The Women of Jane Austen Jane Austen has attracted a great deal of critical attention in recent years. Many have spoken out about the strengths and weaknesses of her characters, particularly her heroines. Austen has been cast as both a friend and foe to the rights of women. According to Morrison, “most feminist studies have represented Austen as a conscious or unconscious subversive voicing a woman’s frustration at the rigid and sexist social order which enforces subservience and dependence” (337). Others feel that her marriage plots are representative of her allegiance to the social quid pro quo of her time: “Marriage, almost inevitab