by Jane Austen
17. People often had profiles, or silhouettes, of themselves drawn; they were simple to make and cost little. There are surviving profiles of Jane Austen as well as other family members; see the facing page. At the same time, they were less attractive than regular drawings or paintings, something the Bertrams could afford, so it makes sense that they are relegated to this room.
18. The mainmast, in the center of the ship, would stick up higher than any other element. Those in the navy were often taught to sketch so they could make accurate pictures when undertaking reconnaissance missions.
19. complaisance: deference, compliance with others’ wishes.
20. exposing herself: making herself look ridiculous.
21. In other words, she fears that the personal misery she would suffer in acting is biasing her judgment of whether it is morally right to do so.
22. A workbox holds needlework supplies. A netting box holds supplies for netting, which involved forming loops around a special shuttle or netting needle in order to create fabrics of varying density. Boxes like this were very popular, due to the important place these activities held in the lives of genteel women, and were often precious objects in their own right, carefully made and elaborately decorated with expensive materials. They also usually had fitted compartments inside, each one designed to hold specific implements. Sometimes women carried their boxes with them on visits, where they could be admired for their beauty while also furnishing the tools needed for doing needlework together, a popular female social activity. In Northanger Abbey the heroine and a young lady she is visiting take out a netting box in the morning with the intention of passing the time with it.
23. familiarity: undue intimacy or intercourse.
24. The license he has particularly in mind is that involving close and continual contact between Charles Maddox, who is presumably young and unmarried, and the young women at Mansfield, especially Mary Crawford, who would be acting opposite him. At this time genteel families would hesitate to admit strangers into their home. They could meet at formal public settings like a ball, and then proceed by gradual stages to greater intimacy. Or strangers could be introduced by someone they already know well, as happened with Henry and Mary Crawford, introduced by Mrs. Grant. Through these means they could acquire, through their own acquaintance or the recommendation of someone they trusted, some assurance of a good character. This was especially crucial when it came to accepting a stranger who was a potential romantic partner, for granting such access to a bad person could lead to disastrous consequences.
25. publicity: notoriety, general knowledge.
26. George Macartney, 1st Earl Macartney, was a diplomat who during the 1790s led the first British embassy to China. It failed in opening China to greater foreign trade, but it did bring back information about China. In 1807 Sir John Barrow, who assisted Lord Macartney, published Some Account of the Public Life and a Selection from the Unpublished Writings, of the Earl of Macartney. A lengthy two-volume work, it contained Barrow’s narrative of Macartney’s career along with the latter’s own writings, including the journal he kept of his embassy to China.
27. This is Tales in Verse by George Crabbe, which appeared in 1812, the very year in which Jane Austen started writing this novel. Crabbe, who had published several previous volumes of poetry, wrote realistic stories of ordinary life. Austen was a great lover of his work; she may even have taken the name Fanny Price from a character in his Parish Register of 1807. Her nephew James Edward Austen-Leigh and her niece Caroline Austen, in their memoirs of Jane Austen, both mention her love of Crabbe, which her nephew says was “perhaps on account of a certain resemblance to herself in minute and highly finished detail.” He adds that she “would sometimes say, in jest, that, if she ever married at all, she could fancy being Mrs. Crabbe,” while her niece writes that her admiration of the poet made her take “a keen interest in finding out who he was.” This is confirmed in Austen’s letters. In one, started upon just arriving in London, she says, “I have not yet seen Mr Crabbe,” and then, a day later, she mentions going to the theater and being “particularly disappointed at seeing nothing of Mr Crabbe” (Sept. 15–16, 1813)—Crabbe was in fact at this time in London, which was not his home, and it is possible she had heard this and hoped to see him. In the following month, having learned of the recent death of Mrs. Crabbe, she writes, playing on the jest that she might marry him, “Poor woman! I will comfort him as well as I can, but I do not undertake to be good to her children. She had better not leave any” (Oct. 21, 1813). According to her niece, Jane Austen was eventually able “by diligent enquiry…to inform the rest of the family that he [Crabbe] held the Living of Trowbridge, and had recently married a second time.”
28. The Idler (1758–60) was a series of essays, principally by the leading eighteenth-century literary figure Samuel Johnson, that were very popular and often reprinted. The essays ranged from general moral reflections to satirical pictures of current life to comments on literature and writing. Jane Austen refers to Johnson several times in her letters, and echoes of his moral reflections and his satire, especially the former, can be found in her novels; for an example in this work, see this page and this page, note 21.
29. great: large. This refers only to size, not quality; “great” in the sense of “extremely good” had not appeared by this time, except within certain limited contexts.
30. establishment: arrangement.
