Part Two: That's Not Funny!
I begin by reposting the seven points I outlined at the beginning of part one:
In Jane Austen: the Secret Radical:
I begin by reposting the seven points I outlined at the beginning of part one:
In Jane Austen: the Secret Radical:
- Dr. Helena Kelly posits that Jane Austen was a secret radical. In other words, Austen held radical views, and these views were not out in the open for everyone to see, but were covert or secret in some way.
- Because in Austen's time, writing something critical of the government or the royal family could get you in trouble with the authorities, even jailed. "[T]he Austen family lived in a country in which any criticism [my emphasis] of the status quo was seen as disloyal and dangerous." (This is overstated, and requires some qualification. We are not talking about North Korean levels of repression.)
- Kelly explains that what you may think are light-hearted, superficial, romantic comedies are in fact very dark and complicated and multi-layered with lots of hidden (secret) messages.
- And that she, Helena Kelly, has the insight to understand those messages.
- It is Kelly's understanding of the context and the times in which Austen wrote her novels, that enables Kelly to analyze and explain the novels.
- And in fact, if you think Jane Austen was a sweet, conventionally-minded spinster who wrote romantic novels, you are reading her all wrong.
- And Kelly says, if you don't want to be disabused of your false notions, don't read her book...
Not funny! I completely disagree with points 1, 4, and 5. I mostly disagree with points 2 and 3. I think it's okay to read Jane Austen for the romance, (6) but I love Austen's bubbling humour, her zinging satire, her irresistible comic muse, her descriptive powers and her unforgettable dialogue and first and always, her language. And 7 is up to you, gentle reader.
I discussed points 1, 2, 4 and 5 in part one. In part two, I will focus on 3, 4, 5 and 6.
Having discarded the main hypothesis of Kelly's book in part one, what remains is a book of typical modern literary criticism. In case younger readers are led astray by the word 'modern,' I should mention that I encountered literary criticism like this back in the late 1970's, when I was attending university. The gist of the approach is as follows – I am paraphrasing:
Reader, you don't really understand that book that you like because you are not educated enough, or enlightened enough, or as the kids say nowadays, "woke" enough, to understand it. Allow me to suck the joy right out of that book for you.
I discussed points 1, 2, 4 and 5 in part one. In part two, I will focus on 3, 4, 5 and 6.
Having discarded the main hypothesis of Kelly's book in part one, what remains is a book of typical modern literary criticism. In case younger readers are led astray by the word 'modern,' I should mention that I encountered literary criticism like this back in the late 1970's, when I was attending university. The gist of the approach is as follows – I am paraphrasing:
Reader, you don't really understand that book that you like because you are not educated enough, or enlightened enough, or as the kids say nowadays, "woke" enough, to understand it. Allow me to suck the joy right out of that book for you.
Kelly claims that she has a unique understanding of Austen denied to Austen's most fervent fans, or even Austen's relatives. And yet, she doesn't appear to comprehend that Austen's muse is a comic one. Consider the famous opening in Pride and Prejudice: "It is a truth …. this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding families, that he is considered the rightful property of some one or other of their daughters."
Kelly: "the joke is, of course, at heart entirely unfunny in a world where women, and some men too, could be owned."
The reader who laughs at Austen has not yet had the terrible news.
For Kelly, Jane Austen's romantic comedies are neither comedic nor romantic. Which raises the question, why would Austen write something that looks like a romantic comedy, albeit with a lot of tongue-in-cheek social criticism, when she really intended to write tragedy or searing social criticism? Why present someone who appears to be the romantic lead of the book, for example, Mr. Knightley in Emma, when (according to Kelly) he is really the villain, an evil, heartless man who oppresses the poor people of Highbury? As Professor John Mullan wrote: "Kelly’s eagerness to find a politically critical subtext leads her to ignore the narrative logic of the fiction." Remember how Mr. Knightley confronts Emma for being rude to Miss Bates at the Box Hill picnic. Why would Emma care, why would we care, about his disapproval if he is a villain? Why does this moment have such dramatic power? It's because Emma knows he is right--and she also realizes how much his good opinion matters to her. If it were Mr. Elton who scolded her, she would brush it off and so would we. Who cares what Mr. Elton thinks? But it is Mr. Knightley, and it does matter, and he's right. He reminds Emma that those who are better-off have a duty to be kind and forbearing to those lower on the social chain. That is, I guess, when he's not turning the local folk off the common lands.
It's like the cruise ship in the Poseidon Adventure – Kelly and similar critics turn Austen upside down and then insist that this is what she meant to do – construct a completely unbalanced, topsy-turvy piece of writing that makes no sense whatsoever structurally, emotionally or dramatically. Hey, she meant for the propeller to be above the waterline and the decks to be submerged, get it?
