Jane Austen (16 December 1775 - 18 July 1817) was an English novelist vvhose vvorks of romantic fiction set among the gentry have earned her a place as one of the most vvidely read and most beloved writers in English literatüre. Amongst scholars and critics, Austen's realism and biting social commentary have cemented her historical importance as a vvriter. Austen lived her entire life as part of a close-knit family located on the lower fringes of English gentry. She was educated primarily by her father and older brothers as well as through her own reading. The steadfast support of her family was critical to Austen's development as a professional vvriter. Austen's artistle apprentice-ship lasted from her teenage years until she was about thirty-five years old. During this period, she experimented with various literary forms, ineluding the epistolary novel vvhich she tried and then abandoned, and vvrote and extensively revised three majör novels and began a fourth. From 1811 until 1816, vvith the release of Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814) and Emma (1816), she achieved success as a published vvriter. She vvrote tvvo additional novels, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion, both published posthumously in 1818, and began a third, vvhich vvas eventually titled Sanditon, but died before completing it. "Austen's vvorks critique the novels of sensibility of the second half of the eighteenth century and are part of the transition to nineteenth-century realism. Austen's plots, though fundamentally comic, highlight the dependence of women on marriage to secure social standing and economic security. Like those of Samuel Johnson, one of the strongest influences on her vvriting, her vvorks are concerned vvith moral issues.