The Readers Review: Literature from 1714 to 1910 discussion

Catherine learns General Tilney is no murdered, and in fact loved his wife. Isabella throws over James for Captain Tilney only to try to get James back. Catherine is thrown out of Northanger Abbey by General Tilney. And Catherine and Eleanor both get the marriage they wanted.

How did the characters change throughout the book?

How does this compare to Austen’s other works?

What are your overall thoughts?

Many of Jane Austen’s heroines, especially the younger ones, have to go through an experience of massive humiliation in order to grow into an adult, and Catherine is no exception. One thing I noticed on this reading was that she had her big revelation about her foolishness before Henry calls her out on it. At the start of vol. II, chap. 9, before he meets her outside his mother’s room, it says, “Catherine had expected to have her feelings worked, and worked they were. Astonishment and doubt first seized them; and shortly a succeeding ray of common sense added some bitter emotions of shame.” Several of Austen’s other books—Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, and Emma—have these transformational moments as well, and it is always the heroine’s own reflections that lead to change.

Humiliation is often viewed as a negative thing, something to shy away from, but it can help a person who is honest with him/herself grow. Of course, the next step from those around the humiliated person needs to be forgiveness. Henry, as befits a Christian clergyman, takes that step very gracefully, allowing Catherine to be her better self without a prolonged period of shame or pain.

Austen seems so secular that I often forget how deeply imbued she is with mainstream Christian ethical thinking. Her mind-set is so rational and far-sighted that I skate over those moments when she makes sweeping cultural assumptions about norms that can be taken for granted. The passage about “among the English, she believed, in their hearts and habits, there was a general though unequal mixture of good and bad” is one example; there are others in Emma.

That passage brings me to one thing I have been meaning to note in this discussion: her use of the term romance. What she means is very different from what we mean today in the context of fiction. To us, a romance is a novel about romantic love, its challenges and (virtually always) its happy ending. In her day, a “romance” was a novel about exotic places and/or times, with extravagantly wicked or virtuous characters in improbable situations.

I’ve blathered on enough for now. Look forward to seeing other people’s thoughts!

This was my third reading of the novel and it was well worth the effort.

Catherine’s voyage of discovery was an important part of her ‘growing up.’ She remained a seventeen year old for most of the novel and her imagination and ideas befit that time of life. The main thing that she learned was that she cannot put her trust in everyone she meets and that their superficial charm can be a mask for deceit. Her reaction to Isabella’s letter confirms the development of her insight into the motive’s of others.

‘ So much for Isabella,” she cried, “and for all our intimacy! She must think me an idiot, or she could not have written so; but perhaps this has served to make her character better known to me than mine is to her. I see what she has been about. She is a vain coquette, and her tricks have not answered. I do not believe she had ever any regard either for James or for me, and I wish I had never known her.”’

Jane Austen’s ending mirrors that of many gothic novels in the way Mr. Tilney arrives like a knight on a dashing white charger to rescue Catherine from the imprisonment of her abject misery at Fullerton. I know of some of novels of that period where the rejected/displaced lover dies of a broken heart and that could have been the fate of Catherine. Nowadays such an ending might be criticised or even turned on its head in some way, but Henry Tilney, shocked by his father’s behaviour, was finally forced into actions beyond his teasing. Could it have been the teasing that had confused Catherine about the real nature of Henry’s intentions? She certainly didn’t expect him to turn up at Fullerton.

I liked the way, however, that Catherine’s journey to enlightenment made her realise that even Henry and Eleanor will have faults. In fact she is not so pleased with the way Henry defends his brother even if he helped her brother to escape the clutches of Isabella. The General’s avaricious motives might have finally been overcome ( or was it when he heard about the £3000?) to allow the marriage but Catherine’s perceptions of him as less than sincere was another slice of experience gained. This short quote reinforced my picture of the general.

’ Enraged with almost everybody in the world but himself, he set out the next day for the abbey, where his performances have been seen.’

I did feel that the author was a little mean in continuing the humour at Catherine’s expense almost to the end with this cutting remark from Mrs. Morland. Her mother’s reaction to Henry’s proposal of marriage was….

’ “Catherine would make a sad, heedless young housekeeper to be sure,” was her mother's foreboding remark; but quick was the consolation of there being nothing like practice.’

