Jane Austen's Desk Kickstarter Campaign: Interview with Sarah Walton

Jane Austen's Desk (JAD), our award-winning digital humanities platform, provides users with a window into Austen's world and a space for scholars, fans, and general readers around the world to explore and learn, as well as connect and collaborate. This interpretive vision of Austen's writing space and traveling desk hosts historical, musical, literary, material culture, and philosophical sources in as interactive a manner as possible. The website simulates Jane Austen's imaginative world and network of influences as of Tuesday, March 30, 1813. 

Click image to visit Jane Austen's Desk.

With the loss of funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), JAD has launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise $9,000. This money is necessary to give tribute to the specific music Austen knew, loved, and transcribed by hand. The JAD team will add interactive tools with access to this music, making it come alive for all kinds of Janeites, by using historical instruments, professional performers, historic illustrations, information about composers and specific pieces, and images of Austen’s own sheet music.

The project will only be funded if we reach this goal by Sunday, December 28 at 11:59 PM ET. To help spread the word and encourage support, we interviewed JAD co-creator and project manager, Sarah Walton. Sarah is an Assistant Professor of English and the Director of Digital Humanities at Marshall University. She has been a part of the Jane Austen Collaborative since 2014. Sarah also served as a director of the Jane Austen Summer Program from 2019-2025.

What is your role with Jane Austen's Desk?

I am one of the creators and the Project Manager. We are so excited that JAD is now on mobile and out of beta--Version 1.0 is up, and is looking very festive for this holiday season.

What was the inspiration behind creating Jane Austen's Desk? Why is this project crucial for educating the public about Jane Austen and her novels? 

Digital mediums offer such exciting possibilities for preservation and access. We thought that there's so much out there about Austen and her world, but much of it is spread out across museums, archives, and collections all over the world--a website allows us to bring digital versions of those objects and texts together into a free, interactive environment. It means students and readers everywhere can explore these things and make their own connections to Austen's novels.

What is your favorite JAD feature and why? 

I love Austen's "Vicarious Travels," especially the globe. It's fascinating to see just how far-flung her network was, and to consider all those global issues and ideas that she might have been thinking about when creating her "three or four families in a country village."

Click image to visit 'Travels' feature.

Why is adding music to JAD important?

Music was so important to Austen. If we're going to truly capture what sorts of media she was engaging with as an artist and thinker, we need her music. 

Why should people support JAD's Kickstarter campaign? 

With all the changes to federal and state funding agencies, we no longer have access to the grant line that supported JAD until now. But that's not the only reason we thought of Kickstarter--it's also a way to let people know about this project and give our users an opportunity to shape the site. This campaign will mean that JAD's features are expanded to include something essential to Austen, and will allow us to introduce innovations to the site's interactivity and media content.

Visual prototype of anticipated JAD feature. Visitors will be able to explore the unique sounds and mechanics of the pianoforte and harpsichord firsthand, playing pieces and even reading sheet music transcribed by Jane Austen herself.

If you're interested in supporting JAD's goal of adding music to the site, please make your donation here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/janeaustencoll/adding-music-to-jane-austens-desk.

Thank you for your support!