Jane Austen's Books & Adaptations discussion
This topic is about
Jane Austen And Her Times, 1775-1817
Books/Adaptations of the Month
>
June & July 2022 Group Read: Jane Austen and Her Times by G. E. Mitton
date
newest »
newest »
Mod
(EDIT: Read my further comments.)
What I found amusing is Mitton's explanation that though it was less than 100 years since JA's death (1817-1905), given the industrial revolution & scientific advances in the 19th century it was as though 200 years went by and modern readers (in the Edwardian era) no longer understand the nuances of the original text. It's funny to read this book now when it's truly been 200+ years since Jane Austen died.
Mod
James
[GEORGE]
Edward
Henry
Francis
Charles
Cassandra
Jane
Well, isn't it interesting that the mentally and physically disabled George Austen junior is (yet again) totally ignored? Maybe that's how Austens would have wanted it. As far as I've read poor George never lived with his family, his parents shoved him to some farmers to bring up out of sight. I don't think that Jane ever mentioned him in her letters. It's as if he never existed. I wonder if his siblings ever met him in person. Maybe I'll discover more about him in one of newer biographies of JA (Tomalin and Honan).
Mod
In 1869, when Mr. Austen-Leigh published his Memoir, only one or two of Jane Austen’s letters were available; but in 1882, on the death of Lady Knatchbull (née Fanny Knight [Jane Austen's niece]), the letters above referred to, which Cassandra Austen had retained, were found among her belongings, having come to her on her aunt’s death. Her son, created Lord Brabourne, therefore published these in two volumes in 1884..."
A Memoir of Jane Austen by James Edward Austen-Leigh
Letters of Jane Austen by E.H. Knatchbull-Hugessen (editor)
Mod
I wasn't as enthusiastic about the parts concerning Jane Austen herself. The author bought into the JA's family rhetoric of Jane being an unasuming meek little family-oriented country lady whose writing just sort of happened out of nowhere. There are several instances where the author implies that Jane Austen's genius was "accidental", that she was not intellectual. In short what Jane did was all instinct and she didn't know what she was doing, why she was doing it, and why it worked. It's bollocks - and the nephew (James Edward Austen-Leigh) who came up with it in the first place should have been ashamed of himself. The family wanted to retroactively re-package their aunt as an ideal meek Victorian lady. She was nothing of the sort - as a single woman who wanted to become a professional writer and aimed at making money and financially supporting herself, she didn't fit the mold.
Thankfully modern scholars debunked this insulting supposition. Jane was very intentional in her work, she worked on her novels for a long time before they were published, she re-wrote them many times, edited them, tried different things, tested them on her family to see and understand what worked and what didn't. She also wanted to earn money (oh, the shock!) - she, her sister Cassandra and their mother weren't exactly well-off after Reverend Austen's death - they were partially dependent on their brothers' "good-will" and "charity" - it was not an ideal situation. No wonder Jane wanted another source of income.
Mod
My impression of this biography is that G. E. Mitton didn't do sufficient research of Jane Austen's life. I'm not sure she looked into any primary sources other than JA's published letters. Everything else seems to be lifted from James Edward Austen-Leigh without any critical analysis. Thankfully, the majority of the book deals with the life in the Regency era in general - it's much more interesting than the rest and it's supported by quotes from a variety of contemporary works.
The book starts like this:
"Of Jane Austen’s life there is little to tell, and that little has been told more than once by writers whose relationship to her made them competent to do so. It is impossible to make even microscopic additions to the sum-total of the facts already known of that simple biography, and if by chance a few more original letters were discovered they could hardly alter the case, for in truth of her it may be said, “Story there is none to tell, sir.”
I naively thought that the author had been merely modest and such an opening served as an apology for not uncovering a plethora of new facts about Austen's life. What she was admitting though was that she believed that while family members had told Jane Austen's story there was no need to do any research or question any of what they had written (though A Memoir of JA by Edward Austen-Leigh was written more than 50 years after Austen's death).
PS: There is no bibliography. Maybe it was not required/expected in the early 20th century non-fiction.
Mod
"Mrs. Montagu, in 1750, had made bold strokes for the freedom and recognition of her sex. The epithet “blue-stocking,” which has survived with such extraordinary tenacity, was at first given, not to the clever women who attended Mrs. Montagu’s informal receptions, but to her men friends, who were allowed to come in the grey or blue worsted stockings of daily life, instead of the black silk considered de rigueur for parties. Up to this time, personal appearance and cards had been the sole resources for a leisured dame of the upper classes, and the language of gallantry was the only one considered fitting for her to hear. By Mrs. Montagu’s efforts it was gradually recognised that a woman might not only have sense herself, but might prefer it should be spoken to her; and that because the minds of women had long been left uncultivated they were not on that account unworthy of cultivation.
