Dear Ardent Admirer,

Thank you for the invitation to join your Dream Dinner Party with other long-deceased novelists. It was most generous of you to think of me more than two centuries after my passing. Unfortunately, I will not be able to attend.

You see, I have received many such requests for my companionship of late. It is a truth universally acknowledged that a prominent writer being profiled by the Gray Lady’s book review section must want to resurrect my corpse for their personal amusement. It would seem that Pride and Prejudice and Zombies weren’t adulation enough.

Flattered as I am by your attentions, I fear I lack the fortitude to withstand another fête of this nature. I did indeed write that “one can never have too large a party,” but the declaration was laced with irony—you know, the hallmark of my literary works. I find my spirits depleted; even my infinite wit has its limits.

Not that I disapprove of parties. On the contrary, I delight in the opportunity to don my finest frock, to trade quips, and indulge in spirited gossip with friends and neighbors. But I cannot abide the vulgar shoptalk of striving strangers who demand to know, “Where do you find your inspiration?”—or worse, “What are you working on now?” Were not my six novels, my Darling Children, the very essence of perfection? Where was this enthusiasm whilst I was still capable of holding a quill, I wonder!

Your modern conception of a party is a dull affair indeed. No pianoforte to be found, and you call the most unseemly gyrations “dancing.” Not to mention your pedestrian parlor games. It is time we concede that civilization peaked with the invention of Whist. My idea of a diverting evening does not include being subjected to a quiz entitled “Which Austen Heroine Are You?” I adore each and every one of my fictional creations. (Yes, even Fanny Price.)

Nor will I be coerced to answer impertinent queries regarding my youthful liaisons. My work was signed “By a Lady,” and a Lady never tells. Furthermore, I refuse to debate the merits of the 1995 BBC production of Pride and Prejudice versus the 2005 rendering. If I hear the words “wet shirt” or “hand flex” uttered even one more time in my presence, I shan’t be responsible for my comportment.

Please trust that I am sparing you a good deal of disappointment by declining your invitation. One should never meet one’s hero, you know. I once had the rather unfortunate honor of being seated next to William Shakespeare, my former idol, at a dinner of departed literary giants. The Bard spent the majority of the evening composing a sonnet about flatulence, complete with musical accompaniment of a sort I care not to describe. If I wished to be insulted in so crude a manner, I would stay in and peruse one-star Goodreads reviews of Mansfield Park.

I assure you that however much you think you would enjoy my presence, in reality it would prove vexing. You need only have read one of my private letters to know that I would make a delicious mockery of you and your friends on the carriage ride home.

Can you think of no other paragon of discernment and taste to fulfill the female quota at your literary soiree? Or perhaps I’m the sole woman writer you have deigned to read. Well, then allow me to recommend Charlotte Brontë. There is always room on her dance card. Or you might try Emily Dickinson—as I am sure that one literary spinster is the same as any other in your estimation.

In short, did you really think you could persuade me to spend even a single precious hour of my afterlife in the company of social-climbing scribes such as yourself? To quote one of the only tolerable adaptations of my work: “as if!”

Sardonically yours,
Jane Austen

Postscript: Even if I wished to attend, Colin Firth is taking me out for birthday drinks that evening. “Wet shirt” wins, after all.