\047Little Matters they are to be sure, but highly important.\047 Letter-writing was something of an addiction for young women of Jane Austen\047s time and social position, and Austen\047s letters have a freedom and familiarity that only intimate writing can convey. Wiser than her critics, who were disappointed that her correspondence dwelt on gossip and the minutiae of everyday living, Austen understood the importance of \047Little Matters\047, of the emotional and material details of individual lives shared with friends and family through the medium of the letter. Ironic, acerbic, always entertaining, Jane Austen\047s letters are a fascinating record not only of her own day-to-day existence, but of the pleasures and frustrations experienced by women of her social class which are so central to her novels. Vivien Jones\047s selection includes very nearly two-thirds of Austen\047s surviving correspondence, and her lively introduction and notes set the novelist\047s most private writings in their wider cultural context.