Kelly: "the joke is, of course, at heart entirely unfunny in a world where women, and some men too, could be owned."
The reader who laughs at Austen has not yet had the terrible news.
For Kelly, Jane Austen's romantic comedies are neither comedic nor romantic. Which raises the question, why would Austen write something that looks like a romantic comedy, albeit with a lot of tongue-in-cheek social criticism, when she really intended to write tragedy or searing social criticism? Why present someone who appears to be the romantic lead of the book, for example, Mr. Knightley in Emma, when (according to Kelly) he is really the villain, an evil, heartless man who oppresses the poor people of Highbury? As Professor John Mullan wrote: "Kelly’s eagerness to find a politically critical subtext leads her to ignore the narrative logic of the fiction." Remember how Mr. Knightley confronts Emma for being rude to Miss Bates at the Box Hill picnic. Why would Emma care, why would we care, about his disapproval if he is a villain? Why does this moment have such dramatic power? It's because Emma knows he is right--and she also realizes how much his good opinion matters to her. If it were Mr. Elton who scolded her, she would brush it off and so would we. Who cares what Mr. Elton thinks? But it is Mr. Knightley, and it does matter, and he's right. He reminds Emma that those who are better-off have a duty to be kind and forbearing to those lower on the social chain. That is, I guess, when he's not turning the local folk off the common lands.
It's like the cruise ship in the Poseidon Adventure – Kelly and similar critics turn Austen upside down and then insist that this is what she meant to do – construct a completely unbalanced, topsy-turvy piece of writing that makes no sense whatsoever structurally, emotionally or dramatically. Hey, she meant for the propeller to be above the waterline and the decks to be submerged, get it?
Sometimes Kelly sees a joke and pronounces it unfunny, sometimes she has difficulty even recognizing jokes and sarcasm in Austen.
For example, as John Mullan points out, Kelly thinks that when Willoughby shows up when Marianne is gravely ill, he is drunk. When in fact he is saying: “Yes, I am very drunk” with bitter sarcasm.
She thinks Catherine Morland doesn't understand that the adorable, witty Mr. Tilney is having fun with her in the passage below, when he tells her what will happen during her visit to Northanger Abbey:
Henry Tilney: "How fearfully will you examine the furniture of your apartment! -- And what will you discern? -- Not tables, toilettes, wardrobes, or drawers, but on one side perhaps the remains of a broken lute, on the other a ponderous chest which no efforts can open…. [The housekeeper] Dorothy, meanwhile, no less struck by your appearance, gazes on you in great agitation, and drops a few unintelligible hints. To raise your spirits, moreover, she gives you reason to suppose that the part of the abbey you inhabit is undoubtedly haunted, and informs you that you will not have a single domestic within call. With this parting cordial she curtsies off -- you listen to the sound of her receding footsteps as long as the last echo can reach you -- and when, with fainting spirits, you attempt to fasten your door, you discover, with increased alarm, that it has no lock."
Catherine Morland: "Oh! Mr. Tilney, how frightful! -- This is just like a book! -- But it cannot really happen to me. I am sure your housekeeper is not really Dorothy. -- Well, what then?"
Kelly says that the reference to Dorothy "sails over [Catherine's] head." What do you think?
"Catherine either hasn't read more than half of a Gothic novel, or if she has, has read it with such a breathtaking lack of attention that she might as well not have bothered." No, the exact opposite is the case. Catherine loves Gothic novels and it leads her to imagine that maybe General Tilney murdered his wife, like a villain in a novel.
Catherine's delusion about the General is the climax of the extended parody of Gothic novels contained within Northanger Abbey. In its first draft, Northanger Abbey must have been very similar to Austen's other juvenilia – a funny take off of contemporary novels. That's why Northanger Abbey, structurally, is like a house with a patched on bow window – the first half is a satire on the literary conventions of the novel ("No one who had ever seen Catherine Morland in her infancy would have supposed her born to be an heroine….") Then, after Catherine realizes she's been a fool with her gothic imaginings, it becomes a more typical love story.
And by the way, there is a novel, called The Female Quixote, which Austen admired, about a deluded heroine who thinks she's living in a land of chivalric romance. If you compare it with Northanger Abbey, you'll get a better idea of the context and intent of Austen's gothic parody. Reading an annotated edition of Northanger Abbey, like David Shapard's, would also help illuminate the text.
For example, as John Mullan points out, Kelly thinks that when Willoughby shows up when Marianne is gravely ill, he is drunk. When in fact he is saying: “Yes, I am very drunk” with bitter sarcasm.
