Complete Works of Jane Austen (216 page)
Read Complete Works of Jane Austen Online
Authors: Jane Austen
Jane Fairfax had already quitted Highbury, and was restored to the comforts of her beloved home with the Campbells. — The Mr. Churchills were also in town; and they were only waiting for November.
The intermediate month was the one fixed on, as far as they dared, by Emma and Mr. Knightley. — They had determined that their marriage ought to be concluded while John and Isabella were still at Hartfield, to allow them the fortnight’s absence in a tour to the seaside, which was the plan. — John and Isabella, and every other friend, were agreed in approving it. But Mr. Woodhouse — how was Mr. Woodhouse to be induced to consent? — he, who had never yet alluded to their marriage but as a distant event.
When first sounded on the subject, he was so miserable, that they were almost hopeless. — A second allusion, indeed, gave less pain. — He began to think it was to be, and that he could not prevent it — a very promising step of the mind on its way to resignation. Still, however, he was not happy. Nay, he appeared so much otherwise, that his daughter’s courage failed. She could not bear to see him suffering, to know him fancying himself neglected; and though her understanding almost acquiesced in the assurance of both the Mr. Knightleys, that when once the event were over, his distress would be soon over too, she hesitated — she could not proceed.
In this state of suspense they were befriended, not by any sudden illumination of Mr. Woodhouse’s mind, or any wonderful change of his nervous system, but by the operation of the same system in another way. — Mrs. Weston’s poultry-house was robbed one night of all her turkeys — evidently by the ingenuity of man. Other poultry-yards in the neighbourhood also suffered. — Pilfering was
housebreaking
to Mr. Woodhouse’s fears. — He was very uneasy; and but for the sense of his son-in-law’s protection, would have been under wretched alarm every night of his life. The strength, resolution, and presence of mind of the Mr. Knightleys, commanded his fullest dependence. While either of them protected him and his, Hartfield was safe. — But Mr. John Knightley must be in London again by the end of the first week in November.
The result of this distress was, that, with a much more voluntary, cheerful consent than his daughter had ever presumed to hope for at the moment, she was able to fix her wedding-day — and Mr. Elton was called on, within a month from the marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Martin, to join the hands of Mr. Knightley and Miss Woodhouse.
The wedding was very much like other weddings, where the parties have no taste for finery or parade; and Mrs. Elton, from the particulars detailed by her husband, thought it all extremely shabby, and very inferior to her own.—”Very little white satin, very few lace veils; a most pitiful business! — Selina would stare when she heard of it.” — But, in spite of these deficiencies, the wishes, the hopes, the confidence, the predictions of the small band of true friends who witnessed the ceremony, were fully answered in the perfect happiness of the union.
FINIS
Northanger Abbey
was finally published, in conjunction with
Persuasion,
in 1818 by John Murray. It is believed that the novel was written in the late 1790’s and revised in early 1803, shortly before Austen’s brother sold the book for ten pounds to Richard Crosby, a London publisher. However, Crosby failed to release the work and in 1809 Austen wrote to him insisting that he either publish it or she would seek to have it released by other means. Crosby responded to her by stating that there was no guaranteed timeframe for publication nor was he required to publish the work at all. He also threatened legal action if she attempted to sell the work to another publisher and wrote that he would only relinquish rights to the novel if she paid him ten pounds. It was not possible for Austen to pay that amount in 1809 and therefore the text remained ‘in limbo’ until 1816, when she asked her brother to buy the book back from Crosby. The author then made further revisions before releasing an advertisement which criticised Crosby, before she drew attention to the fact the novel had been written thirteen years earlier and as a result there would be aspects of it that appeared dated. Curiously, Austen did not publish it then and it was only released in December 1817 after she had died.
Northanger Abbey
satirises gothic novels, a particularly popular genre during the last decades of the eighteenth century. Austen makes explicit reference to
The Mysteries of Udolpho,
a successful 1794 gothic work by the widely read author Ann Radcliffe. Austen’s novel can be fairly easily interpreted in a conservative manner as a criticism of the irrational thought and excessive emotions that were politically linked to the social upheaval and violence of the French Revolution. However, there are interesting and possibly mildly subversive elements to the work, particularly in the author’s treatment of Mr Tilney and, to a lesser extent, her subtle satire of aspects of Henry’s character. An interesting facet of the work is that it is both highly critical of novels, but also contains Austen’s renowned defence of the genre at a time when novels were considered insubstantial, frivolous and intellectually and culturally inferior to poetry or history books.
