelists are professional novelists, thus make a living writing novels and other fiction, while others aspire to ...
, and the eighth child and fourth daughter of Sir
Francis Austen
Admiral of the Fleet Sir Francis William Austen, (23 April 1774 – 10 August 1865) was a Royal Navy officer and an elder brother of the novelist Jane Austen. As commanding officer of the sloop HMS ''Peterel'', he captured some 40 ships, was ...
(1774–1865), and niece of English novelist
Jane Austen
Jane Austen (; 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist known primarily for her six major novels, which interpret, critique, and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots of ...
.
She began writing fiction to support herself and her three sons after her husband John Hubback was institutionalized. She had copies of some of her aunt's unfinished works and, in 1850, remembering Austen's proposed plot, she wrote ''The Younger Sister'', a completion of Jane Austen's ''
The Watsons
''The Watsons'' is an abandoned novel by Jane Austen, probably begun about 1803. There have been a number of arguments advanced as to why she did not complete it, and other authors have since attempted the task. A continuation by Austen's niece ...
''. In the next following thirteen years, she completed nine more novels.
Life
Catherine Hubback began writing fictional novels to support her family after her husband was institutionalized following a nervous breakdown.
In 1870, she emigrated to California, in the United States, where she settled in Oakland with her second son Edward. In the Autumn of 1876, she moved to Gainesville, Virginia, where she died on 25 February 1877 from pneumonia. Her novels, which were then popular, are now rarely read and difficult to obtain. Her best-known work is ''The Younger Sister''.
''The Younger Sister''
''The Watsons'', as we know this unfinished novel through the publication of James Edward Austen-Leigh, nephew of Jane Austen in 1871, is generally considered a very promising work, begun in 1804, The editing was unfortunately interrupted, perhaps by the death of Jane Austen's father in 1805.
''The Younger Sister'', which appears in three volumes, is probably written, not from a copy of her aunt's novel that Catherine Hubback would have held, but more likely from her memories, for
used to read with her family the works of her sister Jane. This was one of the Austen family traditions.
Moreover, ''The Younger Sister'', in a somewhat approximate manner, resumes in its first five chapters the text of ''The Watsons'' as it is known since 1871. The point-by-point comparison of ''The Watsons'' and the corresponding text of ''The Younger Sister'' reveals a very great resemblance, despite some name changes, but the elegant and alert style of Jane Austen is replaced by a text that takes on more the character of notes than a faithful copy of the original.
List of works''The Younger Sister: a novel'' (1850)''The Wife's Sister'', also known as, ''The Forbidden Marriage'' (1851)''May and December: a tale of wedded life'' (1854)''Agnes Milbourne'', also known as, ''Foy pour devoir'' (1856)''The Old Vicarage: a novel'' (1856)
Mistakes of a Life (1863)
'
Love and Duty
'
The Rival Suitors (1857)
'
External links
''Catherine Hubback: Jane Austen’s Literary Niece''
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Hubback, Catherine
1818 births
1877 deaths
Austen family
English emigrants to the United States
Jane Austen
English women novelists
19th-century English women writers
19th-century British writers