A petition has been launched to try to save part of the Alton countryside associated with Jane Austen.

The Windmill Hill and Fields Appreciation Group’s ‘Securing Jane Austen’s Literary Landscape for the Nation’ change.org petition already has 690 signatures.

Organiser Ginny Boxall said: “Currently Windmill Hill and Fields is at risk from this government’s massive house building targets for our area.

“In the same way as parts of Dorset have been conserved to form a legacy for Thomas Hardy, we are urging the UK government to recognise the importance of Alton and Chawton to Jane Austen’s legacy.

“Alton and its surrounding landscape is where Jane Austen walked, shopped, socialised and made notes for developing the characters who featured in her novels.

“Jane Austen is loved and respected as a literary giant and as such it’s vital that we secure this landscape where she spent her most productive years - writing her six novels - for the nation.”

The petition is at https://tinyurl.com/ymrx3fwa