Although it seems unlikely to have changed its meaning, isn't it dangerous to assume that a contemporary dictionary definition of a word means what a user 200 years ago meant?
That's why I also included Samuel Johnson's 18th century definition too. Also, the OED does point out old / obsolete and new / contemporary meanings of words.
I think that Fanny started out as probably a sensitive child who was taken from her family without fully understanding why, was subject to the constant emotional abuse of Mrs. Norris and throughout her stay at Mansfield Park before she returned to visit her birth family at Portsmouth, was treated in many ways as little more than a servant. Her love for Edmund stemmed from the fact that he is the only member of the Mansfield family who appears to notice, understand or care at all about or for her. I do not see her as insipid because she has the strength to overcome her habits of obedience to defy even Sir Thomas when the situation is critical. Once she returns to Portsmouth, she sees herself more clearly and for the first time in the novel, develops some real agency in her life. Upon her return to Mansfield, she is integrated as a full member of the family as both she and the rest of the family have learned to appreciate her place in their lives and their place in hers. As an aside, I have always seen both Fanny and Mary Crawford as the only characters in this novel who clearly know what they do need and will not accept anything less. If Mary had married Edmund it would have been disastrous because she could not be happy in the life that he offers her, nor could he be happy in a compromise that might include either a house in town or a wife who visits her friends there as often as she probably would. Mary knows this and her actions are based on her self-awareness. Fanny doesn't know if she can ever marry Edmund (for most of the novel) but she does know that she could not be happy with Henry Crawford because even if he loves or believes that he loves her, she believes that his flirtatious ways and his need to have every female to be attracted to him would likely resurface eventually. Fanny may be somewhat less self aware than Mary but her awareness and understanding of those around her have been honed as part of her self protection in Mansfield.
I do agree with Mrs. Austen -- Fanny may have all the feels, but by and large she does absolutely nothing about them. I don't regard continuing in the sway of strong emotion as a sign of any strength or color of personality but rather a token of Fanny's weakness in the face of her own emotions. She neither suppresses them, nor acts on them. In behavior she is a yielding, ineffectual, colorless and pious little rabbit of a person, and as such is the least sympathetic, certainly the least modern, of all Austen protagonists (one can hardly call her a heroine.)
I think that Fanny's physical weaknesses were a deliberate contrast to her moral strength. Fanny also isn't passive; she just chooses her battles. She lets her aunts boss her around because there's no moral wrong there. She is a dependent and running everybody's little errands is a way of paying back that debt. But as soon as she is asked to cross a moral boundary she digs in her heels and will not budge. Fanny is probably the strongest Austen character. She has a will of iron in a body of glass.
That's a really good point - I think you're right that Fanny's physical weakness serves as a deliberate contrast to her inner strength and moral rectitude. I agree that Fanny isn't passive, and I understand exactly what you mean about Fanny choosing her battles. But to extend your point, I'm not sure that she chooses to "battle" in an active sense; I see her character more as defending herself rather than attacking others. She will not do what she believes to be wrong (and - as you say - she does so with a will of iron).
Fanny is indeed the strongest character in Austen. As Dumbledore says: it takes courage to stand up to your enemies, but even more to stand up to your friends"
@@DrOctaviaCox Fanny is also taken from the frying pan and pitched into the fire. Her own family were chaotic but Mansfield Park is peopled by truly immoral, treacherous, debauched, devious, oblivious, rapacious characters. She must be the moral center of the novel and preserve her own health and composure. It’s occurred to me that Fanny is aware of (Tolstoy’s? Chekhov’s?) dictum that unhappy families are unhappy in numerous ways but happy ones are consistent due to adherence to recognized virtues. Mansfield Park is a novel which catalogs the most common failings in good society. It’s a “don’t let this happen to you” cautionary tale.
The moment I began to love Fanny as a heroine was the line: "She'd lived with too much opposition all her life to find it charming." That was the moment where everything came together for me about her: the oppressive house she'd been brought up in and the daily neglect by her thoughtless relatives and the actual poisonous degradations of her aunt. She did what her bolder cousins didn't have the internal strength to do - deny their own temporary pleasures and the escapes afforded by men and charm and money. Jane Austen paints an amazing picture of the gap between privilege and real independence; Maria Bertram has all the advantages life can give but makes non-choices, soft choices that shatter any chance of her independence, in the end. Fanny exercises real, mindful choice in ways that the women around her do not, despite their greater advantages in life - and she sticks to that choice despite immense pressure and accusations of being willful and ungrateful.
A beautiful, and revealing, quotation Kay (re "To Fanny, however, who had known too much opposition all her life to find any charm in it"). Your comment puts me in mind of the opening of _Emma_ where the narrative voice suggests that Emma had, unlike Fanny, not experienced enough opposition: "The real evils, indeed, of Emma's situation were the power of having rather too much her own way, and a disposition to think a little too well of herself; these were the disadvantages which threatened alloy to her many enjoyments. The danger, however, was at present so unperceived, that they did not by any means rank as misfortunes with her." (Emma, ch.1)
@@rosezingleman5007you’re absolutely right. Jane made Henry love a deep and honest love. He saw in her what others, even Edmund, didn’t appreciate. He loved the way Fanny deserved to be loved. I felt bad for him. Who knows If he ever would’ve won Fanny over, but he was becoming a better person. But he couldn’t escape himself.
@@paladin1726”winning Fanny over” was his objective; and what would he do with her once she was won? She would become a version of Lady Bertram, neglected by Henry and her sensitivity to the natural world beaten down by his love of novelty. She could share nothing with him that he valued, and he had only financial security to offer her. I do think that had Henry waited for Edmund’s marriage he could have worn her down as Portsmouth was toxic to her spirits.
@@Patricia-kk8tr completely disagree. Lady Bertram was all beauty and all shallow. She was appreciated for one quality and that one quality made her a trophy wife. Chapter 30 explains the appreciation Henry felt for Fanny. This started as a simple attempt at sport, conquering the quiet prude, but for Henry, it unexpectedly changed. You see Henry without all of Henry’s layers. This is why Jane dives so deep into his background, into his thoughts. Nobody else, not even Edmund, not even Fanny, explains in depth the virtues of anyone else in this story. Nobody but Henry. Had he won her over, truly won her over, I believe he would’ve replaced the handling of his emptiness with the joy of serving Fanny. That hole in his heart would have been filled.
I have little patience with those who judge Austen’s women with no sensitivity for the precariousness of their social and financial standing. Fannie is completely reliant on others for her keep. She can not be forward the way Mary Crawford can. Her existence depends on it. Instead she HAS to remain silent while at the same time enduring incredible emotional abuse. I think Fanny is amazing. She holds out for what she believes and what she wants despite living on a precarious knife edge where to speak would be to risk ejection from the household. If that is not spirit and strength in the face of poverty, powerlessness, and abuse, what on earth is?
I think Fanny is Austen's STRONGEST heroine because she alone faces CONSEQUENCES for her values and she chooses to follow her conscience instead of going along with the opinion of others which would make her life MUCH easier. Because of her life circumstances she has nothing of her own. Everything she has is from the charity of others yet she never lets fear intimidate her into silence. Unlike Anne, Fanny is unpersuaded. Unlike Lizzie, she stands by her decisions even in the face of banishment. We have a MINUTE in P&P, right before Mr Bennett gives his "unhappy alternative" speech before we and Lizzie realize she will face zero consequences for turning down Mr Collins. So while it is brave for Lizzie to turn down safety and security contained in a proposal I think she has grown up with Mr Bennett constantly belittling Mrs Bennett for her completely rational fear of the future that Lizzie doesn't truly understand the precariousness of their position. The treatment of Fanny is more about proof that we as a society adore the adored not the underdog- despite how we like to pretend that we appreciate the finer values we really are drawn to money, beauty, fame, power and tend to ignore the stable good. Like teachers who make pets of the pretty, confident kids or how reality TV exalts Kardashians even Austen readers are attracted to the sizzle and not the steak.
I agree very much with your point about Lizzy in _P&P_ - readers are aware that there is not really any jeopardy for her. As Austen herself commented on _P&P_ just after its publication, in a letter to her sister Cassandra (29th January 1813), "The work is rather too light & bright & sparkling; it wants shade". At the time, Austen was writing _MP_ - which as you suggest has much more shade & darkness.
You say that Fanny never lets fear intimidate her into silence - I'm not sure that's entirely correct. It seems to me that she is often silent (e.g. in the scene described in the video), and other characters in the novel (and indeed many readers too) mistake this silence for passivity. But her state of silence is not a state of acceptance - as you suggest. Perhaps I would say instead that Fanny never lets her fear intimidate her into acquiescence.
I do agree that Lizzie doesn’t really face any consequences for her refusal to marry mr Collins but I think she was justified in doing so. Her position is not as precarious as Charlotte. She is still quite young,only 21 and as they often stay with the Gardiners in London, they do have prospects of moving in different society and meeting potential suitors. Although mr Bennet is irresponsible in not providing sufficiently for his children, I think he is right in allowing Lizzie to refuse mr Collins. He knows very well she will be miserable with mr Collins as he is with Mrs Bennet. Even when Lizzie tells him about her engagement to mr darcy at the end of the novel, he urges her to reconsider and marry only if she had true regard for mr darcy and not to be blinded by money and status. Even with Jane, he was fully aware of mr Bingley being a potential suitor and he therefore pays him a visit as soon as he is settled in netherfield despite not telling his family about it. We are told that he was one of the first people to wait on mr Bingley.
Given that Fanny Price sits between Lizzie Bennet and Emma Woodhouse, I like John Mullan’s comment that each of Jane Austen’s heroines is a counterpoint to the heroine in her previous book. Fanny is an introvert thrust into a situation that must emphasise the introverted nature of her character. We readers get to hear enough of her unspoken thoughts to be able to understand what she is thinking and feeling. We can see her trying to hide her strongest feelings from those around her and perhaps us; sometimes she even denies them to herself, particularly her love for Edmund and her jealousy of Mary Crawford. I think this has given rise both to the criticism that she is outwardly insipid and passive, and inwardly (Mary Cooke’s criticism) that she has insufficient moral strength. I am amused by this quote where Fanny alleges maltreatment of Edmund's mare in an attempt to cover up her jealousy of Mary Crawford. "She could not turn her eyes from the meadow; she could not help watching all that passed. At first Miss Crawford and her companion made the circuit of the field, which was not small, at a foot's pace; then, at her apparent suggestion, they rose into a canter; and to Fanny's timid nature it was most astonishing to see how well she sat. After a few minutes they stopped entirely. Edmund was close to her; he was speaking to her; he was evidently directing her management of the bridle; he had hold of her hand; she saw it, or the imagination supplied what the eye could not reach. She must not wonder at all this; what could be more natural than that Edmund should be making himself useful, and proving his good-nature by any one? She could not but think, indeed, that Mr. Crawford might as well have saved him the trouble; that it would have been particularly proper and becoming in a brother to have done it himself; but Mr. Crawford, with all his boasted good-nature, and all his coachmanship, probably knew nothing of the matter, and had no active kindness in comparison of Edmund. She began to think it rather hard upon the mare to have such double duty; if she were forgotten, the poor mare should be remembered."
Great point, and I agree - we wouldn't want Lizzy to marry Mr Collins at all! And yes, the two moments where Mr Bennet most shines as a father to Lizzy are the two you mention. My point was that Fanny Price does seem to be in jeopardy in a way that Lizzy Bennet does not (compare Mr Bennet's response to Lizzy & Collins with Sir Thomas's response to Fanny & Henry Crawford) - and this reflects a difference in the aims of _P&P_ and _MP_ as novels.
the fact that Fanny, after having had to leave her family so young (and a mother who valued boys above daughters who didn't make things the easiest to beguine with) and after living for so long with a family in which most members seemed to have an innate talented in tearing down self esteem, still manages to have genuine kindness, to avoid drowning in resentment and bitterness, and to still have a will strong enough to allow her to be true to her own conscience, is a miracle in itself, and makes her a wonderful heroine in my eyes. I understand that the plot is not as funny and exiting as some other books from Austin are, and I understand that most people have not been in situations similar to Fanny's and because of that may be annoyed and her endurance, and at all the signs that her upbringing has left on her, and would wish for her to just tell everybody off all the time, but I love her dearly, and it warms my heart to know that Jane Austen did too
Fanny is the only heroine in Austen to have the narrative voice refer affectionately to her directly (self-consciously within the text). The narrative voice remarks in the final chapter of _MP_ : " *My Fanny* , indeed, at this very time, I have the satisfaction of knowing, must have been happy in spite of everything..." (ch.48).
I loved Mansfield Park and Fanny Price. Her Aunt was the insipid one , not Fanny. Mary Crawford was most detestable and so was her brother Henry who thought way too much of himself.
I love Fanny. She's a sensitive, introverted, abused young woman in a very patriarchal and class conscious society, and though she gets pushed around all the time and is painfully aware of her dependency, she cannot be made to do something that in her opinion is wrong. She even (quietly) stands up to her formidable uncle, the one who's advise is a command - that to me is strength and even a deviation from her usual outward passivity.
She's no Jane Eyre, though. She's not that likable as she never stands up for herself, but she is definitely better than Edmund, practically saved his life and I hope he lived to appreciate the angel that he got.
I've always felt that "Mansfield Park" is the story of the reversal of the situations of the characters of Anne de Bourgh and Lizzy Bennet. I notices that many of the descriptive terms used for Anne de Bourgh are similar to the ones used for Fanny: little, sickly, quiet, prone to headaches. Fanny's view of Mary Crawford seem to me to be similar to how someone who didn't particularly like Lizzy Bennet and was jealous of her might describe her from a distance.
