Anna Walker

This intoxicating setting provided the backdrop to some of Jane Austen's most treasured walks.

And that's what Nada's ongoing PhD research at Cumbria University is all about.

The transformative power of walking in Austen's novels.

My colleague Jane Wright there, with Nada Sadui.

I love the idea of Anne Wentworth walking towards transformation.

The way Nada puts it really embodies the vast and sometimes conflicting emotions we experience over the course of our lives.

But by now, I feel, we should expect nothing less.

Jane Austen is often revered as a master of the psychological novel.

But what did her own interior world look like?

Coming up, I sit down with two experts to find out, after this short break.

Welcome back.

Freya Johnston, you're a professor of English at St Anne's College at the University of Oxford and the author of Jane Austen, Early and Late.

Welcome to the podcast, Freya.

And John Mullen, you're a professor of modern English literature at the University College London and the author of What Matters in Jane Austen.

Welcome, John.

As I've been working on this podcast series, I've asked many people what their favourite Jane Austen book is, and I've been surprised by how many people say Persuasion.

It has its share of famous fans too.

The poet Alfred Tennyson paid a visit to Lyme Regis in 1867, specifically to see locations from the novel.

John, why do you think Persuasion resonates with so many people?

Well, Anne Elliot, as you've alluded to there, John, the protagonist of Persuasion, is perhaps Austen's most melancholic heroine.