She thinks Catherine Morland doesn't understand that the adorable, witty Mr. Tilney is having fun with her in the passage below, when he tells her what will happen during her visit to Northanger Abbey:
Henry Tilney: "How fearfully will you examine the furniture of your apartment! -- And what will you discern? -- Not tables, toilettes, wardrobes, or drawers, but on one side perhaps the remains of a broken lute, on the other a ponderous chest which no efforts can open…. [The housekeeper] Dorothy, meanwhile, no less struck by your appearance, gazes on you in great agitation, and drops a few unintelligible hints. To raise your spirits, moreover, she gives you reason to suppose that the part of the abbey you inhabit is undoubtedly haunted, and informs you that you will not have a single domestic within call. With this parting cordial she curtsies off -- you listen to the sound of her receding footsteps as long as the last echo can reach you -- and when, with fainting spirits, you attempt to fasten your door, you discover, with increased alarm, that it has no lock."
Catherine Morland: "Oh! Mr. Tilney, how frightful! -- This is just like a book! -- But it cannot really happen to me. I am sure your housekeeper is not really Dorothy. -- Well, what then?"
Kelly says that the reference to Dorothy "sails over [Catherine's] head." What do you think?
"Catherine either hasn't read more than half of a Gothic novel, or if she has, has read it with such a breathtaking lack of attention that she might as well not have bothered." No, the exact opposite is the case. Catherine loves Gothic novels and it leads her to imagine that maybe General Tilney murdered his wife, like a villain in a novel.
Catherine's delusion about the General is the climax of the extended parody of Gothic novels contained within Northanger Abbey. In its first draft, Northanger Abbey must have been very similar to Austen's other juvenilia – a funny take off of contemporary novels. That's why Northanger Abbey, structurally, is like a house with a patched on bow window – the first half is a satire on the literary conventions of the novel ("No one who had ever seen Catherine Morland in her infancy would have supposed her born to be an heroine….") Then, after Catherine realizes she's been a fool with her gothic imaginings, it becomes a more typical love story.
And by the way, there is a novel, called The Female Quixote, which Austen admired, about a deluded heroine who thinks she's living in a land of chivalric romance. If you compare it with Northanger Abbey, you'll get a better idea of the context and intent of Austen's gothic parody. Reading an annotated edition of Northanger Abbey, like David Shapard's, would also help illuminate the text.
According to Kelly, a careful reading of Pride and Prejudice will reveal that it is a serious work because there are soldiers in it, and militia, and militia were sometimes called out in Regency times to subdue rebellions. Plus: "Jane knew that military camps were anything but 'beauteous,' knew that a town full of soldiers was not a pleasant place for women – and she knew that her readers knew that too, or could guess at it."
So never mind Lydia's and Kitty's girlish giggles over men in uniform. Austen really wants us to think of England as a land under occupation.
One wonders if Kelly would react the same way to all comedy that treats serious matters with levity -- what does Kelly think about The Mikado, or The Importance of Being Ernest, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, or Duck Soup, which make light of arbitrary capital punishment, child abduction, slavery, defrauding widows, and war. I'd say that Kelly doesn't understand black humour, but she'd only accuse me of having an unconscious hidden meaning.
In Mansfield Park, Austen paints Fanny Price, entering the ball room, with her beloved cousin Edmund's chain holding her beloved brother's topaz cross, around her neck. Supposing that we care about Fanny (another question entirely) aren't we supposed to feel her little heart flutter as she combats her shyness? Do we see the warm glow in her cheek as she takes comfort in wearing the dual talismans of the two people who mean the most to her in the world? Are you feeling the love, reader? The warmth?
Kelly: "For the reader, the associations [of the chain and the cross] are, or should be, by this point in the novel, very different."
The chain does not represent love and faithful friendship -- the chain represents slavery. (Obviously).
So never mind Lydia's and Kitty's girlish giggles over men in uniform. Austen really wants us to think of England as a land under occupation.
One wonders if Kelly would react the same way to all comedy that treats serious matters with levity -- what does Kelly think about The Mikado, or The Importance of Being Ernest, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, or Duck Soup, which make light of arbitrary capital punishment, child abduction, slavery, defrauding widows, and war. I'd say that Kelly doesn't understand black humour, but she'd only accuse me of having an unconscious hidden meaning.