Ooh, fascinating idea! I have mostly read Austen's books to enjoy the humor, not to analyze them as a body of work (my English minor was concentrated in Shakespeare -- Austen was for fun!), but since finding this CZcams channel a few days ago I started thinking about Austen's approach to her heroines. Elizabeth Bennet and Elinor Dashwood seem very similar to me, except that Elizabeth isn't hoping for more from Darcy and Elinor very much hopes for more from Edward. The scenes with each couple alone in the drawing room seemed like the same scene played out two different ways. Other heroines seem like Austen explored what aspects of their personality might be emphasized if they come from different backgrounds or have different experiences. Fanny Price is outwardly described much like Anne de Bourgh, about whom we know very little beyond her mother's projections of her. I remember one high school English teacher asking what we actually know about Miss Anne de Bourgh, beyond the things her mother thinks she might have accomplished had she not been an invalid. She's pretty much there to point up how Lady Catherine sucks up all the oxygen in the room with her self-importance, and perhaps to provide a reason for the showdown between Lizzy and Lady Catherine. There's no reason for Lady Catherine to stir herself to an in-person confrontation not on her own turf without the perceived personal insult; she could socially snipe Lizzy from a distance by making sure everyone knew that Bennet girl aimed too far above her station and ruined the great lady's poor, deluded nephew. So maybe Austen wanted to explore an Ann de Bourgh-like character in a main role, without a smother-mother? Or did she want to showcase the Bertram family in all its awfulness through the eyes of a close observer who can be used for moral comparison, and a quiet invalid who isn't part of the action was a useful mechanism? There were a lot of consumptive or otherwise unhealthy young women at the time; maybe that similarity is not as significant as it seems in modern day? "Mansfield Park" is the one I've read most often, but now I feel the need to read it again! (Gotta read "Emma" again, too; only read it once, when my heart was still very much with Eliot's "Middlemarch," and I did not fully appreciate it.)
I've been saying this for months. I think that is exactly why pride and prejudice fans can have such a nasty reaction to Mansfield Park. You're completely on point here. Actually I always liked Anne de Bourgh better than Lizzy (though I don't dislike her) and I found Mansfield Park much more my sort of book than p and p.
Rather, Fanny seems like Georgiana Darcy! Remember how Elizabeth perceives Georgiana and kindly helps her and draws her out. Mary Crawford doesn't really seem to treat Fanny the same. Georgiana is timid and unsure of herself and while Fanny seems similar she is like Elizabeth in perceiving people accurately as they reveal themselves. Mary Crawford is very different from Elizabeth Bennett but I do see how their lively personalities would make them look alike. Final note: you said it's how someone would think of Elizabeth from a distance (referencing Fanny's feelings about Mary's morals and purposes). But we must remember Henry and Mary were extremely close with Mansfield park, they were intimate friends and therefore this argument of Fanny misjudging Mary from a distance without understanding her doesn't do the story accurate justice.
I think what has always made Fanny Price stand out, to me, is that she is a true introvert. It is very rare to see a heroine who is an introvert, and I guess that her introversion is what some people may interpret as her being ‘passive’. However, I would like to point out that she generally succeeded in her objectives, even when she was pressured to do something else. She didn’t want to take part in the play, so she didn’t. She didn’t want to marry.... *he whose name has vanished from my head* so she didn’t. The whole book is scenario after scenario of people trying to convince her do things she doesn’t want to do, and then her finding ways to ‘not do it’. She’s far too stubborn to be considered passive. A passive ‘weak’ person would have gone along with what the other more forceful characters wanted, but Fanny, for the most part, generally got her way, eventually. She just didn’t do it noisily as the other characters did.
Yes and one way to see it is that Fanny 'wins' at the end by almost taking on the position as the dominant woman in the household. Lady Bertram comes to rely on her advice, Lord Bertram ceases to order her around and as Edmund's wife, she is no longer ranked behind his sisters, who have disgraced themselves to their parents. She plays the long game and reverses many of the power dynamics at the start of the novel in her favour. Whether winning a place in the Bertrams' hearts was worth all that effort is another question...
@@naegrant4722 Great point. But what other winning hand other than marrying Edmund could she play? Her choices were to go back to Portsmouth, stay unmarried at Mansfield or marry Edmund. She definitely turned her very bad hand into a pretty good deal. Of the possible husbands she could have chosen- Edmund, Tom, Henry, Yates, and Rushworth I think she did the best possible win.
I agree with those who point out that Fanny is an introvert, and suffers from the general devaluation of introverts in our society. She is also a highly sensitive person (HSP) as defined by Dr. Elaine Aron: very observant, easily overwhelmed and exhausted by overstimulation from noise and bustle, with a complex inner life that she shows only to a few highly trusted loved ones (Edmund and William). HSPs are often criticized for being “weak” or “too sensitive,” when in fact they have to be very strong to live in society given the intensity with which they (we) experience sensory and emotional input. I believe an entire course on personality theory could be taught using Jane Austen’s work in lieu of case studies.
I've always read Mansfield Park as a very sly satire, not just of societal expectations but also (albeit to a lesser extent) of Austen's own prejudices. Without descending into self-parody, Fanny represents a third alternative for Regency womanhood: she is neither less nor more than she should be, neither a rebel nor completely ignorable. And yes, as you say, she has her own inner life, a quality that should not be assumed missing in anyone. As in all Austen's works, the other characters do more than an adequate job of making themselves look ridiculous next to the heroine. That this is the case even next to such a slight specimen as Fanny Price is really quite a stunning indictment. I believe Fanny is an attempt at realism, as realistically there are far more of her in the world than there are of the sparkling sort of Lizzie Bennet. Edmund is her perfect match because he is also quite dull, at times also sanctimonious and excessively prudish. In the world of Pride and Prejudice, Edmund would have been Mr. Collins, a butt of humour, not the hero. That Mary Crawford serves as a sort of anti-Lizzie further helps in the reading of Mansfield Park as a refining of Pride and Prejudice. The latter will always be more vivacious and popular, yet the former will always hew closer to life as we know it. And in terms of the quality of satire, I would actually nominate Mansfield Park as the top of the heap for its subtlety and multiple levels of insight.
Fabulous point about 'Mansfield Park' being a response to 'Pride and Prejudice' - MP was the novel Austen worked on after P&P, and was still composing when P&P was published (in January 1813). Writing about P&P to Cassandra, 4 February 1813, Austen observed that "The work is rather too light & bright & sparkling-it wants shade-". I think she took this observation into her composition of MP. Comparing Lizzy Bennet and Mary Crawford is interesting too, I think. E.g., they actually make some rather similar jokes. Perhaps we might see Mary Crawford as a Lizzy Bennet gone too far? As you say, the moral universes of the two novels are different. P&P is far more conventional in terms of conforming to the 'comedy' genre, in that there is no real sense of jeopardy for the characters (not to say that the novel doesn't make serious points too); MP has a much more sinister undercurrent of threat .
@@DrOctaviaCox Mary and Lizzie are both lively, perhaps superficially similar. But Mary has a scheming, untrustworthy side to her, as illustrated by her tricking Fanny into accepting Henry's necklace. She is far less moral. Lizzy, on the other hand, puts her love for Jane above regard for herself
when Jane is sick and she tries to get her father to keep Lydia from going to Brighton. Sometimes I imagine mixing up Austen's novel and characters. I think Lizzie might have been a good sort of friend for Fanny, just as she was for D'Arcy's sister.
I think my problem with MP and Fanny is not so much her quiet endurance, but her continued fixation throughout on Edmund. While he is certainly much better than the rest, he continually fails her throughout the book. I can understand her feelings when there is no one else to be any sort of knight for her but I would have felt better if while she was away from Mansfield she actually met someone that would have made her realize that while she will always be very fond of Edmund and love him, that there were better men out there. Her love seems conditioned on that he was the only one to show any sort kindness and consideration when she was a child in a household full of people who otherwise didn't. If it had been otherwise, had those at Mansfield been generally kindly towards her, would she still have loved Edmund as she did?
I worry about this too. Edmund repeatedly overlooks Fanny especially when it's convenient for him to do so (e.g. the horse episode), is frequently unaware of her feelings, and appears to have little interest in discovering &/or delving into her feelings. These are Edmund's words, supposedly of sympathy and comfort, to Fanny after the big scandal is revealed (he refers to their relationships with Mary and Henry Crawford): "No wonder-you must feel it-you must suffer. How a man who had once loved, could desert you! But yours-your regard was new compared with- Fanny, think of _me_ !" (ch.46). Ugh!
@@DrOctaviaCox That part which I just read recently made me mad, not so much because of the "think of me" part, but because even Edmund is still gaslighting her into thinking she loves Mr. Crawford. No matter how many times she says she doesn't love him, nobody ever takes her seriously, even after the scandal. She has so little agency in her life that it feels oppressive to read sometimes.
Fanny has a raging case of Stockholm syndrome. She doesn't go anywhere, so the only men she knows are the family and visitors to the house. Edmund is the only one of them who is nice to her and seeks her company. He brought her some ribbons and took her riding; surely that's love!!
I think it is the various aspects of everything said that amounts to the conclusion being so unsatisfactory. It isn't that she is quietly enduring, but that she emotionally is like a baby chick who once imprinted doesn't change. Her feelings for both her brother and Edmund are very similarly immature and refuse to take any changes into account. So how is the reader supposed to feel about a romance between such an unworthy self-centered male lead and an emotionally immature (however enduring) female lead? Neither of them are even aware of their faults nor are likely to correct them, the way other MCs do in Austen's books by the end. However, they will no doubt be happy- as Fanny will do everything to see that Edmund is comfortable in every way.
Literally this yes he’s perhaps the nicest in the household but that doesn’t make him a nice person in general. He’s not on her side when she needs him and I remember him getting disappointed at her just because she doesn’t want to act.
Fanny is a perfect introvert. She is shy. She prefers to talk about things, or abstract concepts (astronomy, Nature, poetry, or landscape gardening) rather than people. She has a strong internal voice, criticising what she does, and she wants to satisfy this internal voice rather than seeking the approval of others, as an extravert like Henry Crawford needs to do. She has very few friends, but is intensely loyal to them. (Later, she makes a more 'normal' friend of her sister Susan, actually taking the lead in that relationship - her character is growing). She looks beneath the surface of things. Also, she values privacy, and the chance to think her own thoughts. Making an introvert the heroine of a story was a bold move!
I really like the scene, where Fanny is talking to Mary Crawford about memory. I didn't read the book in english, so I can't give you the whole paragraph, but I found the citation: "The memory is sometimes so retentive, so serviceable, so obedient; at others, so bewildered and so weak; and at others again, so tyrannic, so beyond control!" Everthing she says shows so much intelligence and interest and somehow (for me at least) also so much love for life itself. I remember that I would have loved to know more about her thoughts on memory.
A beautiful quotation, Simone! From the same paragraph, I find this quotation quite remarkable too: "If any one faculty of our nature may be called _more_ wonderful than the rest, I do think it is memory. There seems something more speakingly incomprehensible in the powers, the failures, the inequalities of memory, than in any other of our intelligences" (ch.22). And this was before memory was even really beginning to be theorised about. Austen is SO perceptive about the human mind - and its ability to deceive the person its within (I'm struggling to find a good way to put that. The mind's host?). We might think of elements of _Persuasion_ as being, I suppose, a study in memory. We are told of Anne, for example: "No one had ever come within the Kellynch circle, who could bear a comparison with Frederick Wentworth, as he stood in her memory" (ch.4). "as he stood in her memory" - what does that really mean?
Fanny Price is one of my favorite Austen heroines. Being an introvert myself, I can sympathize with having a stronger inner dialogue, than outward wit. Though not as popular these days, I completely admire her moral fortitude.
I like Fanny a lot (my favorite is Elinor, though) and I‘m always sad when people criticize her. I read MP with my book group and many women called her passive and boring and deserving what she gets, because she doesn’t take action to better her position. I think one cannot compare a bold modern woman to Fanny. I always feel with her. She has no standing in the MP family, she is basically an a little bit better liked Jane Eyre. Somewhat part of the family, but always called upon to do chores, to help, to serve. Her only confidante is Edmund. How could she, growing up in such a role, become bold, assertive and active? It’s just not her role in the family dynamics. She has to be thankful for the fact that she is allowed to stay at MP, be educated and not be turned out to her overcrowded messy home. How can she talk back when she has no claim to anything and solely depends on the good mood of her richer relations? I like her much, because she has a good strong moral compass and sticks to it in her shy silent way. In my mind I always contrast her with Emma, the incredibly bold and active one. I don’t like the early Emma at all. In opposition to Fanny, Emma grew up with the silver spoon in her mouth and the adoring eyes of everybody on her. What does she make of it? Nothing! She is lazy (no real accomplishments and a list of books she never reads) and treats human beings and their feelings like playthings for her personal entertainment having no respect for human dignity (objectifying humans). Thank heavens she learns! In a nutshell, Fanny has very little and makes much of it, Emma has everything and nothing to show for it.
Thank you for your comment Daena. Yes, indeed - it is made clear to Fanny over and over again by many of the Bertrams that she is least and last. Take these examples from the awful Mrs Norris: * "I shall think her a very obstinate, ungrateful girl, if she does not do what her aunt and cousins wish her-very ungrateful, indeed, considering who and what she is" (ch.15) * "The nonsense and folly of people's stepping out of their rank and trying to appear above themselves, makes me think it right to give you a hint, Fanny, now that you are going into company without any of us; and I do beseech and entreat you not to be putting yourself forward, and talking and giving your opinion as if you were one of your cousins-as if you were dear Mrs. Rushworth or Julia. That will never do, believe me. Remember, wherever you are, you must be the lowest and last" (ch.23) Presumably Fanny has been on a diet of such diatribes throughout her childhood. No wonder she finds it difficult to voice her opinions externally, even if she feels them internally.
@@DrOctaviaCox wow, thank you so much for the quotes! I recommended your channel to my book group. We read all of Austen‘s major works, The Watsons, Lady Susan and are now embarking on a Brontë project. One question was if Fanny Price and Jane Eyre are somehow similar.
For all her good and admirable qualities and her inner mental dialogue, I’m afraid I am guilty of finding her rather dull and passive. Even in Persuasion, most of the book is about Anne’s inner dialogue, but there’s never a dull moment, maybe because of captain Wentworth’s continued interest in her, despite an outward appearance to the contrary. The readers feel like it’s building upto something. Also I admire Anne Elliot much more than any other Austen heroine, as she is not naturally a very bold or confident person but she grows and matures into being strong and decisive, learning from her past mistakes and never once wavering in her love or loyalty. Also she never blames others for her circumstances.
It's interesting that you say that in _Persuasion_ ( unlike in _Mansfield Park_ ) readers feel that they are building up to something. Do you think, perhaps, that's because Anne Elliot's internal dialogue shows a development in her thinking, whereas Fanny Price expresses a strong opinion internally but that viewpoint remains almost exactly the same throughout the whole novel? In that sense, Fanny's thinking is static.
Yes, I agree! Fanny is my least favorite Austen heroine, she is far too passive and timid to be a satisfying heroine. Plus the fact that she marries her cousin, (yes I know it was common back then but blech!), makes it hard to root for them to get together.
