The governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney has unveiled the new plastic £10 at the Winchester Cathedral.
The note, which follows the polymer £5, will be issued on 14 September and has a portrait of Jane Austen on the 200th anniversary of the author’s death.
It is also the first Bank of England note to include a tactile feature to help visually impaired people.
The tactile feature was developed in conjunction with the Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB) and is a series of raised dots in the top left-hand corner of each note.
Bank notes are already in tiered sizes, and have bold numerals, raised print and differing colours to help blind and partially sighted people.
Meanwhile, a limited supply of a new £2 coin honouring Jane Austen has been put into circulation by the Royal Mint.
The coin will initially only be available in tills at key locations in the Winchester and Basingstoke areas that have connections with Austen, including Winchester Cathedral and the Jane Austen House Museum.
The £10 note will be made of the same material as the £5 note, which means it also contains some traces of animal fat – an issue which caused concern for vegans and some religious groups when it was launched last September.
A petition to ban the note attracted more than 100,000 signatures but the new £10 will again contain some tallow, which is derived from meat products.
However, even before it has been formally presented, it is causing outrage in some corners of the internet thanks to a quote featured on the note.
Concept designs for the new £10 feature an image of English author Jane Austen next to a quote from her magnum opus, Pride and Prejudice.
“I declare after all that there is no enjoyment like reading!” — the quote says, praising the art of reading, a sentiment that is hard to disagree with.
However, in its original context, the character who utters the words, Caroline Bingley, is being more than a little disingenuous. Bingley has no real interest in literature and instead pretends to be an avid reader to attract the attentions of the book’s heartthrob, Mr Darcy.
As noted by the Guardian, Bingley utters these words to impress Mr Darcy while sitting next to him as he reads. She is “as much engaged in watching Mr Darcy’s progress through his book, as in reading her own,” Austen writes.
The use of the quote has drawn criticism online, with Twitter users taking to the platform to criticise the Bank of England for an apparent lack of research.
The new 10 pounds note is set to come into circulation later in the year.
In a related development, the Bank of Scotland had earlier unveiled the design of its new plastic 10 pounds note at the end of May.
Featuring Scottish novelist and poet Sir Walter Scott alongside The Mound in Edinburgh on the front and the Glenfinnan Viaduct on the back, it also has a picture of a steam locomotive hauling a heritage tourist train.
The note is due to come into circulation in the autumn.
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