In Mansfield Park, Austen paints Fanny Price, entering the ball room, with her beloved cousin Edmund's chain holding her beloved brother's topaz cross, around her neck. Supposing that we care about Fanny (another question entirely) aren't we supposed to feel her little heart flutter as she combats her shyness? Do we see the warm glow in her cheek as she takes comfort in wearing the dual talismans of the two people who mean the most to her in the world? Are you feeling the love, reader? The warmth?
Kelly: "For the reader, the associations [of the chain and the cross] are, or should be, by this point in the novel, very different."
The chain does not represent love and faithful friendship -- the chain represents slavery. (Obviously).
And the cross does not represent sweet little Fanny's artless Christian faith, and the love of her brother, it represents the Church of England and we, the readers in Austen's time, are aware that the Church of England owns sugar plantations! Get it? The cross and the chain? It's dark, it's horrible, it's hanging around Fanny's neck like an albatross of guilt and complicity. Let's dance!
So, does Dr. Kelly think people in Austen's time thought about slavery every time they saw a lady wearing a crucifix around her neck, or just in this instance? Would they only think about slavery if the cross was held by a chain, rather than say, a string of pearls?
If the association was vivid, clear, and unavoidable to Austen's contemporaries, would wearing a cross be taken as a sign that the wearer is protesting slavery or does it mean she is complicit in the continuation of slavery? [Update: I rant a bit more about this in this post, and compare Kelly's hypothesis to another hypothesis about the meaning of the cross and chain from another post-modern scholar.]
So, does Dr. Kelly think people in Austen's time thought about slavery every time they saw a lady wearing a crucifix around her neck, or just in this instance? Would they only think about slavery if the cross was held by a chain, rather than say, a string of pearls?
If the association was vivid, clear, and unavoidable to Austen's contemporaries, would wearing a cross be taken as a sign that the wearer is protesting slavery or does it mean she is complicit in the continuation of slavery? [Update: I rant a bit more about this in this post, and compare Kelly's hypothesis to another hypothesis about the meaning of the cross and chain from another post-modern scholar.]
In the same way, it's not clear to me what sort of message is intended by insisting that Austen named Sir Thomas Bertram's house, the house built on riches from the toil of slaves, after Lord Mansfield, the British jurist who effectively ended slavery within the United Kingdom (not the Empire). Mansfield Park is still standing at the end of the novel, in fact it's declared to be "perfect." No-one has a "come to Jesus" moment about slavery. We aren't told that Sir Thomas freed his slaves. Yet it is widely accepted, though it is based on nothing but speculation, that Austen intended a reference to Lord Mansfield. So... what's the message, exactly? [Update: more on that question here.] [Update: much more on that question starting here.]
Let me point out some distinctions here:
Kelly is not saying this is a romantic comedy novel that I don't happen to like, because I don't happen to like Fanny and Edmund. It just didn't hit the mark for me.
Nor is she saying, Well, books that featured slaves or 13-year-old girls getting married or Jewish money lenders used to be okay in the past, but those subjects are problematic in today's world. And for some people, a book in which the main characters live off of slavery is too problematic to be read with enjoyment today. I am not going to dispute that. If you don't want to read Huck Finn, or The Merchant of Venice, or Romeo and Juliet or Mansfield Park, it's your choice. But Kelly is going even farther than that.
Kelly is saying, Austen intended for her contemporary readers to view the main characters, the ones who get married at the end of the novel -- you know, like people always do at the end of a romantic comedy -- as bad, horrible people.
And I think Kelly is quite wrong about that. She is unable to put aside her own modern points of reference - feminism, post modernism, post-colonialism and intersectionalism.
Kelly is not saying this is a romantic comedy novel that I don't happen to like, because I don't happen to like Fanny and Edmund. It just didn't hit the mark for me.
Nor is she saying, Well, books that featured slaves or 13-year-old girls getting married or Jewish money lenders used to be okay in the past, but those subjects are problematic in today's world. And for some people, a book in which the main characters live off of slavery is too problematic to be read with enjoyment today. I am not going to dispute that. If you don't want to read Huck Finn, or The Merchant of Venice, or Romeo and Juliet or Mansfield Park, it's your choice. But Kelly is going even farther than that.
Kelly is saying, Austen intended for her contemporary readers to view the main characters, the ones who get married at the end of the novel -- you know, like people always do at the end of a romantic comedy -- as bad, horrible people.
And I think Kelly is quite wrong about that. She is unable to put aside her own modern points of reference - feminism, post modernism, post-colonialism and intersectionalism.
Therefore – no surprise here -- Kelly sees sexual perversion where Austen's contemporaries would not.
Fanny Price's father is either a pedophile or a sadist or both, Yes, he's loud and uncouth, but how do we know he's something worse? Because, says Kelly, why else would his daughters want to have pocket knives? They must be for protection. (Because a little girl with a silver pocket knife can stop a big burly lieutenant of Marines).