@nidhird Persuasion is my favorite of Austen's too. And I agree with you that Anne has inner strength similar to Fanny Price. But I would disagree that she was always that way. And that Persuasion deals with the notion that too much stubbornness, too much inner strength is a vice more than a virtue. Anne does give in to peer pressure and she refuses Frederick which she later rethinks. Frederick cannot forgive her the sin of being persuadable and praises Louisa Mustgrove for implacability (that she is like a hard nut), but that trait later nearly costs her life while Frederick comes to understand that Anne's being willing to let him go under his circumstances at the time and how it might have hindered his career or cost him his life to have held him to his offer of marriage was an act of true love and sacrifice on her part which he'd grossly unappreciated. Its about knowing when to bend and when to stand your ground, Anne holding her ground in the end when its called for (and not marrying Mr. Elliott) and Frederick being willing to bend and forgive the woman who had once rejected him. It's about wisdom, that you need both traits to be truly strong. The character arcs in that book are amazing. And the forgiveness in the characters is heartwarming. It gives hope. That's why I love it so much.
I can fully understand Fanny choosing to do the right thing and resenting Mary for “saving” her. If you’ve never had that friend “save” you from the attentions of others and revel in the gratitude they expect in return. I can understand Fanny in many aspects as being very human on many levels.
Indeed. Austin takes on the very complicated emotions between “frenemies”. I think that Miss Crawford sees Fanny as a rival to Edmond’s attentions and she seeks to juvenile Fanny. Thus herself appear more womanly and ready for marriage in Edmunds eyes. The frenemies theme in modern times is a common Hollywood trope.
@@DeeWaterlily I don't think Mary Crawford sees Fanny as a rival AT ALL and that is part of what makes Fanny so sad and downtrodden is that everyone never remembers or considers her! You get to see Jealous Mary when Edmund is at his friend with three sister's house and she could never be as nice to Fanny as she is if she thought she was a rival!
@@lovetolovefairytales yes, it honestly annoys me that people compare Lizzy and Emma to Mary Crawford. Emma might be the closest of the two but only on a surface level Neither would dream of wishing an elder brother dead, even joking. Neither of them would be cruel to the man they loved as Mary often is to Edmund. I don't think she thinks of Fanny as a rival, at all, she sees that Edmund loves Fanny (as a brother) and so wants to get in his good graces. That's the only reason she's friends with Fanny. And possibly the hope that Fanny will put in a good word for her
@@DeeWaterlily I don't think Mary thinks of her as a rival. She sees her as a tool, if anything. She pays zero attention to her while the Miss Bertrams are there, she only willingly accepts her as a friend when the other girls are gone. She also sees that Edmund likes Fanny and so interests herself with Fanny, much the same way she 'interested' herself in Tom's horses. She drops her like a 100 pound rock once Fanny is no longer in a position to be used by her and only rekindles their friendship to ask if Tom is dying
I have loved the character of Fanny Price and the book of Mansfield Park from the first reading. I love Fanny for many reasons, and the main one is her integrity of self. There is not another character in the novel who has that. She is true to her herself despite all the obstacles against her, especially social norms and expectations from her elders and peers. For example, the play she does not want to takes part in, she does not, even though she longs to feel a part of a group. She forces herself to do what is expected of her (at least on the outside, as Dr Cox shows). Just by being herself, she inspires comparisons with other characters and puts them in relief. She is the deep still waters to their reflections; and when we look at deep still waters it is the clear reflections that we notice and wonder at, at first. This self-effacing enables her, consciously or not, to bring into prominence the behaviours of others (I'm thinking particularly of Mrs Norris, who eventually hoists herself on her own petard). In Portsmouth, when she becomes a little freer (again when no one takes much notice of her), she is able to reflect her own needs and values, and brings a little space, a little peace, into a chaotic place. She loves deeply and faithfully where others, even readers, feel she ought not; I think this is because gratitude for what she has is one of her saving graces. Fanny makes (or inspires others to make) very slight changes that eventually result in positive consequences. Her deep perception and understanding of the different characters around her shield her from making the mistakes they do, and eventually enable her to delicately reach out to those who she perceives as wanting help. Fanny's character is built on being bullied and oppressed from youth in various ways by various people. However, the kind attentions of just one person made an alternative path to follow. It would have been easier for her to grow up as a nasty victim, but instead she becomes kinder and more insightful. This shows enormous strength of character. She has a very clear sense of what to her is right or wrong, and her judgement of other's behaviours, revealed through her thoughts, shows this. This is not to say that she is not judgemental - she is! But one must take into consideration of the influences she has been under since childhood and the times she lived in. Her character is validation that quietness, awareness of others, integrity and small actions can result in beauty for others as well as self. There are quiet, self-effacing girls who are heroines in their own sphere. In the end, Fanny is the centre the family oscillates around, though they are not quite aware of it. Fanny being Fanny could not help everyone in this grim world - there was too much damage done - but the greatest villains betray themselves and are seen much more clearly against the backdrop of Fanny's virtue. They are forced to move away, leaving Fanny to bring harmony to what was left. The whole book would be a tragedy, an exercise in degrees of misery, if it weren't for the insightful, moral, integrous, deep, grateful, self-effacing, resilience of the 'insipid' Fanny Price.
Absolutely Catriona. I think "she endures" is a good way to summarise Fanny Price. And perhaps this might owe a nod to Samuel Johnson ("Amongst her [Austen's] favourite writers, [was] Johnson in prose", _Memoir of Jane Austen_ by her nephew James Edward Austen-Leigh (1869)), who famously wrote: "Human life is everywhere a state in which much is to be endured, and little to be enjoyed" ('Rasselas', 1759, ch.11).
I agree that Fanny Price seems to suffer from not being Lizzy Bennet (but, then, many heroines do!), and - given that she's Austen's next heroine - the comparison between them perhaps appears more stark. When _Pride and Prejudice_ was first published, Austen wrote to her sister Cassandra (on 29th January 1813) that "I must confess that I think her [Lizzy] as delightful a creature as ever appeared in print, & how I shall be able to tolerate those who do not like _her_ at least, I do not know". Austen wrote this letter while she was still writing _Mansfield Park_ (which would be published the next year in 1814). Austen _knew_ how to write a "delightful" heroine, so I think we should pay attention to why Austen did not make Fanny Price "delightful" (in the way that Lizzy Bennet might be said to be).
I almost see MP as a thought experiment as what if Anne de Bough was the heroine. Fanny is Anne without the privileges and entitlement and Mary is kinda a shadow of Lizzie - someone who has her wit, energy and musical talent (and I think Lizzie is talented she just isn't dedicated enough become accomplished whereas Mary is) but without her moral compass and true kindness. Mary's almost the sort of person Lady Catherine believes Lizzy to be.
Well, Fanny did bed during the part of the book where the cousins decided to put on a play and she had been against it through most of that but then caved towards the end because Mary so aggressively hounds her about it while shoving her interest of Edmond into Fanny's face. I really hated Mary for that behavior, acting innocent but knowing exactly what she was doing.
I have always loved the character of Fanny Price because I could relate to her. Quiet on the outside and overlooked much of the time but with a busy mind and deep feeling. Most heroines are portrayed as confident and outgoing so it is nice to read about someone a little more like me. Through much of the book Fanny is pushed around but is also very strong in a way that many overlook. When she views something as morally wrong she holds her ground. That takes a lot of courage for someone in her circumstances; a young woman completely dependent upon the people who either neglect or take advantage of her.
Hello Dr Cox I am humble bus driver but very enjoy jane austens work. Both in the novels and most of the adaptations on screen My own view i think people misunderstand fanny price She is a very strong character who i believe controls herself very well also people must remember this a very time when the book is written and the treatment of women by society and men is different
I agree Steve - I think Fanny is often misunderstood. Her outward silence, for instance, is sometimes confused for inner silence. And she's really not silent inwardly at all! - we readers have access to a great deal of emotion that Fanny feels that she has to conceal from those around her.
I agree, Steve. I think Fanny shows her strength in patiently fulfilling her subservial family role and trying to limit her expectations, though she longs for Edmund. I don’t know anything about literature, but love Austen and reading novels in general.
I have always been attached to Franny Price, ever since I first read the book at sixteen ( a bit of a jolt for someone who spent their free time reading high fantasy) I can't properly express the frustration I felt when I tried talking to other people about this character, only to find them lukewarm at best or openly scornful of her at worst. It took rereading Mansfield Park after college to finally understand why I liked Franny. She was as painfully introverted as I was in school. She felt the same horror at being somewhere and not doing anything, just taking up space. The same inability to make their opinions understood (the scene where Mary insisted that Franny take a necklace chain she didn't want still gets a sympathy sigh from me.)
I have had a fondness for Fanny since first reading Mansfield Park as a teenager. She was the first Austen heroine with whom I could identify and has always been my heroine. Her life has a rich inner landscape hidden by her circumstances. This takes depth and strength of character.
I wonder if Fanny's unpopularity with many Austen readers has to do with her apparent lack of a sense of humour...? She observes other people's motivations & bad behaviour very clearly, just as Elinor and Elizabeth do, but I'm not sure that she retains much sense of proportion about them? And she definitely seems to lack Elizabeth's wryly humorous self-awareness of her own weaknesses/mistakes. Fanny is stubborn and has integrity, just like the other Austen heroines, but in her story the satirical humour seems to be entirely in the narrator's voice, rather than in her own mind's voice.
I think your interpretation is good but I always got the impression that Fanny was dead against the theatricals because the play was so risqué and she could see the potential for mischief between the young men and young ladies. And she was completely right, and later her refusal to jon in was vindicated. Her moral backbone seems to me to be a big theme in Mansfield Park.
I think that the problem with Fanny as a heroine isn't as it at first appears that she's passive and introverted and conventionally virtuous by the standards of the time, because Anne Elliot is also passive, introverted and conventionally virtuous and she's a much beloved Austen heroine. Anne Elliot has a rich inner world, and is capable of mature self reflection, learning from her experience and changing her mind. Fanny Price's inner world on the other hand is pretty unappealing by modern standards. She's rigid, immature and has a strong moral core (which is so archaic that it's alien and repulsive to a modern woman) which she uses to make harsh, rigid, immature judgements about other people that seem silly, hysterical and mean spirited by modern standards. So I think that Mrs Austen is right, Fanny isn't a satisfactory heroine, but it's not because she's insipid.
Persuasion and Mansfield Park are my favorite of Jane Austen's novels because the heroines are introverts. They are just as strong as the other heroines, but they have a different way of looking at things and acting on things.
Of all her novels, Mansfield Park is the one I have the most mixed feelings about. I liked Fanny Price a lot because I recognized myself in her (her hypersensitivity in particular), but I resented her for being so critical of Henry Crawford when he was actively trying to be a better person. I also resented Jane Austen for the whole ending. The fact that Edmund partly "raised" Fanny felt like he unconsciously groomed her to be what HE thinks a respectable lady should be. Sometimes it even felt like she would not allow herself to think differently from him (the way Mr. Collins acts with Lady de Bourgh). Throughout the book, I felt weirded out by Fanny's obsession and infatuation with her cousin. He literally was the only person to ever show her kindness in an environment where she didn't feel safe. He quickly became her only hope in this cruel, unjust world. Of course she would be in love with him ! For the most part, I thought that she would end up marrying Henry and I was glad about the idea of her outgrowing her dependance to Edmund. I would have prefered him to be a symbol of brotherly affection instead. But alas... That being said, I can't understand how anyone would think Fanny weak or insipid given that she is the most resilient character in all of Austen's novels. She stands her ground whatever the consequences, even if she doesn't do so in an obvious way. I've come to realise that the way we feel about fictional characters says more about ourselves than it does about the characters. The question is not whether Fanny Price is indeed insipid, but rather what makes us think so in the first place. The fact that I was frustrated by the development of the story says more about me than it does about the book.
Isn't the point that Crawford's attempts to be better are just shallow play-acting, as his actions with Maria prove immediately after Fanny refuses him?
Henry isn't a man of high moral character like Edmund, but they strongly resemble each other in their complete disregard for Fanny's clearly expressed distaste for the former's persistent attentions. The author states that had Henry exercised self control Fanny would eventually have married him. But I firmly believe she would have come to regret it. Mary Crawford knew her brother well, and she expected him to tire of Fanny. Courtesy, not constancy, was her highest expectation of her brother if he married Fanny.
Fanny is very intelligent and has keen perception of character. She sees through Henry Crawford right away while others are charmed by him. Her rejection of him during his self-improvement attempts merely show the power of her intelligence. Her keen intuition warns her that Crawford’s attempts to be a better man are shallow and insubstantial, as is shortly proved when he runs away with Maria.
Granted, I haven't read Mansfield Park in nearly 40 years (Heavens! I'm OLD!), but I remember being sorry for Fanny rather than annoyed by her. To me, insipid equates to boring. She isn't boring. She is to be pitied. She couldn't help falling in love, nor could she change her place in the family's pecking order. At least she is self-aware enough to see her circumstances honestly.
Dr. Cox - Thank you for your analysis. I think that in Mansfield Park, Jane Austen taught that the character of a person can be demonstrated more by their actions and influence than by their words. Austen had likely thought about the admonition of the New Testament that “by their fruits ye shall know them.” Austen wrote Fanny as a character of power and strength by showing what good happens around her, rather than by giving her words to make her an outwardly compelling and charming subject. She accomplishes part of this with strong contrasts. Mary Crawford is obviously entertaining and sharp witted and sure to dominate a room. Maria and Julia make immediate impressions on everyone around them. But the reader understands they are empty people, who do little of benefit for anyone. On the other hand, Fanny is weak and quiet, but her power is shown by what slowly happens around her over time. Austen did not describe Fanny by Fanny’s words or wit. Instead, the reader is forced to learn Fanny’s character from her outcomes over the long term. As time goes by, the main characters become more and more dependent on Fanny. Lady Bertram comes to depend on her. Edmund comes to depend on her. Sir Thomas Bertram comes to depend on her. Frank Crawford comes to adore her. Mary Crawford starts to see Fanny as someone she wants to follow. Fanny even positively benefits the members of her immediate family from a distance. It seems like the entire family begins to rotate around quiet and weak Fanny. And those who fall under her influence all become better people. Austen has somewhat the same approach with Elinor in Sense & Sensibility, and with Ann in Persuasion. But it is not entirely unexpected that capable daughters like Elinor and Ann would come to have a strong influence in their families. With Fanny, it is unexpected that a stray and undereducated cousin, who should be far below all four of the Bertram children, would end up being the most dominant person in the family. Fanny quietly wields an influence that ends up being even greater than the mighty Elinor and the strong Ann. Fanny is the hero we all need more of. She makes everyone better, without needing attention or admiration. Thank you, Jane Austen, for this magnificent heroine.
