Jane Austen (1775-1817)
There’s no much information about Austen life, mostly because her sister
Cassandra burnt or destroyed all her letters; she said Jane told so many
personal things about their family and friends that it would be indecorous to
know their content.
We do know she was born in the
rural Hampshire (or Hants), a county in the south of England, that she was the
sixth of seven children in a clergyman’s family with a big library, and that
this library had a wide variety of books, even Tom Jones or Tristram
Shandy, novels that in that period weren’t very appropriate for girls, and
less for clergyman’s daughters.
She was educated mainly at home and
only went to a boarding school for a year in Reading.
She started writing stories that
she read for the family and plays that they perform at home.
When she was 26, they moved to Bath; then, five years later, they went to live in Southampton, and three years later to Chawton, also in the same county.
She never married, althought she had a relationship with a man who died young.
Her novels narrate “the rocky road
to a young woman’s happy marriage”, and she said she needed only three or four
families to develop their plot. So, what is there in her novels?
She published Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813) and Mansfield Park (1814) anonymously. In 1817, after her death, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion were published with the name of the author.
MANSFIELD PARK
This is the story of Fanny Price,
the eldest daughter of a very poor and crowded family. But she is nine years
old when she is adopted by her rich uncle sir Thomas Bertram, of a well-to-do
family, and her living prospects change radically.
The narrative starts telling us about
the three sisters Ward. The eldest and more beautiful, although very apathetic,
indolent and trivial, marries Sir Thomas Bertram and gets a comfortable
position in the world.
The second sister marries a
clergyman, reverend Norris, who has a benefit in Sir Thomas parish, the
vicarage being very near the country house.
The youngest sister, Frances, fared
worse, because she married for love to the poor navy lieutenant Mr Price, and
so got estranged from her sisters; and, to make matters worse, he is been licensed
because of an injury and spends most of his time at home or with his friends,
but not working. The family Price, besides of being poor, is numerous. But when
Mrs Price is about having her ninth child, she asks for help to her sisters.
Mrs Norris, a busybody bossy childless woman, suggests that Sir Thomas could
adopt a Prince’s child. So Fanny got to live with sir Thomas, her wife and
their children, Tom, Edmund, Maria and Julia, all of them older than Fanny.
These children, although they have
an excellent academic education, are spoiled because of the indulgence of their
parents and their aunt Mrs Norris. Fanny, who is very shy and honest, feels a
bit uncomfortable in this house, because Sir Thomas is so serious, Mrs Norris
so bossy, Mrs Bertram and her daughters so indifferent; but in the end she gets
used to the Bertram’s family ways. The only person who shows some sympathy to
Fanny is Edmund, who wants to be a clergyman, and whom she would fall secretly in
love with.
Some years pass without any
novelty. Then, Mr Norris dies, and reverend Mr Grant and his wife comes to live
in the vicarage.
Mr Bertram has to go to Antigua to
manage his plantations because there have been some problems. While he’s away,
a friend of Tom visits the Bertrams, full of enthusiasm about reforms in the
countryside. He’s a very rich man, but not very clever. He falls in love with
Maria.
More or less at the same time,
there are two more visitors: Mary Crawford and Henry Crawford, Mrs Grant’s
step-sister and brother. There are some flirtations between Henry and Julia,
Henry and Maria (although they know she’s engaged to Mr Rushworth) and Edmund
and Mary.
After some days, another guest
arrives. It’s Mr Yates, with his head full of acting. He infects the group with
the craving of acting and theatre. And after some debate, they decide to
prepare a play to perform for all the family. But when they are rehearsing for
the last time, Sir Thomas arrives from Antigua and all is cancelled.
Now the novel changes its tone.
Until this moment, there has been a lot of action; now, it moves to a more
psychological ground. Sir Thomas has changed: he understands and loves better
Fanny, he sees he has indulged too much his daughters and his son Tom, and that
he has given too much power to Mrs Norris over his family.
Maria marries Mr Rushworth, and the
couple and Julia go to London.
Henry Crawford tries to break
Fanny’s heart, but in the end it seems that he’s fallen in love with her. He
approaches her, but she rejects all his advances, even when he helps her
brother in a promotion.
Edmund is indecisive about
proposing to Mary Crawford, because perhaps he thinks she wouldn’t be an ideal
wife for a pastor: she is trivial and wouldn’t like to be married to a
clergyman.
After her refusing Henry Crawford,
Fanny is sent for a couple of months to visit her family, and Tom fells very
ill, almost to the point of dying.