From Wiki:
Elizabeth Montagu (née Robinson; 2 October 1718 – 25 August 1800) was a British social reformer, patron of the arts, salonnière, literary critic and writer, who helped to organize and lead the Blue Stockings Society.
...
In London, Elizabeth began to be a celebrated hostess. She organized literary breakfasts with Gilbert West, George Lyttelton and others. By 1760, these had turned into populous evening entertainments. Card playing and strong drink were forbidden from these convocations, which came to be now known as Blue Stocking events.
By 1770, Montagu's home on Hill Street had become the premier salon in London. Samuel Johnson, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Edmund Burke, David Garrick, and Horace Walpole were all in the circle. For writers, being introduced there meant patronage, and Montagu patronized a number of authors, including Elizabeth Carter, Hannah More, Frances Burney, Anna Barbauld, Sarah Fielding, Hester Chapone, James Beattie, James Woodhouse and Anna Williams. Samuel Johnson's hostess, Hester Thrale, was also an occasional visitor to Hill Street. Among her persistent admirers was the physician Messenger Monsey. Among the Blue Stockings, Elizabeth Montagu was not the dominant personality, but she was the woman of greatest means, and it was her house, purse and power that made the society possible.
Mod
I really enjoyed the chapter on clergy. There are so many clergymen in Jane Austen's novels: Edward Ferrars, Mr Collins, Mr Grant, Edmund Bertram, Mr Elton, Charles Hayter and Henry Tilney. Sometimes they are heroes, sometimes they are comical relief. What always bugged me was that neither of them (not even the priggish Edmund) ever expressed any devotion to spreading the word of Jesus. All of them treated the position of the clergyman as a mere job, means to earn money. No vocation, no higher aims. Makes the men seem shallow and slightly off-putting. Take Edward Ferrars - no talents, no ambitions, no hobbies, hates talking in public - you could not find a less competent person to become a parson. In fact, he's good for nothing. But that made the position perfect for him, that's the reason he decides to become a clergyman - being a clergyman required almost nothing from him.
...He took Orders which, in the days when rectories were looked upon simply as “livings,” was a recognised mode of providing for a young man, whether he had any vocation for the ministry or not.
...
In the Austens’ time the status of a clergyman depended a very great deal on himself, and as the patronage of the Church was chiefly in the hands of the well-to-do lay-patrons, who bestowed the livings on their younger sons or brothers, there was very frequently a tie of relationship between the vicarage and the great house, which was sufficient to ensure the vicar’s position. In
...
At the end of the eighteenth century the Church was at its deadest, enthusiasm there was none. Torpid is the only word that fitly describes the spiritual condition of the majority of the clergy. (Secker)
...
The duties of clergymen were therefore almost as light as they chose to make them. One service on Sunday, and the Holy Communion three times yearly, at Christmas, Easter, and Whitsuntide, was considered enough. “A sacrament might easily be interposed in the long interval between Christmas and Whitsuntide, and the usual season for it, the Feast of St. Michael, is a very proper time, and if afterwards you can advance from a quarterly communion to a monthly one, I make no doubt you will.” (Secker.) Baptisms, marriages, and funerals were looked on as nuisances; the clergyman ran them together as much as possible, and often arrived at the last minute, flinging himself off his smoking horse to gabble through the service with the greatest possible speed; children were frequently buried without any service at all. The churches were for the most part damp and mouldy; there were, of course, none of the present conveniences for heating and lighting. Heavy galleries cut off the little light that struggled through the cobwebby windows. There were mouse-eaten hassocks, curtains on rods thick with dust, a general smell of mouldiness and disuse, and a cold, but ill-ventilated, atmosphere. In some old country churches there still survive the family pews, which were like small rooms, and in which the occupants could read or sleep without being seen by anyone;...
...
The church, only opened as a rule once a week, was left for the rest of the time to the bats and birds.
...
Organs were of course very uncommon at the end of the eighteenth century in country parishes, and though there might be at times a little local music, as an accompaniment, the hymns were generally drawled out without music at all.
...
The sermons were peculiarly dry and dull, and it would have taken a clever man to suck any spiritual nourishment therefrom. They were generally on points of doctrine, read without modulation; and if, as was frequently the case, the clergyman had not the energy to prepare his own, a sermon from any dreary collection sufficed. The black gown was used in the pulpit."