Fanny's situation was totally, utterly different from that of any of the other heroines. She was the only one who came from a working class family, and her presence at mansfield park was an anomaly, in the novel itself, as mrs.norris keeps pointing out at every opportunity. The bennets may not be as wealthy as the bingleys or the darcys. but they were owed courtesy, according to the social norms, because they were still gentry. Elizabeth Bennet could not have displayed wit and an independent attitude if mr.darcy was not even obliged to acknowledge her. whereas, Fanny is actually invisible to all except her kind cousin, and the lady of the house who sometimes needs her caring services.Jane Austen must have strayed from her comfort zone in writing Fanny's character. She must have had little contact or even interest in working class people,in her own life.She had no authorial devices to make her interesting beyond making her straightforwardly selfless, loyal and hopeful in the face of hopelessness. She is the kind of heroine one finds in the works dealing with poor folk - characters who was un-apologetically selfless, restrained and keep their hope even though they have little to look forward to, in contrast, all her other characters are self assured, and are selfless only in an understated or offhand way - they are what we now call 'cool'.
I found this a very interesting episode. One of my friends shocked me years ago when she declared Fanny too insipid and frustrating to read about. I have never thought that Fanny was insipid or particularly passive. She’s just a very strong introvert. In fact, I have always seen her as an extremely interesting character!
One of the issues with MP that I find fascinating is that Fanny is the only central Austen character who grows up as a displaced child in another family. She's not exactly adopted by the Bertrams but she is one of, I have no idea how many, children from that time period who were sent off to richer family members to be raised. Austen's own brother Edward had a similar experience, so it had to be a somewhat common occurence. Being 'discarded' by your family has to have an enormous impract on a child's development and sefl-esteem, and I think if Austen had made Fanny an outgoing, vivacious girl who freely spoke her mind, the Betrams would have sent her packing back to Portsmouth ASAP!
Except he was raised as an only child and heir, from what I remember hearing. That's not to say there couldn't be separation anxiety. Informal adoptions, especially when relatives had no children of their own, was quite common.
In Emma, Frank Churchill is sent to live with, and become the heir of his Aunt after his mother dies. He even takes her last name. Much is made of how he hardly visits his father and misses the wedding, but a case could be made to justify feelings of resentment and abandonment towards his father.
Fanny's character has one foot in the world of Charles Dickens. True, the Bennett sisters, the girls in Sense and Sensibility, and other such characters don't have much to look forward to, either. But there are different degrees of 'don't have much to look forward to'
As someone who is an introvert I do identify with Fanny, and I understand her interior looking life. But I can also see how compared with Lizzy or Emma she might appear as a less interesting fictional character. In real life people do often misinterpret an introverts quietness as passivity or as lacking something to contribute. How much of her passivity is her nature and how much is forced by the circumstances she finds herself in is an important question. She definitely exhibits the survival mechanisms that those who experience trauma and abuse often are forced to develop. I have wondered if Fanny may actually be closest to how Jane herself was. I can imagine Jane in her circumstances as the poor relation being supported by her brother and who suffered from health problems, perhaps often being in situations where she sat to the side and observed society around her without being noticed. That ability to go unnoticed may have contributed to her ability to so richly capture the society she lived in. It is my experience that people quite often become unguarded around an introvert, revealing thoughts and actions that they hide from others they perceive as more in the thick of things.
From her few letters that survive I can't say that I've ever pictured her that way. And I think it's a bit of both. She sounded a bit timid by nature, even at home, but being introverted by mayor would make the adjustment to Mansfield that much more brutal. I've always liked to wonder how different, or the same to a lesser degree, she would have been has she been raised at home.
when i started reading austen by the age of 14, i started with P and P and loved it ( and still do). over the the years i read all her novels and its mansfield park which turned out to be my go to book, when im in a bad mood. it took me about 20 years and lot of rereading of this novel to appreciate Fanny over Lizzy Bennet or Anne Elliot. She is strong and bright, a bit like the quiet kid in school who always helps you with math. compared to Lizzy, who ,to honest ,is a bit shallow at the beginning, Fanny has a strenght of mind and moral, and im always sad, that it was mr. crawford who detects this fact first in mansfield Park. Like a lot of people who doesnt talk that much, by choice or otherwise,she observes and sees people for who they are. a rare gift in mansfield , since erveryone else is pretending to be different than they are. besides maybe from Lady Bertram but shes so shallow that it is negligible. Fanny is shy by a education and position in life, but her mind is strong and her instincts of right and wrong in a moral way , not a societal, are crystal clear. And it took even the stubborn mr. Crawford quite alot of energy to even slightly convince Fanny of his more or less good intentions. But he and all his actions helped to give her the self-assurance she gets to recognize her own worth and the worth of her feelings . but i think that even being married to Edmund doesnt change the family dynamic more drastic than Marias and Mr. Norris absence. in my humble opinion Fanny is , with Anne Elliot and Elenore Dashwood, one of the strongest of austens characters.
This is interesting. I have never thought of Fanny as insipid. She is carefully walking a path through life where there is danger at every step, either physical, emotional, or moral. To be honest, I think I relate to Fanny because we have similar internal processes and rarely show what we are feeling on the outside. I would hate to be though insipid because of it.🤔
When I first read this book I was amazed at Fanny's strength -- leaving a family where she was important among her siblings, to a family who hardly noticed her -- she had to learn the necessity of pleasing by serving, without imposing her opinions. In surroundings where her opinions would have been of no importance, she developed the ability to keep her thoughts to herself, no matter how strongly she felt, and was able to keep true no matter how much others went astray. I feel that she became introverted by necessity, not by nature. Absolutely NOT insipid.
Anyone who thinks Fanny is stupid for not standing up for herself has never experienced continued abuse. I am glad for them. Not only is she an introvert, but she is constantly emotionally abused, unintentionally by most, and intentionally by Aunt Norris. I have always loved Fanny, from the first time I watched the 1983 BBC mini series, through all of my readings. I loved watching her grow from lonely, abused girl, to the glue that held her family together and a mentor to a younger sister, although that sister had a "happier temper". I personally don't think that the problem is "modern" audiences, but a lack of understanding Fanny's situation.
My favorite thing about Mansfield Park is that Fanny keeps trying to bring up slavery aka "the business in Antigua" that is vaguely referred to, and nobody will talk about it. Adds some dark humor and a dash of social commentary.
The "business in Antigua" is off-stage, but is fundamental to understanding much of _Mansfield Park_ , I think (especially the themes of dominance and cruelty that run through the novel).
Austin also tries to bring in the happenings there through Tom's illness. His angst at what happens comes out in his delirium. Austin, being a woman and being confined to her world of English gentry living in the countryside had no window into the wider world. She was necessarily handicapped in the matter of knowing the wide world. But still, she does try to fit in what little she must have gathered about the world. I always found that remarkable about Mansfield Park
@@owl6218 I also think it's because Jane Austen is far more in the position of a Fanny Price than a Bertram daughter. While she wants to say something about the morality of slavery she is also dependent on the charity of her rich relatives- to let her visit, to conduct business on her behalf, to help fund her books, for carriage rides to the city and hopefully for an inheritance. I think we put so much of our modern sensibilities on her. Even at living only at Mansfield and Portsmouth she is more traveled than Emma or Catherine Moreland who never left home until she was 17!
She, Fanny Price, is a heroine I've always appreciated since I first encountered her (probably in 1976). I relate to her. Much of my action in between my ears.
I think Fanny’s personality shy, reserved, and quiet and her nature submissive (we can’t all be bold leaders). She is moved to Mansfield Park at age 8 (was it 8? Or 7) and her shyness is compounded with abuse, put downs, and devaluation, especially by Mrs Norris, pretty much upon arrival. She fights through her shyness and the constant put downs to a place where she feels fairly comfortable and useful. Her quietness does not mean she is not perceptive and her strength shows in her (passive) resistance to marrying Mr Crawford. By the time she is grown and most of the marriage and flirting action happens in the book, she could not have put up an active resistance. If she had gone against her inclination and yelled (politely) back at someone, she would be suspected of being ill or not in her right mind or something because it would have been so out of character and she would have lost the fight. I think Austen does a good job showing what it is like to be very shy and very self conscious and very concerned with rules and manners and morals. She is not a traditional heroine but why does every heroine have to be the same?
I hadn't really given it this much thought, but I do remember thinking that Fanny and Edmund were the only two sane people in the entire cast. I loved how quiet, steady, and real she was (to me, at least). I thought I loved her because the whole book was her point of view. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that anyone likes Mrs. Norris or Mary Crawford... I found Mrs. Norris unbearable and something was just off about Mary Crawford.
I really enjoyed your explanation/ interpretation of Fanny!! I am quite introverted and I tend to stick to what I know to be moral or right (to the dismay of my rebellious teenage friends) so I’ve always related to Fanny. My favorite line from Mansfield Park is “her thoughts and reflections were habitually her best companions”. Fanny may be a bit passive on the outside, but Austen gives us a glimpse into her internal thoughts and reflections which are not passive in the slightest. Justice for Fanny!!
A Psychiatrist would say Fanny had a "strong ego". *ego strength* _. . . in psychoanalytic theory, the ability of the ego to maintain an effective balance between the inner impulses of the id, the superego, and outer reality. An individual with a strong ego is thus one who is able to tolerate frustration and stress, postpone gratification, modify selfish desires when necessary, and resolve internal conflicts and emotional problems before they lead to neurosis._
1. You have convinced me to read Mansfield Park again. You already had with your video on the worst marriages in Austen (I just discovered your channel so forgive me if I am viewing things out of order!) but this continues that. 2. Fanny's characterization makes sense for someone who is horribly bullied. I was bullied throughout my childhood and I was extremely withdrawn outwardly in my teenage years but very inwardly reflective. The idea of being overlooked and forgotten really rang true to my experience, especially the hurt that comes with it. I am especially interested in rereading the book with that perspective. I think my initial disappointment with Fanny was the lack of wit. Emma is my favorite Austen heroine--she is the one I identify the most with now--and while P&P is not my favorite of the books, the banter is strong, and Fanny does come off as lackluster when compared to Lizzie and Emma and the like.
Many thanks for your message, Rachel. Mansfield Park is well worth multiple readings! - so I’d definitely recommend reading it more than once. And - as you suggest - the wit of the novel comes much, much less from the characters themselves, and far more from the wry observations of the narrative voice.
Perhaps people dislike Fanny because she does have such a strong moral centre and sticks to her guns. Most of Austen's heroines are flawed like most of us are. We can identify with them because of it. We do hate a 'goody two shoes' in general. Fanny denies herself popularity in order to do the right thing and that takes great strength of character. I haven't read Mansfield Park for about 40 years so I may be misremembering, but she is a character who has been expected to keep in the background and not put herself forward. She is rather like a fish out of water growing up in Mansfield Park. One wonders how she might have been different, more lively, more confident if she had stayed in Portsmouth. This passage shows how her thoughts are far from the impassive and 'insipid' character she is accused of. I think you've made a good case for her.
Thank you very much, Viv. Yes, that's a great way to put it - and she denies herself popularity (and an easier life, arguably) by refusing to overlook others _not_ doing the right thing.
@@DrOctaviaCox I really love your close analysis of the text in these posts. It is astonishing how a choice of word can change or define a subject and point of view. I'd better get Mansfield Park out for another whirl. Youve wetted my appetite.
@Dr Octavia Cox A great touch to mention the late Tony Tanner whose chapter on Mansfield Park is excellent. I only half agree with him when he refers to Fanny Price as passive. She's passive in her actions towards herself but not always with other people. “You will hurt yourself, Miss Bertram,” she cried; “you will certainly hurt yourself against those spikes; you will tear your gown; you will be in danger of slipping into the ha-ha. You had better not go.” This is very metaphorical as Fanny is trying to stop Maria Bertram endangering her marriage to Mr Rushworth. Also Fanny rents book for Susan from a circulating library and buys betsy a knife to solve this dispute. When Fanny starts to genuinely consider a life with Mr Crawford she takes into account that he would almost certainly allow Susan to come live with them. Do you have an opinion?
Thank you for this. I only read the book once and I remember that I could relate to Fanny a lot. I might seem insipid from the outside but from the inside I am completely the opposite and only the people who know me well know that.
I always saw Fanny's imagination, through her stories, as the key to her. Not insipid, but forced into appearing so, in order to fulfill the station she was regulated to within the household. She had no choice in her day to day situation, but her refusal to marry Crawford speaks to a hardened resolve and her real character. There are many types of heroine's. Fanny survived what she was born into, her upbringing(or lack thereof)and got what she ultimately wanted.
Watching this video has made me appreciate even more what a down to earth breather was MP compared to P&P. They are completely opposite novels on so many levels. I made this connection while watching though YMMV: P&P shows the JOYS of a “union” overcoming background differences while MP shows the DANGERS of a “union” that does not. Elizabeth and Darcy’s clashes is rewarded with deeper understanding and ultimately reconciliation and happiness, while Fanny’s “union” to Mansfield Park (and later culminating in her marriage to Edmund) shows how mentally scarring a union could be when it is unequal in so many ways and also lacking mutual empathy and understanding. MP also begins right off the bat with another poorer girl marrying a rich guy (the Bertrams) almost like picking up right off where P&P left off, but it slides into the more melancholic area because the Bertrams while having love and fortune are a highly flawed couple. Unlike Darcy who initially somewhat looked down on Elizabeth but it turned out mostly harmless and ended up with a satisfying union of equality, Fanny suffered this “looked-down upon” for half of her life, the damages to her mentality shows in how uncomfortably withdrawn, guarded and sensitive she became as an adult compared to Elizabeth. Fanny might actually have another tangible reason for rejecting Henry other than the ones Austen proposed: she suffered the consequences of being raised in a materially prosperous and respectable home but treated with less dignity than not. That may account for a large part of her character that tends to disregard wealth, or as Mary Crawford puts it, untouched by ambition. That is also why she is able to see through Henry when so many others have not, because she already suffered the consequences of living a superficially ideal but innately unideal situation firsthand. Fanny sounds very different from Austen’s primary characteristics and kudos to her for being able to capture a heroine that is so different from what she personally experiences. Unfortunately I personally think her male protagonists fall a little short in this novel that contributed to its unpopularity. A lot of people rooted for Henry Crawford not because he is the attractive, rich and sociable “bad boy”, except his passion and perception is contrasted by Edmund, who is unclear perhaps whether he married Fanny out of convenience. While he understands Fanny better he lacks the comprehension of her more heroic qualities such as selfless, passionate love, which Henry does. Ultimately however neither is actually a great match for her. This is sort of analogous to Fanny unable to find an ideal home in either her birthplace Portsmouth nor adoptive home MP. Had Austen perhaps overdone it and made it too much of a grievance against “the sparkly & bright” P&P? It just seems to me Fanny is having such a tough time in the novel. If only Henry and Fanny could find some comprisable middle ground, this would’ve been a very different novel…
What an interesting take on problematic Fanny! In the intro to one of my copies of MP, the editor points out that, despite her 'passivity,' Fanny in the end gets everything she wants. In fact I think she is the only one to do so.