VOLUME I, CHAPTER XVII
1. They believe he is motivated by a fear of another man acting with Mary Crawford.
2. In this scene Anhalt entreats the Baron to lay aside his class prejudice and follow the dictates of his conscience by marrying Agatha; the Baron initially refuses but is eventually persuaded.
A baron in ceremonial robes.
[From William Alexander, Picturesque Representations of the Dress and Manners of the English (London, 1813), Plate 35]
3. prosperous: fortunate, flourishing.
4. This passage presents a less attractive picture of Fanny by showing her motivated by envy and pique, though it also shows her soon struggling against those feelings. Jane Austen consistently tries to avoid idealizing her heroines. In a letter regarding the wish for ideal heroines in novels, a common phenomenon then, she declares, “pictures of perfection as you know make me sick & wicked” (March 23, 1817).
5. attended: awaited.
6. This is the expectation that Henry will marry Julia, which Mrs. Grant has already expressed. Were others to observe Henry’s flirtation with Julia they might draw similar conclusions, for in this society people are very quick to detect the possibility of matrimony. In Persuasion the hero finds that his friendliness toward an unmarried young woman has convinced almost everyone around them, including her family, that he intends to propose to her. This makes him feel honor-bound to become engaged to her if she indicates a continued interest in him. Henry is not as scrupulous, but he would wish to avoid the social censure and complications that would result from raising such an expectation with Julia, for social rules dictated that a man should not pay prolonged attention to an unmarried woman unless he had serious intentions.
7. Henry, though correct about his own feelings, is being disingenuous, for he has flirted with Julia and is intelligent and experienced enough to have discerned her interest in him.
8. She means being a member of the House of Commons representing a county (rather than a borough). Each county in Britain elected two representatives to the House, while an even larger number were elected to represent boroughs, which were much smaller than counties. Representing the county was especially prestigious, one of the highest honors a man could attain—probably why Mary repeats the phrase for emphasis. It also required greater resources, restricting it to the very wealthiest men, for a candidate needed to appeal to a larger number of electors. At the same time, he would still need to impress the electors with his personal qualities, which is why Mary laments the possession of the necessary wealth by someone like Mr. Rushwo
rth.
9. Mrs. Grant’s hope is that Sir Thomas, who is himself a member of the House of Commons, will help Mr. Rushworth attain the lesser prize of representing a borough. Many boroughs had electorates that were small, due to various restrictions on the franchise, or that consisted mostly of people dependent on a wealthy landowner. This would allow someone with sufficient funds, or personal connections and influence, to sway the electorate to support him or his favored candidate. Mrs. Grant hopes that Sir Thomas will use his influence in a nearby borough, or his connection to another person with influence, to secure a seat for Mr. Rushworth. Such use of personal influence and patronage was a standard part of political life at the time.
10. in the way of: in a favorable position for.
11. She is thinking of A Pipe of Tobacco: In Imitation of Six Several Authors (1736), by the poet Isaac Hawkins Browne. It consists of six short humorous sections, each imitating the style of a different poet and praising tobacco. The fifth, which opens with the lines quoted by Mary, imitates Alexander Pope, the leading English poet of the eighteenth century.
12. Sir Thomas is a baronet rather than a knight, but the terms were linked, as a baronet was in effect a hereditary knight; occasionally the term “knight baronet” was used to refer to baronets. Mary presumably prefers “knight” for the sake of the rhythm of the verse. She also may wish to allude to the idea of a knight as a heroic warrior who performs great deeds, a meaning that would resonate particularly because of this period’s many popular narrative poems and novels, most notably by Sir Walter Scott, involving chivalric knights of earlier times.
13. She means the articles of the marriage contract. Marriages between wealthy families were the subject of elaborate negotiations, usually involving lawyers from each family, in which the exact financial terms were settled, including how much money or other assets the bride would bring, how much money would be set aside for her either while married or after she was widowed, and what the children of the marriage would inherit.
14. Thus both Mary and Mrs. Grant have noticed the danger to Maria’s and Mr. Rushworth’s engagement posed by her attraction to Henry. But neither intends to take action, at least for now. Mary, who perceives the danger fully, is clearly unconcerned, while Mrs. Grant, who worries at the prospect, is reluctant to acknowledge the unpleasant reality or to confront her brother and so prefers to hope that everything will turn out well.
15. was used to: used to. There are other cases in Austen’s novels of this usage.
16. Julia represents another person who perceives the flirtation between Maria and Henry, but she hopes it will result in misery, which means she will not deliver a warning to anyone.
17. This harkens back to an early description of the sisters’ education, in which it is stated that “they were admirably taught” in most things, but were “entirely deficient in the less common acquirements of self-knowledge, generosity, and humility.” Later episodes have shown them displaying polished and agreeable manners, but also acting with complete selfishness on most matters.
