Some of you might know more about Chat GPT than I do, and some might know less. I hadn't paid much attention to the whole AI and Chat GPT thing, but recently, I had the idea of writing an advice column on how to be a good conversationalist, as though written by Mrs. Elton from Emma.
​    I thought about the various points I could put in there, such as "the more you talk about yourself, the sooner people will get to know you, and the better they will like you,"  And, "If you have relatives who live in a very grand way, be sure to work them into the conversation as often as you can."
    Then I thought, I wonder if can Chat GPT do this? So I asked it to "write an advice column as if you were Mrs. Elton in Jane Austen's novel Emma, on the topic of being a good conversationalist." Almost immediately, the writing started scrolling across the screen. Here is the result...

“Do you think me most a knave or a fool?” 
    In the previous post I discussed the possibility, floated by Austen expert Robert Morrison, that Marianne Dashwood was hiding a secret pregnancy in Sense and Sensibility. After a careful re-read of the novel, I've concluded that making Marianne pregnant contradicts the central preoccupation of the main characters as reiterated throughout the conclusion of the novel. To explain what I mean, let's start by recapping the set-up for the dramatic scene when Willoughby arrives at Cleveland, the country estate of Mrs. Jenning's daughter, late at night.
    Marianne Dashwood fell seriously ill at Cleveland on her return trip from London. Her hosts, Mr. and Mrs. Palmer, leave the house so their baby does not catch Marianne's infection. Their other house guest, Colonel Brandon, hurries off in his carriage to fetch Marianne's mother. That leaves Elinor, Mrs. Jennings, and the servants.
​     Marianne is feverish and delirious, but fortunately she pulls through and falls into a restful sleep. Once she is pronounced out of danger by the apothecary, Mrs. Jennings goes to her own room "to write letters and sleep." Elinor is too happy to sleep, so she is sitting by Marianne's bedside when she hears a carriage arrive. She summons Betsy, Mrs. Jenning's maid, to stay with Marianne and she goes downstairs. To her shock, it's Willoughby, the cad who jilted her sister. He explains he came to Cleveland to persuade Marianne and Elinor to hate him "one degree less" than they surely must "do now."  He exclaims: "Tell me honestly... do you think me most a knave or a fool?”
   Who cares if Willoughby had the opportunity to rehabilitate his character? Who cares if we “hate [him] one degree less than [we] do now”? I know I wouldn't have given him the patient hearing that Elinor did, so I didn't miss the absence of this scene in the 1995 movie. However, as I carefully re-listened to the book, I finally get what Willoughby was driving at...

CMP#142  More (Unfounded) Theories about Hidden Stories in Austen

    In an earlier post, I discussed some theories about Austen's plots which struck me as being rather far-fetched. This post and the following post is a longer response to one of those theories.
    Last year, I attended a talk by Robert Morrison, a prominent expert on Austen and the Regency. (His book, The Regency Years, is an informative and entertaining survey of the Regency period.) I was quite surprised when he floated the theory that Marianne got pregnant in Sense and Sensibility. Further, he didn't claim that this interpretation was his own take on the novel, in which case I wouldn’t raise an objection. He attributes the idea to Jane Austen--he thinks Austen hinted that Marianne got pregnant.
​    If it was worth Professor Morrison's time to devote a full lecture to this idea, it's worth my time to lay out the reasons why I disagree. And I am glad that mulling over his ideas gave me a good reason to re-read Sense and Sensibility, because I noticed things I hadn't paid any attention to before. That's mostly for my next post. Briefly, my rebuttal is: 

• The text doesn’t support the theory that Marianne got pregnant, but rather contradicts it. 
• The tenor of the times wouldn’t allow for such a book to be published, because you can't have a girl of good family have sex outside of marriage without also being explicit about the consequences which would befall her.

     The longer rebuttal is below. But first, let's look at the textual evidence in favor of the theory. The timeline of the novel doesn’t contradict the possibility that Marianne had a bun in the oven...

Clutching My Pearls is about Jane Austen and the times she lived in. Click here for the first in the series. ​

    For devoted Janeites, an interest in Jane Austen leads to an interest in learning more about her artistry and her life and times. If you are ready for some deep dives into Jane Austen, either for yourself or as a gift for a friend, there is an overwhelming number of titles to choose from. Even if you limited yourself to books with titles that start with "Jane Austen and..." you'd have enough reading to keep you busy for years. There's ....and Critical Theory, ....and the Enlightenment, ...and Literary Theory, ...and Philosophy, ...and Her Readers, ...and The State, ...and The State of the Nation, ...and Reflective Selfhood, ....and Leisure, ...and The Ethics of Life, ...and Altruism, ....and Her World, ...and Other Minds: Ordinary Language Philosophy, ...and The Reformation, ...and Performance, ...and Animals, ....and Her Art, ...and The Ethics of Description, ...and The Drama of Woman, ...and the English Landscape, ...and so on! 
   All of this reading would be pricey if you were buying the volumes, but if you are a university alumnus, you might check with them to see if you have access to their library. I've also bought a community library card from my local university. You can also speak to your local public librarian about getting inter-library loans. JASNA Canada has an online catalogue of books about Jane Austen and you can borrow from them if you are a member.
​   Here are three scholarly books that I've found worthwhile: