Jane Austen For Beginners

by Robert Dryden

  Economic issues foreground the conflict. We discover that John Thorpe’s web of lies and deception misled the general about Catherine’s social standing. Earlier in the narrative, John (in his most unromantic fashion) had proposed marriage to Catherine via a letter. Although not for an instant seriously considered by Catherine, John felt his proposal would be accepted. Being an accomplished braggart, John told General Tilney that his wife-to-be was worth a fortune. The general believed this about Catherine during the weeks she spent with his family at Northanger Abbey. When he encountered the general again, however, John had already received Catherine’s rejection. Knowing that Catherine was visiting with the Tilneys and wanting to hurt her, John revised his account of Catherine’s financial situation. This time he told the general that Catherine was destitute; he went overboard again but in the opposite direction. The general’s furious reaction to the news reveals his own economic agenda. When the general presents this information to Henry and forbids his son to have any further connections with Catherine, Henry rebels. He is in love with Catherine, and fortune or not, he is determined to propose to her.

  This is yet another example in Austen’s novels of major characters rebelling against the materialistic conventions of their society and marrying for love, not money. Thus, against his father’s wishes, Henry returns to Woodston and then makes the trip to Fullerton to meet with Catherine and express his feelings. Acting the part of the gentleman, Henry asks for and receives permission from Mr. and Mrs. Morland to marry their daughter, but receiving permission from the general would be another matter entirely. Since marriage is a legal contract, permission must be gained on both sides, and the general isn’t interested. This obstinacy in the general is indicative of the old guard in England. To him, marriage is an arrangement, a social and economic contract between families to protect and increase land holdings and riches. But a change does occur in the general when Eleanor marries a man of fortune. Demonstrating the influence that money has in this materialistic society, Eleanor demands that the general forgive Henry and let him marry whomever he pleases. Consent is finally gained, and the general’s mood about his son and Catherine improves substantially when he learns that, although not rich, Catherine is far from destitute.

  • • •

  Loose ends are tied, and we are prepared to see these couples living happily ever after. Austen concludes her novel with this provocative final line: “I leave it to be settled by whomsoever it may concern, whether the tendency of this work be altogether to recommend parental tyranny, or reward filial disobedience.” “Parental tyranny,” as Austen has demonstrated through General Tilney’s behavior, is connected with old England, where couples marry for money and power and retain hierarchical status by contracting themselves to members of similar social classes. “Filial disobedience” is in opposition to these antiquated social and economic traditions. Contained in Henry’s disobedience to his father is the important theme that love and happiness have value in marriage and should not be forsaken. Henry’s actions point the way to new attitudes in a new England, where middle-class characters can mingle with and marry members of the landed gentry, and where love now joins money and social status as an important criterion for evaluating prospective partners on the marriage market.

  Also of significant importance is Catherine’s refusal of John Thorpe’s proposal of marriage. As we have discussed, women weren’t in the habit of refusing marriage proposals during this time in history. Yet in Austen’s novels, we see it happen in Northanger Abbey, in Mansfield Park, Persuasion, Pride and Prejudice, and in Austen’s own life. Austen would seem to be imploring her readers to understand that women have choices. A marriage is a union based on love and compatibility, not a financial contract or a land grant.

  Austen’s focus on love is a criterion that exists for both women and men. As a second son, Henry Tilney will not be inheriting his family riches or the estate. But he has several options, should he choose them, which can considerably heighten his financial position. As we have seen with Willoughby in Sense and Sensibility, for example, Henry could seek out a bride of fortune on the marriage market. Such a move would make him an instant millionaire. This avenue to fortune was extremely common in Austen’s day (and to an extent it still is).

  And if not through the marriage market, Henry could also have chosen a more lucrative profession, such as business or law. But Henry’s choices of both Catherine Morland in marriage and the clergy for his profession demonstrate just how dedicated he is to fulfilling the calling of his heart rather than the calling of his bank account. Austen’s heroes and heroines are characters of substance—good role models for each other in the novels and for us gentle readers in our own lives.

  In this coming-of-age story, we see Catherine’s maturation process as she negotiates the terrain of her society. She has positive role models in the Tilneys and negative role models in the Thorpes. Indeed, Northanger Abbey reads like a conduct manual or a how-to book for young women. Through the tutelage of Henry and Eleanor Tilney, Catherine sharpens her intellect, learns to distinguish right from wrong, and comes to understand the difference between fantasy and reality. In the end it is the Thorpes who are caught up in a world of lies and false fantasies. Their greed gets in the way of allowing them to fulfill their desires. Isabella couldn’t accept James as the modest curate he would become, and John couldn’t help spreading grandiose lies about Catherine’s fortune. They are materialistic in the most negative sense, and in Austen’s world, they end up empty-handed. Finally, Austen is able to use the Gothic tradition as homage to the literary power of female authors and readers and as a vehicle to educate her protagonist. By conjuring up Ann Radcliffe and The Mysteries of Udolpho, Austen positions herself as part of a tradition in literature written by women. She establishes the battle of the sexes between male and female authors of the eighteenth century to show that women have a significant place at the table. In her commentary about the wit, power, knowledge, and language used by women in literature, Austen is demanding that women writers be taken seriously; their mark in the world of letters and literature may be at its dawn when Austen is writing, but the day is gaining fast.