I like all the Austen characters because they’re very relatable. I liked Catherine Moorland for example. She reminded me very much of myself: not always aware of people’s behaviors or intentions, a bit over imaginative, extremely apologetic for any little thing gone wrong, and a huge book fanatic. I also liked Fanny price because she was shy, (also like me), and she was determined in what was right and wrong, even in personal decisions. And I think that’s a good female role model. You don’t need to scream “you’re a manipulative coward!” From the rooftop to a bad person. You just need the courage to give that person a determined “no!” And move on! No means no. Not even if you bribe me.
Your analysis was very interesting to me as I'm currently struggling with Mansfield Park as a novel. I have a hard time relating to Fanny, partially because she seems so passive to the outside. I could hardly find anything to connect with her so far but maybe now I know where to look for something.
Thank you Doro. I hope so! I think it can help if one thinks of Fanny as a person who is imprisoned within her own mind because she feels so paralysed by and unwelcome in the world she has to exist in.
There’s a relatively obscure 1980’s miniseries of Mansfield Park which has the best performance in Fanny, IMO. The rest of the miniseries is not that great, but I loved how the actor and director interpreted her character. There may be one or two low-quality clips floating around on CZcams.
After finding your videos, I purposely looked for one on Mansfield Park's Fanny price, and you had it. Thank you. I agree with your analysis of it on many levels. Like many, I didn't like nor admire Fanny price when I first read the book, but the more often I read it, the more I admired her strength of character even if I didn't agree with her. I don't think I would have liked her, though to be honest, I don't think I would have liked anyone in Mansfield Park. In fact, it is a rare novel in that you can enjoy it even though you don't identify with nor particularly like anyone in it. They are all very flawed people, including Fanny. An interesting aspect I find about Mansfield Park is the more open portrayal of the pull between social traditional norms and sexually 'liberal' behavior as represented by the Crawfords. The first being rewarded and the second, if not being punished, then definitely not rewarded. In her other novels, they may touch on the Madonna/whore complex, see Lydia vs her sisters and Mr Darcy acting to protect Lizzy's reputation, however, it isn't shown quite so blatantly as it is in MF and how it really isn't very far away.
Dear Octavia Cox, I would very much like the BBC to take notice of you - it is fascinating and enlightening to listen to your presentations - A voice from Denmark
My favorite line from Mansfield Park, which made me finally enjoy the novel, comes close to the end--where the narrator reflects that Fanny's joy comes at the cost at everyone else's misery. Her cousin is disgraced, her aunt embarrassed, her uncle not so wealthy and unable to consolidate his fortune through his children's marriage (no more clawing one's way up the social ladder, or even staying at the same rung!), and her lover, well, he's been appropriately abashed. That's when I realized--Fanny's hilarious! She's meant to be priggish with a heart of gold, long-suffering but so very obvious about it, with a backbone of steel. And her happy ending is such a wonderful about-face from the passage outlined in the video. She's come from the margin of the play to the center of the action. Recently I watched The Stitch in Time exploration of the portrait of Lord Mansfield's niece, Dido Belle, and her cousin. Fanny and Dido are in a loose parallel to each other--the poor relation, educated at the family's expense, made into some kind of steward, and petted by the family patriarch. Except that Dido was enslaved by her own father and then her uncle, and only won her freedom at his death. I wonder if Jane Austen had heard of the portrait, or at least wondered at the difficulty of that woman's position, both favorite, relative, and enslaved property. Mansfield Park has always been the hardest of the Jane Austen novels for me, and didn't quite make sense until I read about Lord Mansfield's landmark ruling. Fanny is part of that class of religious abolitionists, who take their faith deadly seriously--to the point where she surrenders her material comfort for her own truth, and makes the best of it. She cleans up her house, does her best to educate her rather willful favorite sister, and she's certainly not saintly about it, she's wonderfully irritable! It took me three reads and Dr. Helena Kelly's book, but I learned to enjoy her. I may not like her, and Mary Crawford is so wonderfully inappropriate and crass, but Fanny makes me laugh. And on an unrelated point--I think it's a shame Charlotte Bronte stopped reading Jane Austen at Pride & Prejudice, because she would've enjoyed Mansfield Park, particularly the ur-evangelicism of Fanny & Edmund. Except, of course, Fanny goes for the wealthier version of St John, rather than waiting for the dissolutions of Henry Crawford to wreck his health and weaken him enough so he can't degrade her if she hands over her economic autonomy to him.
As for Fanny being 'selfless' in her feelings in the immortal words Tori Amos 'I could escape your world if I thought she was the better girl' but she sees through Mary and I think knows deep down Edmund is blind to Mary's faults and they are not compatable. There's a certain amount of values dissonance as both Fanny and Edmund come across as unbearably sanctimonious as they had different values in a different time especially in the play which to us in the modern age comes across as a storm in a teacup. However I respect Fanny for sticking to her guns while Edmund ditches his morality to chase after Mary - I guess Edmund conforms to to two tropes that really annoy me - sanctimous hypocrite and hormone blindness - the later has two cruder euthasisms I won't use here.
I totally agree - I think Fanny would have done the selfless thing and tried to get over Edmond if Mary Crawford had actually been a good match for him. Fanny sees Mary's avariciousness and lack of principle very clearly, so she can't possibly want that for Edmond.
Fanny has a problem, I think, in that she’s the moral centre of the book, and devoted to Edmund - and both endorse a casting-off of Maria that’s pretty brutal. The standards of the day demand it, of course, but Austen’s other books show a bit more flexibility: Lydia is allowed to visit her old home to say goodbye, Colonel Brandon stands by his fallen ward, and the latter, at least, is taken as a sign of kindness. It never seems to occur to Fanny that Maria should be treated more mercifully - indeed, she’s appalled that Mary suggests it - which leaves the modern reader, at least, with a bad taste. But she does genuinely make sacrifices for her principles; she doesn’t demand others pay any price she wouldn’t expect to pay herself. Refusing Henry Crawford is the most obvious, but one that I like is the moment where she refuses the theatricals. Earlier, we’ve heard Edmund plead with Maria not to take part, and when she brushes him off by saying it would be rude to criticise the choice of play, he tells her that what she ought to do is set a quiet example by simply saying she felt unable to take it on. When Fanny is pressed to take a part, that’s exactly what she does: ‘It would be absolutely impossible for me,’ she says, while keeping all criticisms to herself. A higher-status girl might be recognised as showing leadership there - Edmund argues it would be an act of leadership in Maria - but Fanny can’t get away with it, and is rejected and berated by everyone. So I think we can see Fanny as being a character with leadership qualities who has, from her childhood, been absolutely forbidden to lead. The narrative mentions that in her Portsmouth childhood, her younger siblings looked up to and relied on her; aptly enough for the child of a serviceman, she has a kind of soldierliness when there’s a need to be useful. And back in Portsmouth again, she takes a leadership role with Susan, the only sibling she’s allowed to influence, to dramatic effect. Given freedom of action, Fanny becomes active - but in Mansfield, she has none. The only power she has is the power of refusal and of keeping her private opinions independent, and she exercises those with tremendous willpower. A person in a situation this dysfunctional, with no further power to act, may well be frustrating, but when I read the book I mostly feel frustrated for Fanny rather than by her.
I think the difference between what happens to Lydia and Brandon's ways is that they were seduced (by the standards of the time) by men that had no concern for them. Maria on the other hand was married. She went into it willingly and happily. Going by a religious perspective that would be a far, far greater affront.
@@DestinyKiller I think that is exactly right. Lydia and Brandon's ward were unmarried women; they did not, as Maria did, commit adultery. They did not break marriage vows. I don't think it occurs to any "right-thinking" character in the novel that Maria should be treated more mercifully. In fact, Sir Thomas might have chosen to disown his daughter, but he decides to continue to maintain her, which by the standards of the time, might be considered merciful.
I really dislike Edmund a lot more - he's such a santimonius hypocrite. I'm glad Fanny got him in the end but only because that's what she wanted. I also think Edmund was grossly insensitive and lead by the dumb stick.
He’s her cousin, I’m seriously like grossed out at that but I guess it was the times... that’s why I couldn’t connect to the love story, I was shipping more Mr. Crawford but he had to go and be vain again 🤦🏻♀️
Fanny Price was always my favorite heroine in all Austen's works. I don't believe her insipid at all, I think she's quite sharp actually. She totally sees through all of the "improprieties" in the acting scheme. She's just too loyal to snitch on her cousins, and she's too humble to put her thoughts ahead of others. It's not uncommon for people to *say* that looks don't matter to them, they only care about the content of others' hearts and characters. But with Fanny, that claim is tested. She is not funny or charming, but she is sweet, loving, kind, loyal, and dutiful. A true heroine.
Fanny being a poor relation didn't really have much authority in the household, she was keenly aware of her position. When she rejected Henry Crawford she was returned home, this showed her position within the household. Fanny and Mary Crawford are perfect contrasts in Regency women. Mary has position so her more loose version of morality and some of the people she associates with does not define her. Fanny being of more modest position her virtue and standing within the family is central to who she is, she doesn't have the latitude to be as transparent as Mary Crawford.
Illuminating, as always. On the whole I think you are right. I'm just not convinced by your comments on Anna's "couldn't bear Fanny". I think it's perfectly possible for someone to say they "couldn't bear" a heroine they found insipid. Fanny's insipidity early in the novel is annoying. What I don't see is just how anyone could still find Fanny insipid after she resists Henry Crawford and is proved to have been right about him in the end.
Fanny is perhaps the Austen heroine I identify with most. Or at least did at the time I read MP. It's been awhile. I remember so strongly empathizing with her being sent away at a young age (I experienced something similar) and growing up with low self-esteem but a strong sense of morality and justice that often left me feeling alienated from those around me and unable to participate in the things others were doing. Fanny has so many strong personalities around her and they all either think she should be someone she's not or think she's ridiculous for not pursuing happiness the way they are. She very rarely gets approval from anyone and yet she manages to stay true to herself and her sense of right and wrong even when doing what's right causes her inner turmoil. I agree 100% that she is stronger and more passionate than she is given credit for and I think a lot of the hate directed her way may be because people see realities in her story that mirror their own lives but that they're not quite comfortable with. Lizzy and Eleanor are perhaps the Austen characters I most aspire to be like. But in the end I have more in common with Fanny and Anne. My least favourite Austen heroine is Catherine but I think I would be less impatient with her girlish naiveté now that I've grown out of that myself.
It is puzzling - especially as the Austens themselves frequently put on theatrical productions at Steventon. I think it's less to do with the act of putting on a play in and of itself but the choice of play, called 'Lovers' Vows'. Readers experience Fanny first reading the play and her horror at its impropriety and immodesty: "The first use she made of her solitude was to take up the volume which had been left on the table, and begin to acquaint herself with the play of which she had heard so much. Her curiosity was all awake, and she ran through it with an eagerness which was suspended only by intervals of astonishment, that it could be chosen in the present instance, that it could be proposed and accepted in a private theatre! Agatha and Amelia appeared to her in their different ways so totally improper for home representation-the situation of one, and the language of the other, so unfit to be expressed by any woman of modesty, that she could hardly suppose her cousins could be aware of what they were engaging in..." (ch.14) The "situation" of Agatha is that she is unmarried but has a child. The "language" of Amelia clearly worried the translator of the play too. Elizabeth Inchbald (who translated 'Lovers' Vows' (1798) into English from the German original 'Das Kind der Liebe') wrote in the preface: "The part of Amelia has been a very particular object of my solicitude and alteration: the same situations which the author gave her remain, but almost all the dialogue of the character I have changed: the forward and unequivocal manner in which she announces her affection to her lover, in the original, would have been revolting to an English audience: the passion of love, represented on the stage, is certain to be insipid or disgusting, unless it creates smiles or tears: Amelia’s love, by Kotzebue [in the original 'Das Kind der Liebe'], is indelicately blunt, and yet void of mirth or sadness: I have endeavoured to attach the attention and sympathy of the audience by whimsical insinuations, rather than coarse abruptness..."
Fanny also knows that the play would anger and upset Sir Bertram. As a dependent, she is keenly aware of his temperament, and does not dare to arouse his ire. Even in his absence, his domination of the family is absolute in her mind. Of course, she is precisely correct in his reaction!
So glad I found this. My opinion, I read the books many yrs ago, so I am mainly going by the depiction of her character (2008). She was the poor relation, so she knew her place. It wasn't a moral block for her to refuse Crawford's proposal, rather she saw him playing the same game with Maria. She would've been sent right back to her parents if she mentioned Maria's behavior towards Henry C - his behavior didn't really matter because she was already in love with Edmund and she wasn't about to lose that for anything. I know, marrying a cousin, but they did that...Fanny also cared for Edmund a lot because he was very ethical.
I feel fanny price “s inner world and emotions are sufficiently depicted if not better than any other heroines in jane Austen “s books. Given her condition living as a companion with her aunt and their family, she really didn’t have much choice than being complacent and pliant; however, we still can see her inner integrity and righteousness when it comes to misconduct (refusal of the marriage which takes so much fortitude !). The psychological insights are permeated through this book which is the highlight of its entirety. Dr Cox, can you tell us what you think of the writing in Emma ? I saw your video on it but when I read the novel, I feel the second half of the book gets a bit overbearing due to the repetitive minute details of the chit chat and the emphasis on characterization like miss bates and mr wood house. I feel the satire was overly done as their idocy is already established and the repetition of the chitchat is rather annoying. What do you feel ?
_Emma_ is a very difficult book, and I think it gets more difficult the more you unpick it & see just how much work Austen does with each sentence. Yes, I too think that Miss Bates and Mr Woodhouse (and Mrs Elton too) are easy to read as annoying characters, and so many people might dismiss _Emma_ as a result. But I think Austen is incredibly brave to write a novel about how boring life can be! And how repetitive. And how mundane. Part of Emma's state of imprisonment is that she's trapped in the boredom of life in Highbury, and the dreary, petty, dull conversations that go on day after day after day after day.