The novel centres on Catherine Morland, a young woman, who Austen dryly observes possesses none of the characteristics or attributes appropriate for the staple gothic heroine. She is invited by her family’s wealthy friends to Bath and begins to attend balls and social functions. It is here that she meets the Tilney and Thorpe siblings, who greatly influence her. The character of Isabella Thorpe is Austen’s vicious satire of the friend from sentimental and gothic novels and it is she that increases Catherine’s interest in reading such books. The second half of the work follows Catherine’s stay at the Tilney’s residence,
Northanger Abbey.
The author ably and humorously invokes and then exposes the tropes of gothic fiction, while allowing Catherine to mature and develop.
The title page of the first edition
CONTENTS
ADVERTISEMENT BY THE AUTHORESS, TO NORTHANGER ABBEY
The 2007 TV adaptation
A modern portrait of Austen
ADVERTISEMENT BY THE AUTHORESS, TO NORTHANGER ABBEY
THIS little work was finished in the year 1803, and intended for immediate publication. It was disposed of to a bookseller, it was even advertised, and why the business proceeded no farther, the author has never been able to learn. That any bookseller should think it worth-while to purchase what he did not think it worth-while to publish seems extraordinary. But with this, neither the author nor the public have any other concern than as some observation is necessary upon those parts of the work which thirteen years have made comparatively obsolete. The public are entreated to bear in mind that thirteen years have passed since it was finished, many more since it was begun, and that during that period, places, manners, books, and opinions have undergone considerable changes.
CHAPTER 1
No one who had ever seen Catherine Morland in her infancy would have supposed her born to be an heroine. Her situation in life, the character of her father and mother, her own person and disposition, were all equally against her. Her father was a clergyman, without being neglected, or poor, and a very respectable man, though his name was Richard — and he had never been handsome. He had a considerable independence besides two good livings — and he was not in the least addicted to locking up his daughters. Her mother was a woman of useful plain sense, with a good temper, and, what is more remarkable, with a good constitution. She had three sons before Catherine was born; and instead of dying in bringing the latter into the world, as anybody might expect, she still lived on — lived to have six children more — to see them growing up around her, and to enjoy excellent health herself. A family of ten children will be always called a fine family, where there are heads and arms and legs enough for the number; but the Morlands had little other right to the word, for they were in general very plain, and Catherine, for many years of her life, as plain as any. She had a thin awkward figure, a sallow skin without colour, dark lank hair, and strong features — so much for her person; and not less unpropitious for heroism seemed her mind. She was fond of all boy’s plays, and greatly preferred cricket not merely to dolls, but to the more heroic enjoyments of infancy, nursing a dormouse, feeding a canary-bird, or watering a rose-bush. Indeed she had no taste for a garden; and if she gathered flowers at all, it was chiefly for the pleasure of mischief — at least so it was conjectured from her always preferring those which she was forbidden to take. Such were her propensities — her abilities were quite as extraordinary. She never could learn or understand anything before she was taught; and sometimes not even then, for she was often inattentive, and occasionally stupid. Her mother was three months in teaching her only to repeat the “Beggar’s Petition”; and after all, her next sister, Sally, could say it better than she did. Not that Catherine was always stupid — by no means; she learnt the fable of “The Hare and Many Friends” as quickly as any girl in England. Her mother wished her to learn music; and Catherine was sure she should like it, for she was very fond of tinkling the keys of the old forlorn spinnet; so, at eight years old she began. She learnt a year, and could not bear it; and Mrs. Morland, who did not insist on her daughters being accomplished in spite of incapacity or distaste, allowed her to leave off. The day which dismissed the music-master was one of the happiest of Catherine’s life. Her taste for drawing was not superior; though whenever she could obtain the outside of a letter from her mother or seize upon any other odd piece of paper, she did what she could in that way, by drawing houses and trees, hens and chickens, all very much like one another. Writing and accounts she was taught by her father; French by her mother: her proficiency in either was not remarkable, and she shirked her lessons in both whenever she could. What a strange, unaccountable character! — for with all these symptoms of profligacy at ten years old, she had neither a bad heart nor a bad temper, was seldom stubborn, scarcely ever quarrelsome, and very kind to the little ones, with few interruptions of tyranny; she was moreover noisy and wild, hated confinement and cleanliness, and loved nothing so well in the world as rolling down the green slope at the back of the house.
