"On that event they removed to Mansfield, and the Parsonage there, which under each of its two former owners, Fanny had never been able to approach but with some painful sensation of restraint or alarm, soon grew as dear to her heart, and as thoroughly perfect in her eyes, as every thing else, within the view and patronage of Mansfield Park, had long been."
It is a curious contention that beyond and after the story told in detail by the author, life for all the characters runs a smooth course. God, so to speak, takes over.
To consider a question of method in Miss Austen's book, we should note that there are some features about Mansfield Park (and discoverable in her other novels) that we shall find greatly expanded in Bleak House (and discoverable in other novels by Dickens). This can hardly be called a direct influence of Austen upon Dickens. These features in both belong to the domain of comedy—the comedy of manners, to be exact—and are typical of the sentimental novel of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
The first feature common to both Jane Austen and Dickens is the choice of a young girl as the sifting agent—the Cinderella type, a ward, an orphan, a governess, and the like—through whom or by whom the other characters are seen.
In the second point the connection is rather peculiar and striking: Jane Austen's method of giving her dislikable, or less likable, characters some grotesque little trick of demeanor, or manner, or attitude and bringing it up every time the character appears. Two obvious examples are Mrs. Norris and monetary matters, or Lady Bertram and her pug. Miss Austen artistically introduces some variety in this approach by changes of light, so to speak, by having the changing action of the book lend some new color to this or that person's usual attitude, but on the whole these comedy characters carry their droll defects from scene to scene throughout the novel as they would in a play. We shall see that Dickens uses the same method.
The third point I wish to raise is in reference to the Portsmouth scenes. Had Dickens come before Austen, we should have said that the Price family is positively Dickensian and that the Price children tie up nicely with the child theme that runs through Bleak House.
A few of the more prominent elements of Jane Austen's style are worth mention. Her imagery is subdued. Although here and there she paints graceful word pictures with her delicate brush on a little bit of ivory (as she said herself), the imagery in relation to landscapes, gestures, colors, and so on, is very restrained. It is quite a shock to come to loud-speaking, flushed, robust Dickens after meeting delicate, dainty, pale Jane. She seldom uses comparisons by similes and metaphors. At Portsmouth the sea "dancing in its glee and dashing against the ramparts" is unusual. Infrequent, too, are such conventional or hackneyed metaphors as the drop of water in comparing the Price household with the Bertram: "and as to the little irritations, sometimes introduced by aunt Norris, they were short, they were trifling, they were as a drop of water to the ocean, compared with the ceaseless tumult of her present abode." She makes apt use of participles (such as smiling, looking, etc.) in descriptions of attitudes and gestures, or of phrases like with an arch smile, but introducing them in a parenthetical way, without he or she said, as if they were stage directions. This trick she learned from Samuel Johnson, but in Mansfield Park it is a very apt device since the whole novel resembles a play. Possibly also due to the Johnson influence is the oblique rendering of the construction and intonation of a speech in descriptive form, as in the report of Rushworth's words to Lady Bertram in chapter 6. Action and characterization proceed through dialogue or monologue. An excellent example comes in Maria's proprietorial speech as the party nears Sotherton, her future home: "Now we shall have no more rough road, Miss Crawford, our difficulties are over. The rest of the way is such as it ought to be. Mr. Rushworth has made it since he succeeded to the estate. Here begins the village. Those cottages are really a disgrace. The church spire is reckoned remarkably handsome. I am glad the church is not so close to the Great House as often happens in old places. The annoyance of the bells must be terrible. There is the parsonage; at tidy looking house, and I understand the clergyman and his wife are very decent people. Those are alms-houses, built by some of the family. To the right is the steward's house; he is a very respectable man. Now we are coming to the lodge gates; but we have nearly a mile through the park still."
Especially in dealing with Fanny's reactions, Austen uses a device that I call the knight's move, a term from chess to describe a sudden swerve to one or the other side on the board of Fanny's chequered emotions. At Sir Thomas's departure for Antigua, "Fanny's relief, and her consciousness of it, were quite equal to her cousins', but a more tender nature suggested that her feelings were ungrateful, and [knight's move:] she really grieved because she could not grieve." Before she has been invited to accompany the party to Sotherton, she keenly desires to see the avenue of trees at Sotherton before it is altered, but since it is too far for her to go, she says, "Oh! it does not signify. Whenever I do see it, [now comes the knight's swerve] you [Edmund] will tell me how it has been altered" by the discussed improvements. She will see the unaltered avenue, in short, through his recollection. When Mary Crawford remarks that her brother Henry writes very short letters from Bath, Fanny says that " 'When they are at a distance from all their family,' said Fanny [knight's move:], colouring for William's sake, 'they can write long letters.' " She is not conscious of being jealous when Edmund courts Mary, and she does not indulge in self-pity, but when Julia departs from the assignment of roles in a huff because of Henry's preference for Maria, Fanny "could not think of her as under the agitations of jealousy, [knight's move:] without great pity." When hesitating to participate in the play for considerations of truth and purity, she is "inclined to suspect [knight's move:] the truth and purity of her own scruples." She is "so glad" to accept an invitation to dine with the Grants, but at once asks herself (knight's move:) "And yet why should I be glad? for am I not certain of seeing or hearing something there to pain me?" When choosing a necklace she fancies that "there was one necklace more frequently placed before her eyes than the rest," and "she hoped in fixing on this, to be chusing [knight's move:] what Miss Crawford least wished to keep."
Prominent among the elements of Austen's style is what I like to call the special dimple achieved by furtively introducing into the sentence a bit of delicate irony between the components of a plain informative statement. I shall put in italics what I consider to be the key phrases. "Mrs. Price in her turn was injured and angry; and an answer which comprehended each sister in its bitterness, and bestowed such very disrespectful reflections on the pride of Sir Thomas, as Mrs. Norris could not possibly keep to herself, put an end to all intercourse between them for a considerable period." The narrative of the sisters continues: "Their homes were so distant, and the circles in which they moved so distinct, as almost to preclude the means of ever hearing of each other's existence during the eleven following years, or at least to make it very wonderful to Sir Thomas, that Mrs. Norris should ever have it in her power to tell them, as she now and then did in an angry voice, that Fanny had got another child." When the younger Fanny is introduced to the Bertram children, "they were too much used to company and praise, to have anything like natural shyness, and their confidence increasing from their cousin's total want of it, they were soon able to take a full survey of her face and her frock in easy indifference." The next day the two daughters "could not but hold her cheap on finding that she had but two sashes, and had never learned French; and when they perceived her to be little struck with the duet they were so good as to play, they could do no more than make her a generous present of some of their least valued toys, and leave her to herself...." Lady Bertram "was a woman who spent her days in sitting nicely dressed on a sofa, doing some long piece of needlework, of little use and no beauty, thinking more of her pug than her children...." We may call this kind of sentence the dimpled sentence, a delicately ironic dimple in the author's pale virgin cheek.
Another element is what I call the epigrammatic into
nation, a certain terse rhythm in the witty expression of a slightly paradoxical thought. This tone of voice is terse and tender, dry and yet musical, pithy but limpid and light. An example is her description of ten-year-old Fanny as she arrived at Mansfield. "She was small of her age, with no glow of complexion, nor any other striking beauty; exceedingly timid and shy, and shrinking from notice; but her air, though awkward, was not vulgar, her voice was sweet, and when she spoke, her countenance was pretty." In the early days of her arrival Fanny "had nothing worse to endure on the part of Tom, than that sort of merriment which a young man of seventeen will always think fair with a child of ten. He was just entering into life, full of spirits, and with all the liberal dispositions of an eldest son.... His kindness to his little cousin was consistent with his situation and rights: he made her some very pretty presents, and laughed at her." Although when she comes, Miss Crawford has in mind the attractions of an elder son, "to the credit of the lady it may be added, that without [Edmund] being a man of the world or an elder brother, without any of the arts of flattery or the gaieties of small talk, he began to be agreeable to her. She felt it to be so, though she had not foreseen and could hardly understand it; for he was not pleasant by any common rule, he talked no nonsense, he paid no compliments, his opinions were unbending, his attentions tranquil and simple. There was a charm, perhaps, in his sincerity, his steadiness, his integrity, which Miss Crawford might be equal to feel, though not equal to discuss with herself. She did not think very much about it, however; he pleased her for the present; she liked to have him near her; it was enough."
Style like this is not Austen's invention, nor is it even an English invention: I suspect it really comes from French literature where it is profusely represented in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Austen did not read French but got the epigrammatic rhythm from the pert, precise, and polished kind of style which was the fashion. Nevertheless, she handles it to perfection.
Style is not a tool, it is not a method, it is not a choice of words alone. Being much more than all this, style constitutes an intrinsic component or characteristic of the author's personality. Thus when we speak of style we mean an individual artist's peculiar nature, and the way it expresses itself in his artistic output. It is essential to remember that though every living person may have his or her style, it is the style peculiar to this or that individual writer of genius that is alone worth discussion. And this genius cannot express itself in a writer's literary style unless it is present in his soul. A mode of expression can be perfected by an author. It is not unusual that in the course of his literary career a writer's style becomes ever more precise and impressive, as indeed Jane Austen's did. But a writer devoid of talent cannot develop a literary style of any worth; at best it will be an artificial mechanism deliberately set together and devoid of the divine spark.
This is why I do not believe that anybody can be taught to write fiction unless he already possesses literary talent. Only in the latter case can a young author be helped to find himself, to free his language from clichés, to eliminate clumsiness, to form a habit of searching with unflinching patience for the right word, the only right word which will convey with the utmost precision the exact shade and intensity of thought. In such matters there are worse teachers than Jane Austen.
