Re: All the better, it's so boring when everyone agrees. 
Camilla Send a noteboard - 29/09/2010 09:39:25 PM
Camilla Send a noteboard - 29/09/2010 09:39:25 PM
Definitely. It is a good book. Not her best. I prefer Persuasion and Pride and Prejudice to this, and it is ranked about equally with Sense and Sensibility and Northanger Abbey. Mansfield Park and perhaps Lady Susan are the ones I rate below it. But it is a while since I have read the latter.
Agreed about the latter two, the moralizing just kills the potential both stories had. I liked Mansfield Park quite a bit in the beginning, as well, mostly because of that man and his sister with the not impeccable morality. When it turned out they'd be depicted as the bad guys and the boring, goody-two-shoes woman as the heroine, it rapidly went downhill.
Yes.
Haven't read the other two yet, but I might do so soon while I'm at it (as you may have suspected, I'm reading my parents' paperback of all seven novels, hence the reading Emma and Lady Susan after the P&P reread).
Ah. That is not the order of the one I have with all seven. It ends with Lady Susan.
I am not sure I find Emma more interesting than her other heroines. I'd have to re-read it (I am always most in sympathy with the latest heroine of Austen) to say for certain, though. I don't agree that Elizabeth does not have flaws. Quite the contrary. The book is half about her realising them, and quite a lot of emphasis in placed on it in the resolution.
Yes, pride and prejudice, I know. It doesn't quite compare, though. Elizabeth is generally a great person all-round, whose only real fault is that she goes along with the general exaggerated disapproval of Darcy - though Darcy admits later on that he was largely to blame himself for that - and because of that is too naive towards Wickham. That's about it. It's enough of a fault for some kind of regret and guilt, but it's really quite modest. I don't entirely recall all the details of S&S, but Elinor Dashwood is if anything even more virtuous, really.
Elinor, yes. But Marianne....
Now compare that to Emma's arrogance in match-making with such painful results for her friend, her bad judgement in sharing her theory about Jane Fairfax and Mr. Dixon with Frank Churchill, her pride making her treat Jane colder than she deserves, and last but not least her snide remark at Miss Bates. (Certainly, the latter was really quite modest and Mr. Knightley's sermon about it seems quite exaggerated by modern standards, but she feels awfully guilty about it and by her own standards it's a very bad thing indeed.) None of those are unforgiveable faults, of course, but I have to maintain that she really is more prone to committing errors that hurt others and having flaws than Elizabeth or Elinor. And I also like that Mr. Knightley shows his affection and feelings for her partially through his reproaches about her flaws - which seems like a more mature and adult kind of love than that in the other two books.
See, this bit irritates me a little in Emma. I balk somewhat at the idea of this wayward young woman who needs to be shown the true path to proper thinking by the much older suitor. It is there in all the novels, but it is there a little too much in Emma.
What is the theory? I am intrigued.
When Emma hears from Harriet about how Mr. Knightley had been paying so much attention to her lately, and had then gone off to London in a hurry, I thought maybe it was because Mr. Knightley was in fact her father, and had fatherly feelings for Harriet instead of romantic ones - and had gone to London to double-check with her mother, or something like that. I suppose I should've known better than to think Austen would allow Mr. Knightley to have a skeleton quite as gruesome as that in his closet, by the standards of the time anyway.
Clearly you are nuts.
I am not sure those are easily classifiable as "Austen's views". They are definitely Emma's views, but Emma's views are revised as the novel goes along, and the change points to her being wrong rather than right.
No, not really. When it is discovered near the end that Harriet isn't of noble birth after all, we get the following line: "The stain of illegitimacy, unbleached by nobleness or wealth, would have been a stain indeed." And the idea that the discovery of Harriet not being of noble birth is necessary for her to marry Robert Martin and have a perfect ending, well, that says enough, no?
As I read it that section is giving Emma's view in free indirect discourse, or even the view of society. Nailing it on Austen is very tricky. I am not saying Austen could not have it, but there is no way you can tell. Even the fact that Harriet has to be established as not of noble birth in order to be able to marry Martin only tells us that Austen is pandering to her readers, to the general view of society, distinctly avoiding being terribly provocative. No great surprise for the unmarried sister of a clergyman.
When Mrs. Elton first appears on the scene and you get Emma's reaction to her which is basically "who do you lowborn upstart think you are to come act like that in my village", I did wonder for a moment if we'd get Emma taken down a notch, whether it would turn out Mrs. Elton's claims to being of equal or higher rank would be confirmed. But it became clear quickly that it was not so, and Emma's views of her high rank are never really challenged in a way that has Austen's support.
In P&P, Elizabeth does end up marrying Mr. Darcy, but not before she has pointed out that she is of noble blood, however low, and so he is still marrying someone nominally of equal rank. So unless it's different in one of the books I haven't read yet, I think it's safe to say those really are Austen's own views. Which is entirely understandable, to be sure, as she writes about the environment she knows.
See above.
*MySmiley*
structured procrastinator
structured procrastinator
Jane Austen - Emma
- 29/09/2010 06:37:01 PM
619 Views
It has been a while since I have read the book, but I am not sure I agree on all counts.
- 29/09/2010 08:17:35 PM
586 Views
All the better, it's so boring when everyone agrees.
- 29/09/2010 09:01:09 PM
601 Views
- 29/09/2010 09:01:09 PM
601 Views
Re: All the better, it's so boring when everyone agrees.
- 29/09/2010 09:39:25 PM
581 Views
- 29/09/2010 09:39:25 PM
581 Views
Okay, fair enough, I'm talking about her view as appears in her books, there might be a difference.
- 29/09/2010 09:48:31 PM
542 Views
Pet peeve, sorry.
- 29/09/2010 10:19:03 PM
568 Views
Re: Pet peeve, sorry.
- 29/09/2010 11:24:21 PM
555 Views
Re: Pet peeve, sorry.
- 29/09/2010 11:32:50 PM
498 Views