“Jane Austen wrote like that until the end of her days. ‘How she was able to effect all this,’ her nephew writes in his memoir, ‘is surprising, for she had no separate study to repair to, and most of the work must have been done in the general sitting room, subject to all kinds of casual interruptions. She was careful that her occupation should not be suspected by servants or visitors of any persons beyond her own family party.’ Jane Austen hid her manuscripts or covered them with a piece of blotting-paper.”