Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice is published
On this day · 28 January 1813
A novel once rejected by a publisher arrived anonymously in three volumes — and Austen called it her own darling child.
On January 28, 1813, the London publisher Thomas Egerton put Pride and Prejudice on sale, advertising the three-volume set in the Morning Chronicle at 18 shillings. The title page named no author, crediting only “the author of Sense and Sensibility.”
Jane Austen had begun the book years earlier under the title First Impressions, finishing a draft in the late 1790s. A London publisher rejected it sight unseen. When it finally reached print, she had sold the copyright to Egerton outright for £110, meaning the novel’s enduring profits never flowed back to her.
The first edition sold briskly enough to warrant a second printing by October. Writing to her sister Cassandra, Austen called the freshly arrived book her “darling child.” More than two centuries on, that once-anonymous three-decker remains one of the most beloved novels in the English language.
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