Emma is my favorite book of all time and I think that the overbearing nature of the other characters is part of the point. Emma is surrounded by people who will never match her. She adopts Harriet as a project, but she's honestly just as mundane as everyone else and can't keep up with her as well. Miss Bates is desperate to be pleasing and self-depreciating because she knows her actual lot in life, Mr. Woodhouse is obsessed with sickliness, and we as the reader are invited to join Emma in feeling superior to the both of them. What I love about Austen and her writing, especially in Emma, is that I always feel like she loves her characters and their flaws, and she pokes fun at them with fondness. It feels almost like a hug.
I feel deeply for Miss Bates and I admire her too. No other character in Austen's novels displays such fortitude and wisdom under severe restrictions and alarming future prospects. As she is so dependent on the kindness of her neighbors for simple survival, she is to be commended for expressing appreciation and gratitude with such heartfelt sincerity. I really dislike Emma for bullying Miss Bates. How Mr. Knightley could have any regard for her afterward is beyond my understanding. Well, maybe not, she did take his just criticism to heart and humbly undertook to correct herself. And that is admirable.
I did read MP as a teenager in my mother tongue and really much enjoyed the reading. Now, a couple of weeks ago I revisited MP for the first time through an audiobook in English read by Karen Savage. I too enjoyed the experience of listening to the story, Fanny's struggles within her family, her character development through adolescence, the portrayal of all the other characters and the hint to broader and complex main social issues that are timeless or still impact problems of our time nowadays. It's such an interesting book and I would love to listen to more analyses of MP. The only thing MP left me unsatisfied with as a 30 year old woman is Fanny's final choice of a marriage with her cousin Edmund. All her life she was told that she has to be thankful and happy for her position at Mansfield Park no matter how much she was neglected by both her aunts and all her cousins except Edmund. Looking back it feels to me that her experiences and her upbringing taught her that her happiness is dependent on Mansfield because for her it's either Mansfield or her birth family. Is it not sad and harsh that her uncle did never send her to another place except the two? She did never meet other people of other circles except the ones her cousins were acquainted with. So Edmund Bertram ends up being the only decend man in her life to look up to except her brother William. And after an awfully long while Edmund will let Mary Crawford go, finally accept her goals in life, be heartbroken... and he will switch to Fanny, rather quickly, for my taste. So although I understand Fanny's feelings for Edmund and still think it's a pity she had no more intercourse with men of character she was not related to, Edmund's change of feelings to Fanny feels a bit rushed to me, leaving me unsatisfied about the marriage of the two and the end of the book.
Fanny was not a spineless little nonentity. When under pressure to accept Henry Crawford from the whole family, including Edmund, Fanny stood her ground. Her banishment to Portsmouth was intended by Sir Thomas to encourage her to be more compliant, but instead it gave her some autonomy and independence and secured her an ally in her sister, Susan. Plus, it gave Henry Crawford time to discredit himself and from that, caused Edmund to become disillusioned with Mary Crawford. Fanny's refusal to participate in the play was an early clue that she could only be controlled so much.
I finally subscribed to your channel😊. I'm enjoying the Austen videos especially. Thank you for discussing Fanny and for treating her as a fully realized character and not a place holding, afterthought. I'm not sure I agree with one person's comment about her marrying Edmond as a symptom of Stockholm syndrome, but I am still thinking it over. She is more challenging than people might realize, or why else would she be talked about so much? She doesn't have a forward, modern personality so I see many not engage with her character. Your discussion and the comments show she has more to offer than at first read. I've always thought Fanny had plenty to offer all the characters in the book but that they didn't know or wonder why they should treat her as more than an afterthought. Edmond had the personality to treat her kindly when they were young and stayed friends with her as an adult. He only falls into neglect of her when he is dazzled by Mary when she flirts with him. Which definitely shows he hasn't had many flirtations with charming, young ladies. Haven't we all watched at least one friend be dazzled by the attentions of someone we thought wouldn't be good for them? Even Fanny starts to or almost bends to the attentions of Henry? Then to regain her resolve that he is too unsteady for her? Maybe she is too accommodating with the Mansfield family, and people in general, but she isn't easily swayed by pretty words and a few sweet gestures. She is supportive because she is that sort of person. Not because she has no principles or backbone. Fanny is just quiet towards others, until her type of opinion and support are needed. Even if Edmond never offered her marriage, she would have gladly stayed for the safety, security, and support of Lady Bertram. Some would say that lacks spirit but I think it shows her loving heart and her unselfishness. The discussion here shows that many discover Fanny after rereading the novel and gaining a better perspective of her quieter type of heroism. I have always liked that about Austen. Not all of her heroines are a Lizzie, Emma, or Marianne. It shows even a meek character can have a happy ending. Not all romance is flashy and open. Sometimes it happens slower than we would like but it can and does happen if we are willing to wait for it. (Please do not think I don't see the inner dialogues of the three characters I mentioned to contrast Fanny. I do understand they had thoughtful, inner dialogues and had inner changes take place to help them grow. Their journeys are favorites also.) Thank you for discussing Fanny. This was my share of her journey. Plus I just watched the 1980s adaptation of Mansfield Park, available on Amazon Prime. So she was on my mind.
Fanny shines through in her letters to her brother William( a sailor at sea) and her commitment to be constant with the letters. Fanny also shines through whenever William visits...🙂
Yes. Henry Crawford sees Fanny clearly when he observes her love for her brother William, and that's when he starts wanting her. He wants that love for himself, not realising that he would have to deserve it and not just claim it.
I may have read Mansfield Park at a younger age and not been fond of the heroine Fanny Price at that time. I’ve just recently reread the book and instantly saw Fanny Price differently. Fanny lives a very active internal life relative to the weakness of her physicality. Although she will share much of herself with those she feels a like-mindedness with and is secure in their relationships. She stands firm in her moral decisions even thorough the blandishments and urgings of those around her, even her favorite cousin, Edmund. Even though it is in her nature to want to be useful and it’s her habit to give way too those of a superior class. She remains steadfast in the face of entire theatrical party and holds the thoughts and expectations of her uncle as of tantamount importance.
Mansfield Park is very true to the way things happen in real life; messiness of feelings, unrequited love, jealousy, determination to not betray one's better self but not always living up to that etc.
I find Fanny Price very frustrating here in the 21st Century, but I relate to her a lot. The complexity and nuances of her internal struggles are amazing and multilayered. I think Jane Austen does a great job of portraying them. I want Fanny to speak up, but even with the more extensive freedoms of women in the 21st Century, there are knots of problems that I find myself in where expressing myself would feel as hopeless as Fanny's situation does to her. I have definitely experienced people liking me or agreeing with me or "helping" me for the "wrong" (inaccurate) reasons in the ways portrayed as happening in Fanny's life. I think the book is fascinating and very well done. I think in the last chapter, however, Jane Austen loses faith in her audience and conducts an explanation of everything that goes on far too long. I would have preferred that she let the story speak for itself, or with at least a shorter exposition at the end. Thank you for your in depth readings - I very much enjoy them!
Goodness, I didn't realize how utterly relatable Fannie was...I have DEFINITELY felt exactly like her in many social situations, usually in large groups (not the jealousy, but definitely that horrid sense of wanting to engage, not being sure how, and so feeling as though you don't exist).
Dr Cox, Could you please sometime talk about the Crawfords and how charming they are. Mansfield Park is the only Austin novel in which I can imagine an alternative ending-- if only . . . i.e. if only Henry could have been saved by Fanny. I think we know it would not be a good alternative when Mary talks about how Henry will still love her even when he inevitably starts cheating on her. That offhand bit really shows how bad the Crawfords are. But I can't help it! The Crawfords are fun! Even though I know they're bad (like Trollop's Stanhope family) they are so seductive! I guess Austin succeeds in getting the reader to experience the danger they present.
This is so interesting because I (a casual fan of Austen) always explain Fanny doing exactly the right thing always. She doesn’t feel comfortable with the play and ultimately doesn’t give in to peer pressure, she resists the rakish charms of the wrong man, she waits for the right one, she never envies the capital of others (though she didn’t really live in poverty). But to have her explained as not doing the right thing, as failing her contemporary heroines is fascinating
You should, as Dr Cox said it's not an easy read, but I believe that comes down to really how awful the characters surrounding Fanny are not the character of Fanny herself. It's an extremely rich book though full of a lot of wonderfully terrible bits of dialogue and foreshadowing by Austen.
Thank you for bringing this thought out. No, I can see how people might think Fanny was insipid when she was first coming to Mansfield as a girl. But, after a time she develops a very solid gyroscope of morality inside herself and in fact she is as bold as a lion. Bold but quiet. That's a very desirable woman.
One of the things I loved best about Jane Austen's novels is the individuality of the characters. She didn't write a formula type of heroine, just like her storylines weren't the same thing all over, with just a few token changes. I didn't want to read "Mansfield Park" with the same leading lady as "Pride and Prejudice" or "Emma", much as I liked Elizabeth and was entertained by Emma and her misguided matchmaking. Fanny was her own person, just like Catherine and Elinor and Anne. This goes for the other characters as well; when I read about Mr. Knightley I don't think of Mr. Darcy, and Captain Wentworth doesn't remind me of either of them. It's all the individuality that makes Jane Austen such a great author, and I think that quality is missing in too many modern ones.
I love how you explain Jane’s preciseness and skill, even the hidden treasures of understanding. Amazing that her works can be interpreted in opposite ways. ALWAYS happy to listen to your thoughts on any of her writing. Thank you
Very brave of you Dr Cox in taking a view different from that of the late distinguished Tony Tanner and many others but I think you are quite right. Because of Fanny’s position in the family she is absolute powerless. Her freedom of action is under almost the greatest possible constraint. Yet in spite of the enormous pressure she is put under to take part in the play she alone does not give way. She also bravely sticks to her principles and holds out against all the pressure put on her, this time with Sir Thomas weighing in, to marry Henry Crawford, as she alone, typically, can see his true nature. I was very interested too in the first passage you quote and which I think I did not much attend to when I last read the book. Certainly she is jealous. But in spite of suffering gravely she does not give way to almost overwhelming emotion but, Job-like, bears it. I wonder which of Jane Austen’s characters suffers most? Fanny? Elizabeth Bennett when she realises she is in love - hopelessly she must think - with Darcy? Emma, when hit with the devastating irony that her deeply misguided manipulations have conspired to ruin her own happiness for ever? The hysterical Marianne or the silent suffering Elinor? Anne Elliot? Or perhaps Jane Fairfax in the utterly brilliant “Emma”? As it happens I have the book by T Tanner that you picture. Of course I admire his analyses but I do not find every one of them completely convincing. In contrast I find it easy to accept the points revealed in Professor J Mullan’s book and videos and of course the insights shown to us in your own excellent and perceptive close readings.
A beautifully chosen scene. This is precisely why Fanny Price is my favorite Austen character, and it's where the filmed adaptations can't rise to the challenge: her inner life is her only life; so onscreen she's a lump on the couch. But she hangs onto herself- she's a fixed point while everyone around her wavers and eventually falters, revealing Fanny's true worth. There can be more than one kind of heroism. We're just as stodgy as ever in the 21st century about demanding that our heroes- and especially our heroines- conform to certain expectations. Fanny is no feminist, and had little hope of being one. She's treated as furniture. "She is not a Miss Bertram". That's ultimately her most apparent virtue. She is a triumph over invisibility.
I think Mansfield Park is perhaps the cleverest novel I have ever read. Jane Austen hits on what I can only describe as the upside-down-ness of life. Mary and Henry Crawford seem, and are, nice friendly people with lots of social graces on the surface, but are (to quote dear Jane) 'darkened but fancying [themselves] light.' They appear kind to Fanny, but actually selfishly misuse her as badly as her cousins do. It is a book in which people reveal themselves for what and who they really are, I know of no other novel like it. It's a deeply religious book, the book of the soul, and Fanny is 'the meek' person who 'inherits the earth.' Jane Austen's wit is certainly there, but in a different way from P & P or Emma, because there are no comic characters. As always with Austen: blink and you miss it. It's my all-time favourite novel.
Fanny doesn’t demonstrate any personal growth. She is moral. She doesn’t suffer sensibility. But she is stagnant. The film adaptation of this novel is interesting, gives Fanny a bit more flavour
The 1999 film version of _Mansfield Park_ (dir. by Patricia Rozema) actually puts some of Jane Austen's own words from her letters into the mouth of Fanny. That's bound to make her more lively! The 1983 BBC version is much closer to the novel, but is - frankly - rather a dreary watch.
I think Fanny does grow. She starts out having no place in the world at all but in the end she discovers where she belongs -- and it's not a simple "She belongs with Edmund." She belongs where there is order and gentleness and that is ultimately in her Uncle Bertram's world. She belongs with Aunt Bertram, who also has her character arc because she no longer takes Fanny for granted.
@@DrOctaviaCox I haven't found an adaptation I can watch because they all try to turn Fanny into Elizabeth Bennett. Fanny is a case of still waters running deep and instead they try to turn her into a waterfall.
Perhaps Fanny belongs with Edmund because that is where she has decided that she belongs? I'm not sure that Lady Bertram really learns anything, does she? She simply replaces Fanny with Susan. "Susan remained to supply her place. Susan became the stationary niece ... Susan could never be spared ... she was soon welcome and useful to all; and after Fanny's removal succeeded so naturally to her influence over the hourly comfort of her aunt, as gradually to become, perhaps, the most beloved of the two." (MP ch.48)
It is a peculiar thing to try to turn Fanny into Elizabeth. Especially because Austen writes them so decidedly differently. If you want Elizabeth, why not just adapt P&P?!
Interesting views. Life however presents as it’s all simply views and opinions. One person sees a story, in one light, whereas another person may view it from a totally different perspective. The intellectual mind, can dissect, whereas the novel may effect the reader on an emotional level. The author may be exploring certain themes, whereas the readers may be reading a book for leisure, pleasure. Comments are impermanence, opinions change over the years. People can be observing from, judgemental, emotional, mood, fashion. The author can only give one a glimpse, of fictional characters. Everyone is coming from a different past, experiences, which will influence one in their, uneducated, or educated evaluation, of the novel and what effect it has on the reader. ☺️
Absolutely Trish. Reading anything is definitely subjective, and each reader will read every text with different biases. It seems to me that that's part of the wonderful beauty of literature.