However, the disgraceful treatment of Catherine by the general seemed to improve Henry in the way he stood up to his father and showed his true regard for her. He declined any impulse to tease Catherine whilst at Fullerton as was befitting his intentions. The difference in age and experience would no doubt need to be overcome somewhat but Catherine’s lively mind and honest endeavour can point to nothing but success at the parsonage in Woodston.

Great analysis, Trev! I’m more optimistic than most about Catherine and Henry’s chances together. For all her naïveté and foolish conflation of fiction and reality, she has a vein of common sense (no doubt derived from her parodically commonsensical mother) and she will be guided by Henry. And he has proved himself to be very kind, for all his kidding. Maybe he developed the kidding to cheer up Eleanor, who seems to have a depressive tendency, but his behavior modulates toward Catherine, as you pointed out, as his appreciation for her grows.

The jocular style of his conversation is also a relic of the eighteenth century just ending when the book was written. Wordplay, witty arguments on subjects trivial and sweeping, well-turned phrases were considered elegant accomplishments for a person in society. He is a polished gentleman, but shows a deeper, more serious side, which pleases me inordinately as a reader. I feel he will be an excellent clergyman, and Catherine will learn how to be a capable clergyman’s wife.

In this reading I really noticed Mrs. Morland with her relentless commonplace-ness. She is a brilliant cameo!

This time I read it in the annotated edition by Shapard and I highly recommend it. He is very thorough about illuminating how words have shifted in meaning and about how details of daily life illuminate the story, and he’s restrained about interpretation. I’ve read the Belknap/Harvard University Press annotated edition before and while it is gorgeous with color illustrations, the editor is one of those who has a bee in her bonnet about Henry Tilney. She even thinks he will turn into his father and be emotionally abusive to Catherine!

I, too, read the annotated edition. I also found it very helpful as to the changing meaning of words due to a different time period. It’s the second time I’ve used this edition. The first time it was very helpful in understanding such things as why travel takes so long and some of the humor that I had missed first time around.

Yes! Also all the ultra-modern fittings at the Abbey that are described in the book, that were the opposite of “gothic.” Most of those went over my head before, and they must have had Austen’s contemporaries in a constant chuckle—as well as clueing them in to how materialistic the general was!

Abigail wrote: "Yes! Also all the ultra-modern fittings at the Abbey that are described in the book, that were the opposite of “gothic.” Most of those went over my head before, and they must have had Austen’s cont..."

It’s interesting how different things stand out on each reading of a book. This time I kept noticing references to dress - even this near the end.

‘The anxieties of common life began soon to succeed to the alarms of romance. Her desire of hearing from Isabella grew every day greater. She was quite impatient to know how the Bath world went on, and how the rooms were attended; and especially was she anxious to be assured of Isabella's having matched some fine netting-cotton, on which she had left her intent; and of her continuing on the best terms with James.’

Also, in a transport museum close to where I live they have a mock up of an eighteenth century mail coach in transit and you can experience what the journey might be like. It was more like a fairground ride with all the bumping and swaying and I was quite relieved getting out after ten minutes. So I really felt for Catherine having to take that full day’s journey back home, she would have ben shaken up in more ways than one.

What a brilliant thing for a transport museum to offer! It’s true, travel was no fun—and dangerous for an unaccompanied young female. And your comments about the focus on dress have made me notice that more—a reflection of Jane Austen’s youth, or Catherine’s youth, or a comment on shallowness? In the quote you cite above, maybe the last of those three options, a lingering sign of Isabella’s bad influence.

I think one of the reasons people (including me) are so obsessive about Jane Austen is just what you say—you see something different every time you reread her novels. She’s a bottomless well.

Abigail wrote: "What a brilliant thing for a transport museum to offer! It’s true, travel was no fun—and dangerous for an unaccompanied young female. And your comments about the focus on dress have made me notice ..."

For me the constant info on dress was a great example of how limited were the lives of women

How true! That and the constant idleness, and needlework, and gossip, and trashy fiction reading. What a life!

I've read most of the other Austen books, but this was my first visit to Northanger Abbey. The way that the general kept showing interest in Catherine, I was expecting that he was going to end up proposing to her instead of Henry. It seemed less likely as her stay at Northanger continued, but I still thought something was amiss. I guess I was half-right about his courting of Catherine, just not in the way I suspected!

While I enjoyed reading this book, it is a very different experience from her other work. They all have that similar narrative wit, but the commentary was especially biting and subtle here. I don't think I would have appreciated it as much without some understanding of the time period and the tropes of that kind of novel, so I'm glad I waited to read it until now.