For all of you "Austenites," a slight difference of opinion:
Earlier someone posted a remark about Jane Austen not writing romances but studies of human nature that I could not agree with more. The formal classification of Austen's work is "Novel of Manners". Austen's novels are not so much about romantic love as they are about behavior in a small and very sharply defined society. She might have chosen other milieux, but we may be glad she didn't, because she knew no other mileu than the one she wrote about, the English rural gentry of the early 19th century under William IV. Austen was remarkable not only for her penetration but also for a degree of realism hitherto unknown in the English novel. Walter Scott said of "Emma" that it was of "a class of fictions which has arisen almost in our own times, and which draws the characters and incidents introduced more immediately from the current of ordinary life than was permitted by the former rules of the novel, . . . copying from nature as she really exists in the common walks of life, and presenting to the reader, instead of the splendid scenes of an imaginary world, a correct and striking representation of that which is daily taking place around him". Austen herself once wrote to a friend, deploring the lack of realism characteristic of the common stock of romantic fiction of her day, that "pictures of perfection make me sick and wicked". And in her "Plan of the Novel", she mocked the very qualities that defined the romance of that time: "there will be no mixture... the Good will be unexceptionable in every respect -- and there will be no foibles or weaknesses but with the Wicked, who will be completely depraved and infamous, hardly a resemblance of Humanity left in them". Many of her contemporary readers admired the plausibility and depiction of real life in Austen's novels, as opposed to "the sensationalism, unlikely meetings between long-lost relatives, villainous aristocratic would-be ravishers, etc." that were served up to an eager public. But I would take issue with one thing the poster said that marriage and courtship are incidental to Austen's novels. This, I believe, is untrue, because courtship and marriage are not incidental to the society she wished to analyse; rather they were, as Austens' novels reveal on every page, its almost sole preoccupation.
RJD
Richard Divozzo
Circulation Team LeaderThomas M. Cooley Law School
Grand Rapids
616 301-6850 x6932
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2 comments:
Richard,
Excellent post. I posted the original comment on Austen's works as "studies of human nature". You do take exception to my comment about courtship and marriage being "incidental" plot devices. Here, we probably don't disagree as much as you think. My wording was poor on that point. By saying "incidental" I was trying to further emphasize the point of her works not being romances....in that the "love story" was not what she wished to emphasize. You are correct about courtship and marriage being the main preoccupation of the gentry of that period - that was used as the plot device in her books for that very reason. Marrying off one's daughters, genteel women attaining a "provision" to allow them to live comfortably, and what "alliances" were formed between families was what was on everyone's minds. This is what they all talked about, and schemed about, etc., and, as a result, provided the situations that revealed the very human foibles (and strengths) of her characters.
I enjoyed Richard's post very much and concur with the main points. I also think that Jane Austen's "preoccupation," as it were, with courtship and marriage is consistent with her realistic vision of human nature. In reality, a lot of life (especially from the point of view of women) centers on marriage, not just in Edwardian society but universally. That is part of what gives Austen's books such widespread appeal. In that sense, courtship/marriage is no more incidental to Jane Austen's books than it is incidental to human life itself. After all, what is life apart from love? :-)
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