JANE Austen’s warm-witted romantic tale Sense and Sensibility is to be performed in the grounds of Athelhampton House on August 29. Join Chapterhouse Theatre Company this summer for an evening of Regency wonderment as Elinor and Marianne Dashwood make their first forays into the world of 18th century society.

Bring a picnic along with family and friends and follow the sisters as they find their path and lose their hearts in their quest to find the perfect balance of sense and sensibility. Jane Austen novels are still so well liked today because they not only beguile us with beautiful costumes and the romance of the Regency period, but they show us that while the manners might have changed, human nature hasn’t.

Scriptwriter Laura Turner feels that Sense and Sensibility, more than any other Austen novel, mirrors the personal and moral trails of modern life.

She said: “Sense and Sensibility has always been my favourite of the Jane Austen novels.

“The beauty of the story is that it is full of splendour but at the heart is a very sentimental story about finding love, true friendship and sisterly affection and for me that makes it so relevant to today, 200 years after it was written.

“I think the fact that Joanna Trollope has chosen this story for recent modernisation really shows how much we can still find a Jane Austen work that relates to modern life and the trials we face in the pursuit of happiness.”

Sense and Sensibility is at Athelhampton House on Friday, August 29 at 7.30pm. Go to chapterhouse.org for tickets or call 01305 848363.