Reading Jane Austen is nothing as much as looking into a mirror held to English life of her times, mainly life of home, involving men and women, characters and values - and most of it, with sense valued high, transcends time and place, so isn't strange or foreign to readers even couple of centuries later. Reading letters written by the author, personal and mostly to family members, is not different in this sense, except they are naturally more intimate and so more of a close up mirror, viewed by the reader invisible to the characters who were real, long since gone. (Goodreads)
Jane Austen (16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist known primarily for her six major novels, which interpret, critique and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots often explore the dependence of women on marriage in the pursuit of favourable social standing and economic security. Her works critique the novels of sensibility of the second half of the 18th century and are part of the transition to 19th-century literary realism. Her use of biting irony, along with her realism, humour, and social commentary, have long earned her acclaim among critics, scholars, and popular audiences alike.