  Chapter 7

  Persuasion

  Persuasion (originally titled The Elliots) is Austen’s last competed novel, which she wrote during her second-to-last year of life from August 1815 to August 1816. Austen had just completed Emma a few months earlier in 1815, and after turning 40, she began feeling poorly, although she wasn’t able to identify a specific cause. Since she had grown up with a mother who had hypochondriac tendencies, Austen made a valiant effort to fight through her malaise and avoid complaining. She kept her composure and remained focused on the book until she completed it in July of 1816, but then she wasn’t satisfied with her ending. For three more weeks she labored tirelessly over revisions of the final two chapters. Austen would not see Persuasion published during her lifetime. She put the novel aside, and in the early months of 1817 began to pen Sanditon, a novel that she would never complete. Austen died later that year in July. By December of 1817, her brother Henry wrote a “Biographical Notice of the Author” and included it with publication of a volume that consisted of both Persuasion and Northanger Abbey (a novel that had not yet been published). No one knows for sure if Austen intended to change the title from The Elliots to Persuasion or if it was Henry’s idea. Of interest is the fact the Northanger Abbey is Austen’s first completed novel, and Persuasion is her last. The novels bookend her career, and they also share the common setting of Bath for significant portions of their plots.

  Persuasion presents us with more evidence that there is a changing of the guard taking place in British society in the early nineteenth century. As the novel opens, we witness two significant changes taking place simultaneously: the first is that the Napoleonic War has just ended, and British naval officers (most of them from the lower gentry and middle class positions in society) are returning from war victorious. They are heroes, many of th
em have become exceedingly wealthy off the spoils of war, and now they are looking to settle back on land in private society. Coinciding with the return of these officers is Austen’s focus on the Elliots, a family in the gentry who can no longer afford to reside on their familial estate, Kellynch Hall. Due to medieval laws governing the ownership of property, landed estates could not be sold; however, they could be rented.

  Sir Walter Elliot, the baronet of Kellynch Hall, represents a segment of titled and entitled England that is dying. Since he has been unable to manage prudently the affairs of his estate, he must “retrench” to Bath in order to downsize his dwelling and reduce the number of servants he and his family rely upon. As he is in need of a tenant who can afford his familial estate, he chooses a naval admiral just returning from war.

  Sir Walter is a symbol of vanity, greed, waste, extravagance, and shallowness in early nineteenth-century English society. He is a man who is incapable of taking care of himself or his estate, and he is idle. He cannot do anything other than socialize and find fault in others. In his exceeding superficiality, he looks upon himself as physically handsome and superior to most members of the human race. Accentuating his narcissism and vanity, Austen decorates his rooms with several mirrors, so he can admire himself at every turn. Austen’s novel argues that Sir Walter and his kind are on their way out. And in their place are members of the new middle class.

  Members of the growing middle class are numerous and varied, but in the case of her novel, Austen is referring specifically to the heroic and newly monied officers of the navy. These men have been serving and protecting Great Britain from the scourge and terror that is Napoleon’s France. They are a new breed of gentleman. When they make their return to land, they are welcomed with open arms by a grateful society. And since many of them have made a great deal of money during the war, they can now mingle with the elite in English society. They are invited to the balls in London and Bath, and they are desirable prizes themselves on the marriage market. They may not be landed, but they are loaded. In their earlier days, they went off to war like William Price in the pages of Mansfield Park—moneyless, but proud, optimistic, and dashing in their new uniforms. Now Austen manages to capture the precise moment when they return from war with the value of their social stock just soaring. And as they reach land, many of them are looking for brides.

  We can contrast this depiction of naval officers in Persuasion with depictions of the navy in Mansfield Park where Mr. Price and Admiral Crawford are dark and suspicious characters. These depictions are from the time between the wars with America and the Napoleonic War—a time when the navy was in a depressed state. When we contrast the two depictions, we can see how historically accurate Austen’s representation of the navy is, drawing on her knowledge of the naval life gleaned from her two brothers’ successful careers. When Fanny Price sees William off to war looking smashing in his new uniform, we can sense that brighter days are ahead for the navy. Now in Persuasion, that vision is realized.

  The light and dark representations of naval officers that Austen provides in Persuasion and Mansfield Park are also connected to the tropes of the Romantic and Byronic heroes that were conceived during Austen’s lifetime by Romantic authors such as Lord Byron and Percy Shelley. By definition the Romantic hero is a character on the margins of society—an outsider. The alienated and introspective hero fights to triumph over the forces that separate him from the mainstream. Captain Frederick Wentworth is an example of the Romantic hero type. Before his luck in war, he was, according to Austen, a “nobody.” He was barred admittance into polite social circles. However, in the end he triumphs and is able to transcend that social divide.

