By Tamara Cohen in The Daily mail,  15th July 2011


A ‘lost’ Jane Austen novel, which was never published because of a family tragedy, has been sold for nearly £1million.
The story, called The Watsons, was never even completed, supposedly because the author found events in her own life had become uncomfortably close to those in her plot.
The novel tells the story of four sisters who are the daughters of a widowed clergyman, and their attempts to marry well.
The Watsons, a lost novel by Jane Austen, was sold at Sotheby's in London yesterday for £993,250, three times the guide price, to an anonymous buyer
The Watsons, a lost novel by Jane Austen, was sold at Sotheby's in London yesterday for £993,250, three times the guide price, to an anonymous buyer
The manuscript was written after Austen completed Northanger Abbey and before she began Mansfield Park but it was never published because her father died
The manuscript was written after Austen completed Northanger Abbey and before she began Mansfield Park but it was never published because her father died

Significant: The book is one of the most autobiographical of Austen's novels
Significant: The book is one of the most autobiographical of Austen's novels

The handwritten manuscript is the only copy of the story created – and was owned by one of the author’s descendants.
It was sold at Sotheby’s in London yesterday for £993,250, three times the guide price, to an anonymous bidder, later revealed to be Oxford University’s Bodleian Library.
The high price is despite the fact that not only is the manuscript unfinished, it is also lacking the first 12 pages, which were sold during the First World War to raise funds for the Red Cross and are now at a library in New York.
The Watsons was written after Austen completed her third novel, Northanger Abbey, and before she began Mansfield Park, and has been acclaimed by experts.
Critic Margaret Drabble described it as ‘a tantalising, delightful and highly accomplished fragment, which must surely have proved the equal of her other six novels, had she finished it.’