“All the captain's wives belonged to the literate, well-traveled ranks of the new upper-middle class. Family records say as little about them as such records generally say about women, but one of them - probably Sarah's great-grandmother Mary Furber - left an unsigned diary that the Jewett sisters discovered in the old house when they were well into middle age. Set in Exeter in 1782, it shows us a young woman much like one of Jane Austen's Bennett sisters (the younger, flighty ones), engaged in a ceaseless and rather cold-blooded appraisal of the marriage market. Young men are ruthlessly sorted into two categories, "Somebodies" and "Nobodies.” ColdJane AustenCalculatingCold BloodedJane Austen Literature HumorNo PassionSarah Orne JewettSounds Like Pride And Prejudice Book:Sarah Orne Jewett: Her World And Her Work Source: Sarah Orne Jewett: Her World And Her Work