The Thing About Austen

Hello, apologies for the late response – we’re just seeing this now. Good catch! The episode has actually since been edited, as that was a speech error on our part. We meant to say paper knife (a related object but definitely different from a pen knife) since we were discussing the importance of both pens and paper in MP. The text of MP does not not specify beyond it being silver, but it’s unlikely it would be a fruit or kitchen knife as that would probably be both too sharp and too useful to the household to let a kid play with (nor would it be made of silver). A paper knife or other decorative but utilitarian object seems likely. We were thinking a paper knife as they were blunt with rounded edges (safe-ish for kids) and sometimes made from silver. We’ll eventually do an entire object on this object, so stay tuned!