Book Review: Mansfield Park by Jane Austen

[olde_fashioned]

Title: Mansfield Park
by: Jane Austen
Genre: British Literature, Fiction, Classics

Mansfield Park is the most sombre of Jane Austen's works, and the one with the most prominent moral conscience. Originally published in 1814, the novel's heroine, Fanny Price, is often considered a polarizing figure. Even though others find her drippy, irritating, and boring, I find she, like Mr. Darcy, rather improve upon closer acquaintance. ;-)

This is only the second time I’ve read MP, and I did like it more this time around. Fanny is considerably more likable the second time around, but alas, Edmund is still his usual self…I confess that while I do see his merits, (taking care of Fanny more than anyone else, etc.) I am still hung up on his flaws and seemingly willful blindness about the Crawfords. Perhaps a third read will make him more palatable. ;-)



Fanny Price is probably *THE* most moral heroine I’ve ever come across, even more so than Jane Eyre and Molly Gibson. She has such an earnest desire to do what is right, without being a “goody-two-shoes” and show-off type of righteous prig, even though some seem to consider her as such. There are many proofs of her "humanity" and feelings which are all too easy to over-look. The difference is that while Fanny is not immune to temptation, she consciously chooses to do what is right, even at her own expense. The thought of doing wrong horrifies her, and I find that refreshing and something to be admired. In our modern society, we are all too often urged to do “what feels good” no matter what the consequences.

Contrast Fanny with the Crawfords. They are, without mincing words, wicked, devious, selfish, thoughtless, and callous. Mary, much more so than Henry, disgusted me, with her hot/cold/hot/cold behaviour to Edmund. No wonder the poor guy’s so confused! I think Mary’s rather confused herself… And as for Henry, how cruel to want to intentionally wound someone so innocent as Fanny! I wanted to punch him in the nose. And yet, he could have become a good man, I think, if he had married Fanny. I found myself almost wanting to give him a chance, something I’m sure JA fully intended to inflict upon her readers. ;-)

One person I found increasingly interesting was Henry Crawford. Now, let me preface this with the firm statement that I cannot stand him and I deplore his lack of moral conviction. I DO NOT like Henry Crawford. But I found myself almost liking him when he was being kind (well, sort of…) to Fanny and trying to win her over, especially in Portsmouth with her charming family.

Comments

Yup - I will wear Edmund's colors. An Austen hero cannot go unchampioned!!

[iane-grey.livejournal.com]

I agree that MP lacks the sparkling cheer that the other novels possess; Austen herself might've been in a dark place, looking at the decline of her youth. I think I simply like the darker novels (Hard Times was of course also quite shadowy).

You're right :) I cannot say precisely what makes me think Fanny was never intended to be well, liked but I have the idea from things I've read in the past.

I entirely allow you to dislike Edmund - how strange that you should call him unmanly! I don't like manly men myself, or at least not men who fall by the conventions of overt masculinity, because by and large I am myself bored with masculine things and therefore by masculine men. Probably why I never got on with Darcy (I always liked Bingley though).

I did not think you liked Crawford, but that you almost liked him. I never came near to liking him! That he would be nice to Fanny - or that anyone would - never mattered at all to me (you see now why I have no scruples in liking Edmund). But there you stand with the majority - have you ever heard that most fanfictions about MP are Fanny/Henry?

I have a quote to amuse you with (I hope you will be amused) - "In all the novels there is a note of profound seriousness. They are the sprightliest sermons ever penned, apart from Mansfield Park, which it has been smart to consider the best of the six, but which puzzles both these biographers. Occasionally "its art falters" (Nokes). "She had perhaps attempted too radical a piece of self-castigation" (Tomalin). The flaw in the book is that every man would rather marry Mary Crawford than Fanny Price, but Jane Austen forbids us that preference. It is the only one of her novels that is consequently unfilmable." I went googling and found it here (http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3724/is_199709/ai_n8778995). It's a good example of the sort of thing that exemplifies the modern attitude. I find fault with the article, but as Tomalin at least is a well credited biographer, I am inclined to think it partially viable as a perspective. I do not for a minute expect you to agree!!

Re: Yup - I will wear Edmund's colors. An Austen hero cannot go unchampioned!!

[ibmiller.livejournal.com]

I'm not actually sure Jane Austen didn't intend Fanny to be liked - some have instead said that she loved her best (they quote the "My Fanny" from the final chapter as an example of authorial tenderness). I think it's more that so few have liked her that has created a mistaken idea that Fanny was intentionally unlikeable. I certainly never found her so.