Henry Crawford, after visiting
Fanny in Portsmouth with her family and showing one more time his love, goes to
London to visit the married couple.
But we’re not going to give away
any spoiler.
So some questions can be:
Is Fanny going to stay with her
family forever? Is she going to get married to Henry Crawford? Is she going to
go back to Mansfield? Is Edmund going to get married to Mary Crawford? Is Tom
going to recover from his illness?
Mansfield Park. Volume
One. Chapter XVIII
SUMMARY
We are at the last chapter of the
first volume, and Jane Austen is going to offer us a very dramatic ending after
a very dramatic climax, so this way the readers will be anxious to follow
reading the second volume.
We have a group of people wanting
to do the rehearsal of three of the five acts of Lovers’s Vows has, so
all of them are very excited, or very nervous.
Tom, the eldest of the Bertrams,
who had given up his preference for a comedy and accepted playing a drama
instead, would perform any character, doesn’t mind which, and is very impatient
for the rehearsal.
Mr Rushworth, Maria’s fiancé, isn’t
able to learn by heart any of his speeches, and all the time needs a prompter,
and, moreover, he is very worried about his dress.
Maria is going to have a very
equivocal scene with Henry Crawford, a scene that allows them to flirt even
more: in the play, these two characters (mother and son) embrace each other. Mr
Rushworth starts being jealous. Henry Crawford is the best actor: he can play
all the characters, giving them the exact theatrical tone.
Julia, the youngest of the
Bertrams, is not playing because Henry Crawford has showed his preference for
Maria for her part, although he previously had been courting her. Another role
has been offered to her, but she has rejected them all out of spite.
Mrs Grant, the vicar’s wife, also
has a minor part.
Mr Yates, a friend of Tom, is the
man who has come to the Bertram’s home with his head full of acting, and has
persuaded the rest to pass the time preparing a play. He has the main
character, Baron Wildenhaim.
Edmund didn’t approve the idea of
acting while their father was absent faraway and perhaps in danger, but, as Tom
threatened to look for actors and actresses out of the family circle, he
decided to act himself. He is going to play the part of a clergyman (in the
real life, he himself is going to be ordained).
Miss Crawford plays Amelia, the
Baron’s daughter, a young woman who is in love with Anhalt, the clergyman her
tutor. She is who declares her love to Anhalt and persuades him to marry her;
and so there is another couple in a compromising situation.
Mrs Norris is very busy with the
curtains and the players’ clothes.
Lady Bertram is a bit anxious to
see something of the play talked about so much and which causes so much bustle.
Fanny is required by everybody: Mrs
Norris needs her help with the equipment, and the players need her to prompt
them, and as sparring to try their speeches. Even Mary Crawford and Edmund need
her as an interlocutor, a prompter and a critic.
All is now ready for the dress
rehearsal of the first three acts, and all are very impatient, but, at the last
moment, Mr Grant feels ill, and Mrs Grant has to stay at the parsonage to take
care of him, and so she won’t be able to act.
In the face of this problem, they
entreat Fanny —the only person who has always objected to the whole acting
because she thinks inappropriate being Sir Thomas away, being some very
embarrassing scenes, and being, although she doesn’t want to admit, jealous of
Mary Crawford— to take the part of Mrs Grant, or at least to read it. Fanny
refuses because she feels it isn’t right, but then the rest label her egoist,
and stubborn; even Edmund begs her.
In the end, she yields, but, just before they start, Julia makes an astonishing announcement.
QUESTIONS
What qualities must you have to be a good actor?
Henry Crawford is a very good actor. Why can this talent can be a flaw in his character, according to Fanny’s point of view?
Mr Rushworth says that Henry Crawford can’t be a good actor because is too short. How do cinema and art impose us the shape of our appearances?
Sir Thomas and Mrs Norris were thinking about the possibility that Tom, or Edmund, fall in love with her cousin Fanny. Marriage between relatives used to want permission from the religious authorities, and, in most of cultures, is a taboo. Do you think this proscription it’s something biological, or cultural?
Edmund and Mary have very different points of view about religion. According to you: can a marriage between two people of so different opinions work?
In which ways do you think plays are better than films? And films better than plays?
Why is it important (or not) for an adopted child to know their biological parents?
VOCABULARY
fret, trifling, rant, prompter, to her eye, tameness, was at little pains, deferred, catchword, forwarder, seams, trice, festoons, entreat, grate, obliged, in the aggregate, surmise, stand the brunt, had little credit with, yield