If pocket knives were only used for fending off lecherous relations, why did Jane Austen offer to buy her sister-in-law one? Cannot Kelly visualize a world without scotch tape and cling wrap, when parcels were tied up with string and when the chief occupation of little girls was to sew and do other hand crafts? Why do the Steele sisters in Sense & Sensibility have knives as well as scissors in their work bags?
Both of the male leads in Sense & Sensibility are despicable: Edward Ferrars is nervous before he proposes to Elinor, so [he] "took up a pair of scissors that lay there, and while spoiling both them and their sheath by cutting the latter to pieces as he spoke…" This is proof that Edward is a sexual deviant, because the sheath for the scissors represents the female vagina. Colonel Brandon is the father of young Eliza, so he is both a seducer and a liar. [Update: more on Brandon here].
I think we can question whether a majority of people, then and now, would automatically associate the fumbling efforts of a girl exploring the hidden cavities of a cabinet, as being a metaphor for female masturbation.
Or even supposing that Austen had sex on her mind when she wrote that passage, how does a reference to female masturbation undergird the supposedly "real" message of Northanger Abbey, that sex with men is dangerous? Austen doesn’t write approvingly of Catherine's fumbling with the cabinet. She doesn't suggest that Catherine should be fumbling with a cabinet instead of fumbling with Mr. Tilney. [Update: it appears this fumbling/masturbation suggestion was previously advanced by scholar Darryl Jones back in 2004].
In fact, Austen is showing Catherine fumbling with a cabinet, because she is parodying gothic novels. Catherine is experiencing in real life the things that Tilney teased her about. As Freud said, sometimes a cabinet is just a cabinet.
Fanny Price's father is either a pedophile or a sadist or both, Yes, he's loud and uncouth, but how do we know he's something worse? Because, says Kelly, why else would his daughters want to have pocket knives? They must be for protection. (Because a little girl with a silver pocket knife can stop a big burly lieutenant of Marines).
If pocket knives were only used for fending off lecherous relations, why did Jane Austen offer to buy her sister-in-law one? Cannot Kelly visualize a world without scotch tape and cling wrap, when parcels were tied up with string and when the chief occupation of little girls was to sew and do other hand crafts? Why do the Steele sisters in Sense & Sensibility have knives as well as scissors in their work bags?
Both of the male leads in Sense & Sensibility are despicable: Edward Ferrars is nervous before he proposes to Elinor, so [he] "took up a pair of scissors that lay there, and while spoiling both them and their sheath by cutting the latter to pieces as he spoke…" This is proof that Edward is a sexual deviant, because the sheath for the scissors represents the female vagina. Colonel Brandon is the father of young Eliza, so he is both a seducer and a liar. [Update: more on Brandon here].
I think we can question whether a majority of people, then and now, would automatically associate the fumbling efforts of a girl exploring the hidden cavities of a cabinet, as being a metaphor for female masturbation.
Or even supposing that Austen had sex on her mind when she wrote that passage, how does a reference to female masturbation undergird the supposedly "real" message of Northanger Abbey, that sex with men is dangerous? Austen doesn’t write approvingly of Catherine's fumbling with the cabinet. She doesn't suggest that Catherine should be fumbling with a cabinet instead of fumbling with Mr. Tilney. [Update: it appears this fumbling/masturbation suggestion was previously advanced by scholar Darryl Jones back in 2004].
In fact, Austen is showing Catherine fumbling with a cabinet, because she is parodying gothic novels. Catherine is experiencing in real life the things that Tilney teased her about. As Freud said, sometimes a cabinet is just a cabinet.
And by golly, when Austen does write about sex in a symbolic fashion, when Maria Bertram and Henry Crawford escape through the locked gate in Sotherton into the park, when Maria quotes Laurence Sterne and says she feels like the starling in the cage that can't get out, are we supposed to think about throwing off the restraints of society, and sexual temptation? No, says Kelly – we're supposed to think about slavery! What a perverse reading of a justly famous passage.
In part three, we'll look at the evidence adduced by Kelly to demonstrate that Mansfield Park is really an anti-slavery tract and finish off with some other peculiarities of Jane Austen: the Secret Radical.
In part three, we'll look at the evidence adduced by Kelly to demonstrate that Mansfield Park is really an anti-slavery tract and finish off with some other peculiarities of Jane Austen: the Secret Radical.
Click here for more information about my book, A Contrary Wind: a variation on Mansfield Park.
Click here for part one of Jane Austen: the Secret Radical, a review
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