  The Byronic hero type (a term that refers to characters created by Lord Byron) differs from the Romantic hero in that these characters are more significantly flawed. The Byronic hero is suffering from some unnamed secret sin in his past. He is darker than the Romantic hero and potentially not redeemable. He has the quality of the bad boy or troublemaker about him. In Mr. Price and Admiral Crawford of Mansfield Park, Austen provides more than a hint of Byronic qualities. Even Wentworth may have a tinge of the Byronic persona about him, especially when we read between the lines.

  But Frederick Wentworth is redeemable, and the key ingredient that assists in his redemption is money. Money now has a more commanding voice in British society, and as a result, landed members of the gentry are interacting with sailors. Over the course of the preceding century, there had been a great deal of opportunism talking place in the colonial domain. We see this in Mansfield Park as Sir Thomas is in possession of a sugar plantation on the island of Antigua. War too—or victory in war—has created opportunities for many of these sailors. They may lack the landed status of the gentry, but due to the significant rise of capitalism, colonial opportunism, and the increasing importance of money, these sailors, who at one time were shunned by polite society, are now welcomed guests.

  Among those eager to welcome the victorious sailors back home are the Musgroves, a country-gentry family connected to the Elliots through Sir Walter Elliot’s youngest daughter Mary, who is married to Charles Musgrove. Although landed, the Musgroves are not a refined family. They lack both the sophistication and the condescension of the Elliots. Charles is very likable, but Mary is a hypochondriac to an extreme degree. She complains of various ailments to the point where she becomes a comedic character. Charles also has two sisters, Louisa, nineteen, and Henrietta, twenty. They are both attractive and figure into the plot as prospective partners for the dashing Captain Wentworth.

  When we investigate the title Persuasion, the social-class issues begin to come clearly into focus. The background is as follows: Eight years before the present-day action of the novel, sailor Frederick Wentworth came to visit his brother, who lived near Kellynch Hall. Having some interactions with the Elliot family, the sailor fell in love with, and proposed marriage to, Anne Elliot. Anne was in love with Wentworth, and if she could have had her own way, she would have accepted his proposal. The problem, however (and here is where the title comes in), was that Anne was persuaded by a family friend, Lady Russell, to turn down Wentworth’s proposal. Wentworth was just starting out in his career. He was not wealthy, he was not of the gentry’s status, he didn’t have great prospects, and as a sailor, he worked in a most “uncertain” profession. Lady Russell, along with the rest of the Elliot clan, rejected the idea. Feeling like there was no other option, Anne acceded to the wishes of family and friends’.

  This connection between Wentworth and Anne eight years earlier allows Austen to provide her readers with a great deal of information about the navy and the uncertain aspects of the profession. We see how important nepotism is, for example, in getting a promotion. Wentworth received his promotion due to the fact that his sister, Sophia, was married to Admiral Croft. And because a promotion was essential in putting Captain Wentworth in a position to make money during the war, he could not have done so well for himself without the family connection. Naval officers were able to earn what is called “prize money” in wartime by sacking enemy ships. The background here is that sailors received certain amounts of money by the naval administration for the value of prizes (ships) captured. As a reward to the captain of the capturing vessel and the members of his crew, they received incentive pay for defeating enemy ships, and taking enemy prisoners. All crew members received a portion of the prize money; however, captains got the lion’s share. All of this history exists as background in the pages of Austen’s novel. In fact, when Wentworth arrives on the scene in the early chapters of Persuasion, the reader discovers that he has just been “paid off,” a term used by the navy when an officer receives his prize money. This pay transforms Wentworth into a desirable prize himself on the marriage market, as war has made him into a millionaire.

  As we discover in all of Austen’s novels, her protagonists—in this case the character Anne Elliot—function as precursors of feminist characters. Although she appears for much of the novel
as a Cinderella figure, Anne is no exception. She is thoughtful, smart, and compassionate—a woman of substance, who is not bedazzled by riches and status. She differs from, say, Emma Woodhouse or Elizabeth Bennet in that she doesn’t impose her will on others in society. In Anne’s case, society’s will (or more specifically Lady Russell’s) is imposed on her. Anne looks back to the decision she failed to get right eight years earlier. However, where most of the women in the novel are entirely dependent on men, Anne is capable of acting and caring for others in a way that is not commonly seen. Anne has compassion for her impoverished, ailing former school friend Mrs. Smith, she never complains, and is not vain like her sister Elizabeth. Anne is very much alone through the pages of the novel, but she never disappears. And at moments when there are crisis situations to be dealt with, Anne rises to the occasion. She keeps her head, manages the situations, and finds resolutions. Ultimately she is valued for her resolve and is finally noticed for her selflessness. In the end, she is rewarded.

  In addition to the nascent feminist depiction of her protagonist, Austen also presents us with Sophia Croft, who is Wentworth’s married sister. During a dinner party at the Musgroves, we discover that on numerous occasions Sophia has accompanied her husband Admiral Croft to sea. When Sophia relates stories about her adventurous travels with her husband, Austen shows us a woman independent, fearless, full of adventure, and a partner (not a dependent) for her husband. Sophia’s experiences provide an extremely positive example for Anne.