The Abbey School has proudly supported a commemorative plaque honouring Jane Austen’s school days in Reading. It has been installed on the Abbey Gateway and was revealed by the Deputy Lord Lieutenant, Lucy Zeal, and the Mayor of Reading, Dr Alice Mpofu-Coles on Saturday.

Our school took its name in order to keep alive the memory of the old house in the Abbey Gateway which was honoured by having among its pupils one of the greatest of all women writers in the English Language, Jane Austen.

As part of the unveiling ceremony, The Abbey’s talented poet, Imogen Upper VI, performed a poem, ‘Overcoming’, that she had written to mark the occasion. Imogen had the gathered crowd captivated as she generated an eclectic atmosphere of connection between the past and present, and the lasting impact of Austen’s work.

Members of the Abbey community, including Headteacher Will le Fleming, Chair of Governors Elizabeth Harrison, Director of Sixth Form Charlotte Hart, Head of Engagement & Development Julia Wootton and our Head Girls Emily and Leah, were also part of the invited audience. Mr le Fleming gave a speech in which he shared what a pleasure it was to be part of the occasion and how our school proudly continues the tradition of all girls education in Reading, that stretches back to Reading Ladies Boarding School and Jane’s experience there.

He also drew a wonderful comparison between Jane’s heroines and our Abbey students today, “There is a spirit at The Abbey which I think you can find quite clearly in Jane Austen’s writing. She and her heroines defied a system that dictated how women would live their lives depending on their social and economic circumstances, and a whole range of injustices that held them back. Nearly all of her books embody that spirited defiance in a very particular way, and her heroines would not tolerate some of those obstacles placed in front of them – and that’s exactly what the Abbey is still here today to do, to continue that mission on behalf of girls and women. That spirit of delight and joy and humour and we hope that you can see that at the school every day.”

Jane Austen spent 18 months being educated in Reading, enrolling in the Reading Ladies Boarding School in the Reading Abbey Gateway in 1785 at the age of nine years old, and remaining a pupil at the school until December 1786. Her sister Cassandra, and their cousin Jane Cooper also attended the school with her. The schoolroom at Abbey Gateway is often cited as the inspiration for Austen’s Mrs Goddard’s School in Emma. It did not take much ‘persuasion’ from Emily and Leah to convince Mr le Fleming to pose with them for a photo, right where Jane may have stood alongside her teacher.
The plaque was installed this year as part of the celebrations to mark 250 years since Jane Austen’s birth and The Abbey School is proud to be associated with her history.

Overcoming, by Imogen Upper VI

I stumbled when I first walked this narrow path,
I was a child, clutching the hand of another:
Older, wiser, sister to the sisterless,
You held my hand. You who, though I did not see it,
Faced this huge invisible wall that rose before you
Wherever you walked – I could not comprehend
The sale or dimensions of this untold barrier.
Even now, without you, I do not understand how you,
A lonely figure cut from a solitary cloth, could ever
Survive in a wilderness, in this crowd of rock-faced men.

You will overcome, are overcoming and have overcome
This transcending fear of the feminine – it’s one of
Those things that spans space and time, a testament
To the prevailing bitterness of angry men.
I wish you could hear me now as
I howl outside the door to your tomb
Carved from the language of letters and love.
I wonder if you’d be proud or ashamed of this
Outpouring of sentiment over you or you’d just
Sit, embarrassed of my twenty-first century words.

So please, take us now by the hand and lead us
To the next place where, I am sure, you will continue
To thrash your way through the tall crop, your hand a scythe,
Cutting a path between one life to the next, stringing
Ariadne’s thread from person to person;
The ineffable and the tangible sandswept in a declaration
To you, oh, the great named heroine,
Lead us too as we tell stories to pass the time –
I will transcribe them in the chambers of my heart,
Your letters and words echoing in the spaces between,
Each and every other heart that beats a pounding drum.

My Jane, our Jane, your very own self –
Did you ever let yourself anticipate the scale of the words you wrote?
The power you wield over us today as we sit,
Respectably, and marvel at you from afar; up close,
You are a warrior of words with a hand stained from ink.
You live on in our hearts, and stand here beside me now –
I ask you to look around and see what wonder you have created.