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CMP#151  Mansfield as a Bit Player

9/6/2023

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​“My argument is that 'Mansfield' is a name of generic Englishness, that it is so widely found as to make singling out a reference to Lord Mansfield both untenable and only understandably popular because of its capacity to be exploited in readings of Mansfield Park that bestow upon the novel a twentieth-century political correctness.”                                                                                --   John Wilshire (link to pdf)

CMP#151   Mansfield as a Bit Player, not Symbolic Allusion
     As I've been discussing in my previous posts, one of the things that makes the "Mansfield Park-is-named-after-Lord Mansfield" theory questionable is the fact that many other novels used the name Mansfield for their characters without any evident reference to the Chief Justice much less to the issue of abolition. Here are a few more examples. 
PictureThe hero's grouchy old uncle cuts him off, and Frederic has to wander the world, pining for his sweetheart
The Heir of Montague (1796-7):
    The Heir of Montague follows one English family, the Montagues (not to be confused with the real noble family of the same name). We open with the life story of grandfather Montague, who has one son and two daughters. 
    One daughter elopes but the unsanctioned marriage ends with the early death of the lovers, leaving their son Frederic, who is the main hero. The other daughter becomes a scolding spinster. In addition to being miserable to her family, she argues about politics--the 18th century version of the culture wars. As her saucy niece Cecelia explains, “Why you know my aunt is a democrat; well, she had been descanting upon rights of man, social happiness, necessary violence, and the blessings of the revolution in France, when I interrupted her, and advised a journey thither…”
  Cecelia and her cousin Frederic are raised by her grouchy father, (the one son mentioned above) who has married a nice ladylike woman. Frederic and Cecelia do not fall in love. Although the countryside is shown as the abode of virtue in novels of this stamp, as opposed to the wicked city, here the countryside is also portrayed as being very dull and tedious for Mrs. Montague, Frederic, and Cecelia. Frederic is educated by an exceedingly long-winded vicar, Dr. Evans, who is opposed to all sorts of things, including singing in public, and warns against the many dangers lurking out there in the world to trap the innocent and unwary.
     Thanks to the plot device of a carriage accident, Frederic meets the beautiful and principled Emma Nevil, who again, despite sharing her name with a noble family, who comes from a lower social strata than the Montagues. Impediments, hardships, and separations ensue before the pair can be happily united...


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CMP#150  Two Suitors Named "Mansfield"

8/31/2023

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

CMP#150   Two Tales with Suitors Named "Mansfield" with some introductory opining
PictureLasting legacy
   Recently, I’ve been seeking out novels from Austen’s era with characters named "Mansfield." I've published a few posts about them, but I had better explain more fully what I'm up to and my reasons for doing it.
      I am exploring the assumption--well, more than an assumption, it's become an article of faith--that the name "Mansfield" in Mansfield Park is a subtle allusion to Lord Mansfield. That is, our modern scholars take it for granted that a book published 21 years after Lord Mansfield's death would inevitably make readers of that era think of the eminent British jurist. The follow-on assumption is that the top-of-mind association for that reader, at that time, was Mansfield's ruling in the Somerset v. Stewart case which effectually ended the practise of slavery on British soil.
    I think both of these assumptions can be tested, or at least prodded at a little bit.
    As to why I am interested in this question: yes, it's true that I don't think Mansfield Park is about slavery, even though it's about a family with colonial property, therefore I doubt that an allusion to Lord Mansfield is intended. But I'm also perplexed about the way that scholars of literature can make these assertions without even attempting to test them--and they can be tested. We can look for evidence to support or detract from the assertion and we can weigh possibilities. I'm perplexed when scholars share assertions about Austen's meaning that have no more substance behind them than if they had communed with her shade using a Ouija board. They make little to no attempt to test the plausibility and historicity of their assertions, which of course leaves them open to the suspicion that they simply believe what they want to believe. As an example, some confidently believe that Austen viewed marriage in the same light as slavery, and subtly conveyed this message in her novels. They want to believe Austen was a radical girl boss, not a woman who held the conventional moral and political views of her time. 
​     Questioning our assumptions starts with placing Austen's work in its time, not our time....


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CMP#149  Modern Manners and Mansfield

8/24/2023

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Clutching My Pearls is about Jane Austen and the times she lived in. The opinions are mine, but I don't claim originality. Click here for the first in the series. For more about other female writers of Austen's time, click the "Authoresses" tag in the Categories list to the right.

CMP#149   Modern Manners, part two: of Meaning and Mansfields
PictureEnglish nabob smoking a hookah
     In my last post, I gave a synopsis of an 1817 novel, Modern Manners, or a Season at Harrowgate, which featured a big cast of characters, two sets of romantic triangles, a comic subplot, misunderstanding, and moral lessons. Now I'd like to discuss some other features of interest.
      Every time I read one of these forgotten novels of the long 18th century, I make note of any references to slavery and colonialism, women's rights, and other topics of current academic interest. For example, several characters in this book have colonial wealth; most notably, Lord Fitzgerald, who came back from India with a large fortune. He intends to marry his son to an heiress with an East Indian fortune. While Lord Fitzgerald has his faults as a parent, he is not critiqued in the novel for the source of his wealth, though of course it is inferior to inheriting your wealth but a class/rank standpoint. The heiress, Elvina Dorrington, is not faulted for her Indian riches, but for her lack of sound religious principle and her "languid" and sensual character.


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CMP#148  Book Review: Modern Manners

8/17/2023

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This blog explores social attitudes in Jane Austen's time, discusses her novels, reviews forgotten 18th century novels, and throws some occasional shade at the modern academy. ​The introductory post is here.  My "six simple questions for academics" post is here.

CMP#148  Book Review: Modern Manners, or, a Season at Harrowgate (1817)
Note: I've included details  that resemble Austen, while leaving it to my clever readers to spot them.​
PictureHarrogate spa well, Wikicommons, detail
Synopsis
   Modern Manners, an 1817 novel by an anonymous authoress, starts with the marriages of the parents of our main characters. Amelia has the good luck to captivate Henry Fitzgerald, a “gentleman from the Indies” (aka a man with a colonial fortune) who all the “Mamma’s” of the neighbourhood are angling after. Amelia’s match means she goes off to live in London and mingle with the ton. Her sister Matilda marries Mr. Oswald, a respectable vicar with a small independent fortune. Matilda “sighed at the idea of… her sister [Amelia] being lost in the fashionable vortex of dissipation and vanity."  
   The years pass, the countrified Oswalds have a daughter and the city-dwelling Fitzgeralds have two sons and a daughter. Mr. Fitzgerald becomes an MP and then is elevated to the peerage; now, instead of being the wife of a nouveaux riche Indian nabob, Amelia is Lady Fitzgerald. An easy-going woman of no strong opinions, Amelia is more engaged with her morning visits and playing cards than paying attention to the education and moral upbringing of her daughter Julia.
​     The Fitzgeralds come to visit the Oswalds and their lovely, sensible, daughter Emma. Julia Fitzgerald is a social butterfly and an enthusiast for Rousseau, rugged scenery, and defying whatever it is her parents want her to do. We learn that the oldest son, Frederic, is not very attentive to his fiancée. She is Elvina Dorrington, an Indian heiress. Emma Oswald, our main heroine, is intelligent, principled, and sincerely devout, and the author struggles to make her as interesting as Elvina and Julia...  


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    About the author:

    I blog about my research into Jane Austen and her world, plus a few other interests. Welcome! My earlier posts (prior to June 2017) are about my time as a teacher of ESL in China (just click on "China" in the menu below). More about me here. 


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