Nabokov's chronology for Mansfield Park
CHARLES DICKENS (1812-1870)
Bleak House
(1852-1853)
Nabokov's map of Great Britain locating the action of Bleak House
We are now ready to tackle Dickens. We are now ready to embrace Dickens. We are now ready to bask in Dickens. In our dealings with Jane Austen we had to make a certain effort in order to join the ladies in the drawing room. In the case of Dickens we remain at table with our tawny port. We had to find an approach to Jane Austen and her Mansfield Park. I think we did find it and did have some degree of fun with her delicate patterns, with her collection of eggshells in cotton wool. But the fun was forced. We had to slip into a certain mood; we had to focus our eyes in a certain way. Personally I dislike porcelain and the minor arts, but I have often forced myself to see some bit of precious translucent china through the eyes of an expert and have discovered a vicarious bliss in the process. Let us not forget that there are people who have devoted to Jane all their lives, their ivy-clad lives. I am sure that some readers have a better ear for Miss Austen than I have. However, I have tried to be very objective. My objective method was, among other ways, an approach through the prism of the culture that her young ladies and gentlemen had imbibed from the cool fountainhead of the eighteenth and young nineteenth centuries. We also followed Jane in her somewhat spidery manner of composition: I want to remind the reader of the central part that a rehearsal plays in the web of Mansfield Park.
With Dickens we expand. It seems to me that Jane Austen's fiction had been a charming rearrangement of old-fashioned values. In the case of Dickens the values are new. Modern authors still get drunk on his vintage. Here there is no problem of approach as with Jane Austen, no courtship, no dillydallying. We just surrender ourselves to Dickens's voice—that is all. If it were possible I would like to devote the fifty minutes of every class meeting to mute meditation, concentration, and admiration of Dickens. However, my job is to direct and rationalize those meditations, that admiration. All we have to do when reading Bleak House is to relax and let our spines take over. Although we read with our minds, the seat of artistic delight is between the shoulder blades. That little shiver behind is quite certainly the highest form of emotion that humanity has attained when evolving pure art and pure science. Let us worship the spine and its tingle. Let us be proud of our being vertebrates, for we are vertebrates tipped at the head with a divine flame. The brain only continues the spine: the wick really goes through the whole length of the candle. If we are not capable of enjoying that shiver, if we cannot enjoy literature, then let us give up the whole thing and concentrate on our comics, our videos, our books-of-the-week. But I think Dickens will prove stronger.
In discussing Bleak House we shall soon notice that the romantic plot of the novel is an illusion and is not of much artistic importance. There are better things in the book than the sad case of Lady Dedlock. We shall need some information about lawsuits in England, but otherwise it is going to be all play.
At first blush it might seem that Bleak House is a satire. Let us see. If a satire is of little aesthetic value, it does not attain its object, however worthy that object may be. On the other hand, if a satire is permeated by artistic genius, then its object is of little importance and vanishes with its times while the dazzling satire remains, for all time, as a work of art. So why speak of satire at all?
The study of the sociological or political impact of literature has to be devised mainly for those who are by temperament or education immune to the aesthetic vibrancy of authentic literature, for those who do not experience the telltale tingle between the shoulder blades. (I repeat again and again it is no use reading a book at all if you do not read it with your back.) It may be all right to contend that Dickens was eager to castigate the iniquities of Chancery. Such cases as that of Jarndyce did occur now and then in the middle of the last century although, as legal historians have shown, the bulk of our author's information on legal matters goes back to the 1820s and 1830s so that many of his targets had ceased to exist by the time Bleak House was written. But if the target is gone, let us enjoy the carved beauty of his weapon. Again, as an indictment of the aristocracy the description of the Dedlocks and their set is of no interest or importance whatsoever since our author's knowledge and notions of that set are extremely meager and crude, and as artistic achievements the Dedlocks, I am sorry to say, are as dead as doornails or door locks (the Dead locks are dead). So let us be thankful for the web and ignore the spider; let us admire the structural qualities of the crime theme and ignore the weakness of the satire and its theatrical gestures.
Finally, the sociologist may write a whole book, if h
e please, on the abuses that children underwent at a period of time that the historian will call the murky dawn of the industrial age—child labor and all that. But to be quite frank, the link of these poor children in Bleak House is not so much with social circumstances of the 1850s as with earlier times and mirrors of time. From the point of view of literary technique the connection is, rather, with the children of previous novels, the sentimental novel of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. One should read again the pages of Mansfield Park on the Price family in Portsmouth and see for oneself the quite definite artistic pedigree, the quite definite connection between Miss Austen's poor children and the poor children of Bleak House, and there are other literary sources, of course. So much for the technique. Now from the emotional point of view, here again we are hardly in the 1850s at all—we are with Dickens in his own childhood—and so once more the historical frame breaks down.
As is quite clear, the enchanter interests me more than the yarn spinner or the teacher. In the case of Dickens, this attitude seems to me to be the only way of keeping Dickens alive, above the reformer, above the penny novelette, above the sentimental trash, above the theatrical nonsense. There he shines forever on the heights of which we know the exact elevation, the outlines and the formation, and the mountain trails to get there through the fog. It is in his imagery that he is great.
Lectures on Literature Page 10