Fanny is certainly a timid character, but she isn't insipid. Her strong feelings for her brother, her willingness to stand out against the majority in opposing the play, and her willingness to come back to Mansfield Park with no expectation of any better treatment than she's experienced prior to her exile to Portsmouth, are facets of her character that to my mind oppose the characterization of insipidity.
I love Fanny! She is so steadfast and one of the most moral characters in JA's works. As a people pleaser and more introverted, I related to her way more than many of the other heroines.
I absolutely love your channel Dr. Cox! I was wondering if you might be able to do a video about Mary Crawford from Mansfield Park. I find her to be one of the most intriguing characters across Jane Austen's books. She seems so complex and I would absolutely love to better understand her. And on the same note, I'm also very intrigued by Caroline Bingley. I was wondering if you could do a deep dive into her as well? Thank you very much for your time!
I loved Fanny Price. My sisters dislike her. I don't think they understand the position she lived with. Poor and dependent, made to feel less worthy than her cousins. Yet Fanny has the strength of character to stick to her guns when she feels she is right. She is discerning, seeing both Crawfords' actual characters instead of how they intend others to see them. I also liked the character of Julia. She defends Fanny and her char
So, do you think Mrs Austen is right? Is Fanny Price too insipid to be a satisfying heroine?
Although it seems unlikely to have changed its meaning, isn't it dangerous to assume that a contemporary dictionary definition of a word means what a user 200 years ago meant?
That's why I also included Samuel Johnson's 18th century definition too.
Also, the OED does point out old / obsolete and new / contemporary meanings of words.
I think that Fanny started out as probably a sensitive child who was taken from her family without fully understanding why, was subject to the constant emotional abuse of Mrs. Norris and throughout her stay at Mansfield Park before she returned to visit her birth family at Portsmouth, was treated in many ways as little more than a servant. Her love for Edmund stemmed from the fact that he is the only member of the Mansfield family who appears to notice, understand or care at all about or for her. I do not see her as insipid because she has the strength to overcome her habits of obedience to defy even Sir Thomas when the situation is critical. Once she returns to Portsmouth, she sees herself more clearly and for the first time in the novel, develops some real agency in her life. Upon her return to Mansfield, she is integrated as a full member of the family as both she and the rest of the family have learned to appreciate her place in their lives and their place in hers.
As an aside, I have always seen both Fanny and Mary Crawford as the only characters in this novel who clearly know what they do need and will not accept anything less. If Mary had married Edmund it would have been disastrous because she could not be happy in the life that he offers her, nor could he be happy in a compromise that might include either a house in town or a wife who visits her friends there as often as she probably would. Mary knows this and her actions are based on her self-awareness. Fanny doesn't know if she can ever marry Edmund (for most of the novel) but she does know that she could not be happy with Henry Crawford because even if he loves or believes that he loves her, she believes that his flirtatious ways and his need to have every female to be attracted to him would likely resurface eventually. Fanny may be somewhat less self aware than Mary but her awareness and understanding of those around her have been honed as part of her self protection in Mansfield.
@@jeanninemasiello7155 well stated!
I do agree with Mrs. Austen -- Fanny may have all the feels, but by and large she does absolutely nothing about them. I don't regard continuing in the sway of strong emotion as a sign of any strength or color of personality but rather a token of Fanny's weakness in the face of her own emotions. She neither suppresses them, nor acts on them. In behavior she is a yielding, ineffectual, colorless and pious little rabbit of a person, and as such is the least sympathetic, certainly the least modern, of all Austen protagonists (one can hardly call her a heroine.)
I think that Fanny's physical weaknesses were a deliberate contrast to her moral strength. Fanny also isn't passive; she just chooses her battles. She lets her aunts boss her around because there's no moral wrong there. She is a dependent and running everybody's little errands is a way of paying back that debt. But as soon as she is asked to cross a moral boundary she digs in her heels and will not budge. Fanny is probably the strongest Austen character. She has a will of iron in a body of glass.
That's a really good point - I think you're right that Fanny's physical weakness serves as a deliberate contrast to her inner strength and moral rectitude.
I agree that Fanny isn't passive, and I understand exactly what you mean about Fanny choosing her battles. But to extend your point, I'm not sure that she chooses to "battle" in an active sense; I see her character more as defending herself rather than attacking others. She will not do what she believes to be wrong (and - as you say - she does so with a will of iron).
Fanny is indeed the strongest character in Austen. As Dumbledore says: it takes courage to stand up to your enemies, but even more to stand up to your friends"
@@DrOctaviaCox Fanny is also taken from the frying pan and pitched into the fire. Her own family were chaotic but Mansfield Park is peopled by truly immoral, treacherous, debauched, devious, oblivious, rapacious characters.
She must be the moral center of the novel and preserve her own health and composure. It’s occurred to me that Fanny is aware of (Tolstoy’s? Chekhov’s?) dictum that unhappy families are unhappy in numerous ways but happy ones are consistent due to adherence to recognized virtues. Mansfield Park is a novel which catalogs the most common failings in good society. It’s a “don’t let this happen to you” cautionary tale.
Meekness is not weakness
So well said. I completely agree with you on this assessment of Fanny. Those are the reasons that I like her so much.
The moment I began to love Fanny as a heroine was the line: "She'd lived with too much opposition all her life to find it charming." That was the moment where everything came together for me about her: the oppressive house she'd been brought up in and the daily neglect by her thoughtless relatives and the actual poisonous degradations of her aunt. She did what her bolder cousins didn't have the internal strength to do - deny their own temporary pleasures and the escapes afforded by men and charm and money. Jane Austen paints an amazing picture of the gap between privilege and real independence; Maria Bertram has all the advantages life can give but makes non-choices, soft choices that shatter any chance of her independence, in the end.
Fanny exercises real, mindful choice in ways that the women around her do not, despite their greater advantages in life - and she sticks to that choice despite immense pressure and accusations of being willful and ungrateful.
A beautiful, and revealing, quotation Kay (re "To Fanny, however, who had known too much opposition all her life to find any charm in it"). Your comment puts me in mind of the opening of _Emma_ where the narrative voice suggests that Emma had, unlike Fanny, not experienced enough opposition:
"The real evils, indeed, of Emma's situation were the power of having rather too much her own way, and a disposition to think a little too well of herself; these were the disadvantages which threatened alloy to her many enjoyments. The danger, however, was at present so unperceived, that they did not by any means rank as misfortunes with her." (Emma, ch.1)
Your comment shows a deep understanding of the novel. It’s about the dangerous trap of choices.
@@rosezingleman5007you’re absolutely right. Jane made Henry love a deep and honest love. He saw in her what others, even Edmund, didn’t appreciate. He loved the way Fanny deserved to be loved. I felt bad for him. Who knows If he ever would’ve won Fanny over, but he was becoming a better person. But he couldn’t escape himself.
@@paladin1726”winning Fanny over” was his objective; and what would he do with her once she was won? She would become a version of Lady Bertram, neglected by Henry and her sensitivity to the natural world beaten down by his love of novelty. She could share nothing with him that he valued, and he had only financial security to offer her. I do think that had Henry waited for Edmund’s marriage he could have worn her down as Portsmouth was toxic to her spirits.
@@Patricia-kk8tr completely disagree. Lady Bertram was all beauty and all shallow. She was appreciated for one quality and that one quality made her a trophy wife. Chapter 30 explains the appreciation Henry felt for Fanny. This started as a simple attempt at sport, conquering the quiet prude, but for Henry, it unexpectedly changed.
You see Henry without all of Henry’s layers. This is why Jane dives so deep into his background, into his thoughts. Nobody else, not even Edmund, not even Fanny, explains in depth the virtues of anyone else in this story. Nobody but Henry.
Had he won her over, truly won her over, I believe he would’ve replaced the handling of his emptiness with the joy of serving Fanny. That hole in his heart would have been filled.
I have little patience with those who judge Austen’s women with no sensitivity for the precariousness of their social and financial standing. Fannie is completely reliant on others for her keep. She can not be forward the way Mary Crawford can. Her existence depends on it. Instead she HAS to remain silent while at the same time enduring incredible emotional abuse. I think Fanny is amazing. She holds out for what she believes and what she wants despite living on a precarious knife edge where to speak would be to risk ejection from the household. If that is not spirit and strength in the face of poverty, powerlessness, and abuse, what on earth is?
Another treasure from Dr. Cox
I think Fanny is Austen's STRONGEST heroine because she alone faces CONSEQUENCES for her values and she chooses to follow her conscience instead of going along with the opinion of others which would make her life MUCH easier. Because of her life circumstances she has nothing of her own. Everything she has is from the charity of others yet she never lets fear intimidate her into silence. Unlike Anne, Fanny is unpersuaded. Unlike Lizzie, she stands by her decisions even in the face of banishment. We have a MINUTE in P&P, right before Mr Bennett gives his "unhappy alternative" speech before we and Lizzie realize she will face zero consequences for turning down Mr Collins. So while it is brave for Lizzie to turn down safety and security contained in a proposal I think she has grown up with Mr Bennett constantly belittling Mrs Bennett for her completely rational fear of the future that Lizzie doesn't truly understand the precariousness of their position. The treatment of Fanny is more about proof that we as a society adore the adored not the underdog- despite how we like to pretend that we appreciate the finer values we really are drawn to money, beauty, fame, power and tend to ignore the stable good. Like teachers who make pets of the pretty, confident kids or how reality TV exalts Kardashians even Austen readers are attracted to the sizzle and not the steak.
I agree very much with your point about Lizzy in _P&P_ - readers are aware that there is not really any jeopardy for her. As Austen herself commented on _P&P_ just after its publication, in a letter to her sister Cassandra (29th January 1813), "The work is rather too light & bright & sparkling; it wants shade". At the time, Austen was writing _MP_ - which as you suggest has much more shade & darkness.
You say that Fanny never lets fear intimidate her into silence - I'm not sure that's entirely correct. It seems to me that she is often silent (e.g. in the scene described in the video), and other characters in the novel (and indeed many readers too) mistake this silence for passivity. But her state of silence is not a state of acceptance - as you suggest. Perhaps I would say instead that Fanny never lets her fear intimidate her into acquiescence.
I do agree that Lizzie doesn’t really face any consequences for her refusal to marry mr Collins but I think she was justified in doing so. Her position is not as precarious as Charlotte. She is still quite young,only 21 and as they often stay with the Gardiners in London, they do have prospects of moving in different society and meeting potential suitors. Although mr Bennet is irresponsible in not providing sufficiently for his children, I think he is right in allowing Lizzie to refuse mr Collins. He knows very well she will be miserable with mr Collins as he is with Mrs Bennet. Even when Lizzie tells him about her engagement to mr darcy at the end of the novel, he urges her to reconsider and marry only if she had true regard for mr darcy and not to be blinded by money and status. Even with Jane, he was fully aware of mr Bingley being a potential suitor and he therefore pays him a visit as soon as he is settled in netherfield despite not telling his family about it. We are told that he was one of the first people to wait on mr Bingley.
Given that Fanny Price sits between Lizzie Bennet and Emma Woodhouse, I like John Mullan’s comment that each of Jane Austen’s heroines is a counterpoint to the heroine in her previous book.
Fanny is an introvert thrust into a situation that must emphasise the introverted nature of her character. We readers get to hear enough of her unspoken thoughts to be able to understand what she is thinking and feeling. We can see her trying to hide her strongest feelings from those around her and perhaps us; sometimes she even denies them to herself, particularly her love for Edmund and her jealousy of Mary Crawford. I think this has given rise both to the criticism that she is outwardly insipid and passive, and inwardly (Mary Cooke’s criticism) that she has insufficient moral strength.
I am amused by this quote where Fanny alleges maltreatment of Edmund's mare in an attempt to cover up her jealousy of Mary Crawford.
"She could not turn her eyes from the meadow; she could not help watching all that passed. At first Miss Crawford and her companion made the circuit of the field, which was not small, at a foot's pace; then, at her apparent suggestion, they rose into a canter; and to Fanny's timid nature it was most astonishing to see how well she sat. After a few minutes they stopped entirely. Edmund was close to her; he was speaking to her; he was evidently directing her management of the bridle; he had hold of her hand; she saw it, or the imagination supplied what the eye could not reach. She must not wonder at all this; what could be more natural than that Edmund should be making himself useful, and proving his good-nature by any one? She could not but think, indeed, that Mr. Crawford might as well have saved him the trouble; that it would have been particularly proper and becoming in a brother to have done it himself; but Mr. Crawford, with all his boasted good-nature, and all his coachmanship, probably knew nothing of the matter, and had no active kindness in comparison of Edmund. She began to think it rather hard upon the mare to have such double duty; if she were forgotten, the poor mare should be remembered."
Great point, and I agree - we wouldn't want Lizzy to marry Mr Collins at all! And yes, the two moments where Mr Bennet most shines as a father to Lizzy are the two you mention.
My point was that Fanny Price does seem to be in jeopardy in a way that Lizzy Bennet does not (compare Mr Bennet's response to Lizzy & Collins with Sir Thomas's response to Fanny & Henry Crawford) - and this reflects a difference in the aims of _P&P_ and _MP_ as novels.
the fact that Fanny, after having had to leave her family so young (and a mother who valued boys above daughters who didn't make things the easiest to beguine with) and after living for so long with a family in which most members seemed to have an innate talented in tearing down self esteem, still manages to have genuine kindness, to avoid drowning in resentment and bitterness, and to still have a will strong enough to allow her to be true to her own conscience, is a miracle in itself, and makes her a wonderful heroine in my eyes. I understand that the plot is not as funny and exiting as some other books from Austin are, and I understand that most people have not been in situations similar to Fanny's and because of that may be annoyed and her endurance, and at all the signs that her upbringing has left on her, and would wish for her to just tell everybody off all the time, but I love her dearly, and it warms my heart to know that Jane Austen did too
Fanny is the only heroine in Austen to have the narrative voice refer affectionately to her directly (self-consciously within the text). The narrative voice remarks in the final chapter of _MP_ : " *My Fanny* , indeed, at this very time, I have the satisfaction of knowing, must have been happy in spite of everything..." (ch.48).
I loved Mansfield Park and Fanny Price. Her Aunt was the insipid one , not Fanny. Mary Crawford was most detestable and so was her brother Henry who thought way too much of himself.
I always liked Fanny for that reason as well. 🙂
I love Fanny. She's a sensitive, introverted, abused young woman in a very patriarchal and class conscious society, and though she gets pushed around all the time and is painfully aware of her dependency, she cannot be made to do something that in her opinion is wrong. She even (quietly) stands up to her formidable uncle, the one who's advise is a command - that to me is strength and even a deviation from her usual outward passivity.