18. His “consistency” is his adherence to his own principles. By joining in the play he has been inconsistent, but he would still be struggling with this and trying to violate his principles as little as he can.
19. Meaning she delights in her own integrity in taking great pains to save someone else money.
20. Thus three other members of the party fail even to notice anything amiss in the behavior of Maria and Henry. Since Lady Bertram hardly ever notices what does not involve herself, and Fanny, who is the keenest observer of all, is unwilling to speak up after having her earlier vague warning dismissed by Edmund, there is no one remaining to intervene.
VOLUME I, CHAPTER XVIII
1. in a regular train: proceeding in an orderly fashion.
2. The increased use of a wide array of large painted backdrops in theaters led to greater prominence of professional scene painters (see this page for an example of painted scenery). Starting in the 1770s, the names of scene painters were printed in playbills and sometimes even in the published texts of plays.
3. eclat: public display or notice.
4. behind-hand: backward, tardy.
5. Their first scene, a long one, is where their characters reconcile and express their love of each other.
6. In this sentence the author switches to expressing the collective complaints of the participants against one another.
7. Maria’s character, Agatha, has a series of long speeches in which she relates her story, including how she became pregnant out of wedlock. This would perturb Fanny, who earlier felt shock at reading of Agatha’s situation.
8. The scene calls for her to express love and tenderness toward the character played by Henry, and she would naturally act that well, if it even could be called acting. Such conduct demonstrates the dangers created by the play, for it allows Maria to behave in a manner toward Henry that prevailing social and moral rules would absolutely prohibit if she were acting in her own character.
9. Henry’s ability as an actor will reappear in a later scene in which he reads from Shakespeare. It also manifests itself throughout his conduct, for he displays an almost chameleon-like ability and inclination to adapt his behavior toward whatever situation he is in and whichever people he is trying to influence.
10. mean: inferior, undistinguished.
11. It is notable that the only two who criticize Henry’s acting are the most foolish of the participants, and both Mr. Yates and Mr. Rushworth condemn him according to their particular obsessions: the virtue of ranting when acting and the virtue of being tall.
12. forward: advanced.
13. catchword: the last word in an actor’s speech, which cues the next speaker to begin. He would need to remember the catchword of those acting opposite him to know when to speak himself.
14. In this passage Jane Austen arouses some sympathy for Mr. Rushworth, which she does not always do for her foolish and comical characters. In this case it serves the function of underlining the wrongness of Maria’s and Henry’s conduct.
15. executive part: role of executing or carrying out the task. Mrs. Norris sees herself as having the managing or directing part.
16. This is a sign of Mrs. Norris’s obtuseness, for anyone who has been around Fanny over the course of many years should have realized by now that she is intelligent. In fact, since Fanny seems to be regularly doing needlework in the drawing room, Mrs. Norris has almost certainly observed her talking while working on numerous occasions. But Mrs. Norris believes what she wants to believe—that Fanny is inferior in personal qualities as well as social position. She shows a similar blindness toward Maria, in that case refusing to believe negative truths.
17. stay: wait. She means Lady Bertram should wait until the curtain is hung to watch a rehearsal.
18. Mrs. Norris has earlier spoken of her work on the curtain, and the ways she saved money on it, so she naturally wishes to emphasize that she still managed to make it attractive. Stage curtains then were normally drawn up by festoons rather than pulled to the sides. This meant spectators could see and potentially admire them throughout the performance. For an illustration, see the preceding page.
19. In this scene Anhalt, Edmund’s character, delivers a lengthy speech that eloquently evokes the beauty and happiness of a marriage based on love.
20. absent: absentminded, inattentive.
21. These are the bars of her fire grate. As explained earlier, Mrs. Norris has stipulated that Fanny never have a fire in her room, and Fanny now feels remiss as a hostess. The bars are bright because they have long been untouched by embers or ashes.
22. against: before.
23. in the way: at hand.
24. The passage likely provoking Mary’s concern begins with a declaration by her character, Amelia, “I am in love.” She follows this with a lament that the object of her love does not love her, which leads Anhalt to say, “Who is there that would not?” and her to reply, “Would you?” His resu
lting confusion causes her first to propose teaching him about her own feelings of love, and then to declare that he has actually taught her about love and that she wishes him to do so again. When he persists in trying to change the subject, she finally proclaims, quoting from his earlier speech on the glories of married love, “Ay, I see how it is—You have no inclination to experience with me ‘the good part of matrimony:’ I am not the female, with whom you would like to go ‘hand in hand up hills, and through labyrinths.’ ” This finally forces him to admit that he does love her passionately. The social rules prevailing at this time would forbid even a man from speaking such words to a potential lover unless they were part of a proposal, and would forbid an unmarried woman from uttering them under any circumstances.