Mod
Moreover, parsons rarely bothered to do any of the work themselves and employed curates for a lowly pay to work in their stead.
"Livings, many of which are bad enough now, were then even worse paid; £25 a year was the ordinary stipend for a curate who did most of the work. Massey (History of England in the Reign of George II.) estimates that there were then five thousand livings under £80 a year in England; consequently pluralism [clergymen held more than one living at the same time] was oftentimes almost a necessity.
...
But though the clergy frequently left all the work to their curates, they always took care to receive the tithes themselves.
...
Hannah More gives us an account of the usual state of things in regard to non-residence— “The vicarage of Cheddar is in the gift of the Dean of Wells; the value nearly fifty pounds per annum. The incumbent is a Mr. R., who has something to do, but I cannot find out what, in the University of Oxford, where he resides. The curate lives at Wells, twelve miles distant. They have only service once a week, and there is scarcely an instance of a poor person being visited or prayed with. The living of Axbridge ... annual value is about fifty pounds. The incumbent about sixty years of age. Mr. G. is intoxicated about six times a week, and very frequently is prevented from preaching by two black eyes, honestly earned by fighting.” “We have in this neighbourhood thirteen adjoining parishes without so much as even a resident curate.” “No clergyman had resided in the parish for forty years. One rode over three miles from Wells to preach once on a Sunday, but no weekly duty was done or sick persons visited; and children were often buried without any funeral service. Eight people in the morning, and twenty in the afternoon, was a good congregation.” She evidently means that the service was sometimes held in the morning, and sometimes in the afternoon, as she says there were not two services. She also speaks of it as an exceptionally disinterested action of Dr. Kennicott that he had resigned a valuable living because his learned work would not allow him to reside in the parish."
The author points out that there had to be "better", more invested clergymen in those times, Jane Austen's father and two of her brothers were clergymen after all, yet going by contemporary reports, the disinterested money-raking lazy parsons were more prevalent.
It's also interesting what the requirements were to become a clergyman. (Un)surprisingly next to none. It was sufficient to be part of the gentry and perhaps to be able to read.
It is also striking to see how very much the taking of Orders depended upon some living to be obtained; there seems to have been no special idea of suitability, and still less of preparation, only the merest and most perfunctory examination was demanded of the candidate for Orders.
...
In an entertaining book on Jane Austen by Miss Constance Hill, published in 1902, there is a quotation from a letter anent the ordination examination of Mr. Lefroy, who married Anna, Jane’s niece. “The Bishop only asked him two questions, first if he was the son of Mrs. Lefroy of Ashe, and secondly if he had married a Miss Austen.”
.,.
It is probable that the Bishops judged a great deal more, on the whole, by the appearance and manners of the man before them, and the prospects he had of holding a living, than by his own knowledge, and in the case of a well-born, serious-minded man like Edmund Bertram there would be no difficulty whatever about his lack of divinity.
Mod
Cowper's satire on the way in which preferment is secured [Cowper was Jane Austen's favorite poet]:
“Church-ladders are not always mounted best
By learned clerks and Latinists professed.
The exalted prize demands an upward look,
Not to be found by poring on a book.
Small skill in Latin, and still less in Greek,
Is more than adequate to all I seek.
Let erudition grace him or not grace,
I give the bauble but the second place;
His wealth, fame, honours, all that I intend
Subsist and centre in one point—a friend.
A friend whate’er he studies or neglects,
Shall give him consequence, heal all defects.
His intercourse with peers and sons of peers
— There dawns the splendour of his future years;
In that bright quarter his propitious skies
Shall blush betimes, and there his glory rise.
‘Your lordship’ and ‘Your Grace,’ what school can teach
A rhetoric equal to those parts of speech?
What need of Homer’s verse or Tully’s prose,
Sweet interjections! if he learn but those?
Let reverend churls his ignorance rebuke,
Who starve upon a dog-eared pentateuch,
The parson knows enough who knows a duke.”
Pretty damning.
Jane Austen's Books & Adaptations
Books mentioned in this topic
Memoir of Jane Austen (other topics)Letters of Jane Austen (other topics)
Jane Austen And Her Times, 1775-1817 (other topics)
Jane Austen and Her Times, 1775 - 1817 by G.E. Mitton
Beyond the usual details of her life, Jane Austen and Her Times, 1775-1817 expounds upon the clergy, contemporary writers, and the navy. It also features chapters like "Society and Love-Making" and "Dress and Fashion," which are sure to delight the reader. The book, written in 1905, includes twenty-one illustrations, as well as tables and graphs.
Download for free @ Project Gutenberg: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/52622