Emma

Emma Woodhouse's confidence in her judgment makes the lives and marriages of her neighbours an absorbing personal project.

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Listen free: the LibriVox audiobook, read by Sherry Crowther. Press Listen in the reader to hear each chapter as you read.

Length: 55 chapters
Reading time: About 10 hr 59 min
Words: 156,801

About the book

Emma has money, an affectionate father and considerable freedom to do as she chooses. When her former governess marries, the change disturbs a comfortable household and gives fresh importance to the question of how other people's happiness should be arranged.

Austen makes social conversation an intricate field of evidence, where a remark can mean something different to each listener. The narrator stays close enough to Emma's expectations for her confidence to be persuasive, while small discrepancies invite readers to exercise a judgment of their own.

On these lists

Courtship and marriage

This edition

Text from Standard Ebooks, who proofread and typeset it and dedicate their edition to the public domain. Jane Austen died more than 70 years ago, so the work is out of copyright in the UK. Includes the original dedication.