So well put!
She's no Jane Eyre, though. She's not that likable as she never stands up for herself, but she is definitely better than Edmund, practically saved his life and I hope he lived to appreciate the angel that he got.
I've always felt that "Mansfield Park" is the story of the reversal of the situations of the characters of Anne de Bourgh and Lizzy Bennet. I notices that many of the descriptive terms used for Anne de Bourgh are similar to the ones used for Fanny: little, sickly, quiet, prone to headaches. Fanny's view of Mary Crawford seem to me to be similar to how someone who didn't particularly like Lizzy Bennet and was jealous of her might describe her from a distance.
That is a really fascinating parallel between Lizzie and Mary Crawford!
Ooh, fascinating idea! I have mostly read Austen's books to enjoy the humor, not to analyze them as a body of work (my English minor was concentrated in Shakespeare -- Austen was for fun!), but since finding this CZcams channel a few days ago I started thinking about Austen's approach to her heroines. Elizabeth Bennet and Elinor Dashwood seem very similar to me, except that Elizabeth isn't hoping for more from Darcy and Elinor very much hopes for more from Edward. The scenes with each couple alone in the drawing room seemed like the same scene played out two different ways.
Other heroines seem like Austen explored what aspects of their personality might be emphasized if they come from different backgrounds or have different experiences. Fanny Price is outwardly described much like Anne de Bourgh, about whom we know very little beyond her mother's projections of her. I remember one high school English teacher asking what we actually know about Miss Anne de Bourgh, beyond the things her mother thinks she might have accomplished had she not been an invalid. She's pretty much there to point up how Lady Catherine sucks up all the oxygen in the room with her self-importance, and perhaps to provide a reason for the showdown between Lizzy and Lady Catherine. There's no reason for Lady Catherine to stir herself to an in-person confrontation not on her own turf without the perceived personal insult; she could socially snipe Lizzy from a distance by making sure everyone knew that Bennet girl aimed too far above her station and ruined the great lady's poor, deluded nephew.
So maybe Austen wanted to explore an Ann de Bourgh-like character in a main role, without a smother-mother? Or did she want to showcase the Bertram family in all its awfulness through the eyes of a close observer who can be used for moral comparison, and a quiet invalid who isn't part of the action was a useful mechanism? There were a lot of consumptive or otherwise unhealthy young women at the time; maybe that similarity is not as significant as it seems in modern day?
"Mansfield Park" is the one I've read most often, but now I feel the need to read it again! (Gotta read "Emma" again, too; only read it once, when my heart was still very much with Eliot's "Middlemarch," and I did not fully appreciate it.)
I've been saying this for months. I think that is exactly why pride and prejudice fans can have such a nasty reaction to Mansfield Park. You're completely on point here.
Actually I always liked Anne de Bourgh better than Lizzy (though I don't dislike her) and I found Mansfield Park much more my sort of book than p and p.
Rather, Fanny seems like Georgiana Darcy! Remember how Elizabeth perceives Georgiana and kindly helps her and draws her out. Mary Crawford doesn't really seem to treat Fanny the same. Georgiana is timid and unsure of herself and while Fanny seems similar she is like Elizabeth in perceiving people accurately as they reveal themselves.
Mary Crawford is very different from Elizabeth Bennett but I do see how their lively personalities would make them look alike.
Final note: you said it's how someone would think of Elizabeth from a distance (referencing Fanny's feelings about Mary's morals and purposes). But we must remember Henry and Mary were extremely close with Mansfield park, they were intimate friends and therefore this argument of Fanny misjudging Mary from a distance without understanding her doesn't do the story accurate justice.
Hah! Interesting parallels. Maybe that's why I like Mary Crawford ^^
I think what has always made Fanny Price stand out, to me, is that she is a true introvert. It is very rare to see a heroine who is an introvert, and I guess that her introversion is what some people may interpret as her being ‘passive’.
However, I would like to point out that she generally succeeded in her objectives, even when she was pressured to do something else. She didn’t want to take part in the play, so she didn’t. She didn’t want to marry.... *he whose name has vanished from my head* so she didn’t.
The whole book is scenario after scenario of people trying to convince her do things she doesn’t want to do, and then her finding ways to ‘not do it’. She’s far too stubborn to be considered passive.
A passive ‘weak’ person would have gone along with what the other more forceful characters wanted, but Fanny, for the most part, generally got her way, eventually. She just didn’t do it noisily as the other characters did.
Yes and one way to see it is that Fanny 'wins' at the end by almost taking on the position as the dominant woman in the household. Lady Bertram comes to rely on her advice, Lord Bertram ceases to order her around and as Edmund's wife, she is no longer ranked behind his sisters, who have disgraced themselves to their parents. She plays the long game and reverses many of the power dynamics at the start of the novel in her favour. Whether winning a place in the Bertrams' hearts was worth all that effort is another question...
@@naegrant4722 Great point. But what other winning hand other than marrying Edmund could she play? Her choices were to go back to Portsmouth, stay unmarried at Mansfield or marry Edmund. She definitely turned her very bad hand into a pretty good deal. Of the possible husbands she could have chosen- Edmund, Tom, Henry, Yates, and Rushworth I think she did the best possible win.
I agree with those who point out that Fanny is an introvert, and suffers from the general devaluation of introverts in our society. She is also a highly sensitive person (HSP) as defined by Dr. Elaine Aron: very observant, easily overwhelmed and exhausted by overstimulation from noise and bustle, with a complex inner life that she shows only to a few highly trusted loved ones (Edmund and William). HSPs are often criticized for being “weak” or “too sensitive,” when in fact they have to be very strong to live in society given the intensity with which they (we) experience sensory and emotional input.
I believe an entire course on personality theory could be taught using Jane Austen’s work in lieu of case studies.
I've always read Mansfield Park as a very sly satire, not just of societal expectations but also (albeit to a lesser extent) of Austen's own prejudices. Without descending into self-parody, Fanny represents a third alternative for Regency womanhood: she is neither less nor more than she should be, neither a rebel nor completely ignorable. And yes, as you say, she has her own inner life, a quality that should not be assumed missing in anyone. As in all Austen's works, the other characters do more than an adequate job of making themselves look ridiculous next to the heroine. That this is the case even next to such a slight specimen as Fanny Price is really quite a stunning indictment. I believe Fanny is an attempt at realism, as realistically there are far more of her in the world than there are of the sparkling sort of Lizzie Bennet. Edmund is her perfect match because he is also quite dull, at times also sanctimonious and excessively prudish. In the world of Pride and Prejudice, Edmund would have been Mr. Collins, a butt of humour, not the hero. That Mary Crawford serves as a sort of anti-Lizzie further helps in the reading of Mansfield Park as a refining of Pride and Prejudice. The latter will always be more vivacious and popular, yet the former will always hew closer to life as we know it. And in terms of the quality of satire, I would actually nominate Mansfield Park as the top of the heap for its subtlety and multiple levels of insight.
Fabulous point about 'Mansfield Park' being a response to 'Pride and Prejudice' - MP was the novel Austen worked on after P&P, and was still composing when P&P was published (in January 1813). Writing about P&P to Cassandra, 4 February 1813, Austen observed that "The work is rather too light & bright & sparkling-it wants shade-". I think she took this observation into her composition of MP. Comparing Lizzy Bennet and Mary Crawford is interesting too, I think. E.g., they actually make some rather similar jokes. Perhaps we might see Mary Crawford as a Lizzy Bennet gone too far? As you say, the moral universes of the two novels are different. P&P is far more conventional in terms of conforming to the 'comedy' genre, in that there is no real sense of jeopardy for the characters (not to say that the novel doesn't make serious points too); MP has a much more sinister undercurrent of threat .
@@DrOctaviaCox Mary and Lizzie are both lively, perhaps superficially similar. But Mary has a scheming, untrustworthy side to her, as illustrated by her tricking Fanny into accepting Henry's necklace. She is far less moral. Lizzy, on the other hand, puts her love for Jane above regard for herself
when Jane is sick and she tries to get her father to keep Lydia from going to Brighton. Sometimes I imagine mixing up Austen's novel and characters. I think Lizzie might have been a good sort of friend for Fanny, just as she was for D'Arcy's sister.
I think my problem with MP and Fanny is not so much her quiet endurance, but her continued fixation throughout on Edmund. While he is certainly much better than the rest, he continually fails her throughout the book. I can understand her feelings when there is no one else to be any sort of knight for her but I would have felt better if while she was away from Mansfield she actually met someone that would have made her realize that while she will always be very fond of Edmund and love him, that there were better men out there.
Her love seems conditioned on that he was the only one to show any sort kindness and consideration when she was a child in a household full of people who otherwise didn't. If it had been otherwise, had those at Mansfield been generally kindly towards her, would she still have loved Edmund as she did?
I worry about this too.
Edmund repeatedly overlooks Fanny especially when it's convenient for him to do so (e.g. the horse episode), is frequently unaware of her feelings, and appears to have little interest in discovering &/or delving into her feelings. These are Edmund's words, supposedly of sympathy and comfort, to Fanny after the big scandal is revealed (he refers to their relationships with Mary and Henry Crawford): "No wonder-you must feel it-you must suffer. How a man who had once loved, could desert you! But yours-your regard was new compared with- Fanny, think of _me_ !" (ch.46). Ugh!
@@DrOctaviaCox That part which I just read recently made me mad, not so much because of the "think of me" part, but because even Edmund is still gaslighting her into thinking she loves Mr. Crawford. No matter how many times she says she doesn't love him, nobody ever takes her seriously, even after the scandal. She has so little agency in her life that it feels oppressive to read sometimes.
Fanny has a raging case of Stockholm syndrome. She doesn't go anywhere, so the only men she knows are the family and visitors to the house. Edmund is the only one of them who is nice to her and seeks her company. He brought her some ribbons and took her riding; surely that's love!!
I think it is the various aspects of everything said that amounts to the conclusion being so unsatisfactory. It isn't that she is quietly enduring, but that she emotionally is like a baby chick who once imprinted doesn't change. Her feelings for both her brother and Edmund are very similarly immature and refuse to take any changes into account.
So how is the reader supposed to feel about a romance between such an unworthy self-centered male lead and an emotionally immature (however enduring) female lead? Neither of them are even aware of their faults nor are likely to correct them, the way other MCs do in Austen's books by the end. However, they will no doubt be happy- as Fanny will do everything to see that Edmund is comfortable in every way.
Literally this yes he’s perhaps the nicest in the household but that doesn’t make him a nice person in general. He’s not on her side when she needs him and I remember him getting disappointed at her just because she doesn’t want to act.
Fanny is a perfect introvert. She is shy. She prefers to talk about things, or abstract concepts (astronomy, Nature, poetry, or landscape gardening) rather than people. She has a strong internal voice, criticising what she does, and she wants to satisfy this internal voice rather than seeking the approval of others, as an extravert like Henry Crawford needs to do. She has very few friends, but is intensely loyal to them. (Later, she makes a more 'normal' friend of her sister Susan, actually taking the lead in that relationship - her character is growing). She looks beneath the surface of things. Also, she values privacy, and the chance to think her own thoughts. Making an introvert the heroine of a story was a bold move!
I really like the scene, where Fanny is talking to Mary Crawford about memory. I didn't read the book in english, so I can't give you the whole paragraph, but I found the citation: "The memory is sometimes so retentive, so serviceable, so obedient; at others, so bewildered and so weak; and at others again, so tyrannic, so beyond control!" Everthing she says shows so much intelligence and interest and somehow (for me at least) also so much love for life itself. I remember that I would have loved to know more about her thoughts on memory.
A beautiful quotation, Simone! From the same paragraph, I find this quotation quite remarkable too: "If any one faculty of our nature may be called _more_ wonderful than the rest, I do think it is memory. There seems something more speakingly incomprehensible in the powers, the failures, the inequalities of memory, than in any other of our intelligences" (ch.22). And this was before memory was even really beginning to be theorised about. Austen is SO perceptive about the human mind - and its ability to deceive the person its within (I'm struggling to find a good way to put that. The mind's host?).
We might think of elements of _Persuasion_ as being, I suppose, a study in memory. We are told of Anne, for example: "No one had ever come within the Kellynch circle, who could bear a comparison with Frederick Wentworth, as he stood in her memory" (ch.4). "as he stood in her memory" - what does that really mean?
Fanny Price is one of my favorite Austen heroines. Being an introvert myself, I can sympathize with having a stronger inner dialogue, than outward wit. Though not as popular these days, I completely admire her moral fortitude.
Mansfield Park is my favorite of Jane Austen's novels. It is a deeper story.
I like Fanny a lot (my favorite is Elinor, though) and I‘m always sad when people criticize her. I read MP with my book group and many women called her passive and boring and deserving what she gets, because she doesn’t take action to better her position. I think one cannot compare a bold modern woman to Fanny. I always feel with her. She has no standing in the MP family, she is basically an a little bit better liked Jane Eyre. Somewhat part of the family, but always called upon to do chores, to help, to serve. Her only confidante is Edmund. How could she, growing up in such a role, become bold, assertive and active? It’s just not her role in the family dynamics. She has to be thankful for the fact that she is allowed to stay at MP, be educated and not be turned out to her overcrowded messy home. How can she talk back when she has no claim to anything and solely depends on the good mood of her richer relations?
I like her much, because she has a good strong moral compass and sticks to it in her shy silent way.
In my mind I always contrast her with Emma, the incredibly bold and active one. I don’t like the early Emma at all. In opposition to Fanny, Emma grew up with the silver spoon in her mouth and the adoring eyes of everybody on her. What does she make of it? Nothing! She is lazy (no real accomplishments and a list of books she never reads) and treats human beings and their feelings like playthings for her personal entertainment having no respect for human dignity (objectifying humans). Thank heavens she learns!
In a nutshell, Fanny has very little and makes much of it, Emma has everything and nothing to show for it.
Thank you for your comment Daena. Yes, indeed - it is made clear to Fanny over and over again by many of the Bertrams that she is least and last. Take these examples from the awful Mrs Norris:
* "I shall think her a very obstinate, ungrateful girl, if she does not do what her aunt and cousins wish her-very ungrateful, indeed, considering who and what she is" (ch.15)
* "The nonsense and folly of people's stepping out of their rank and trying to appear above themselves, makes me think it right to give you a hint, Fanny, now that you are going into company without any of us; and I do beseech and entreat you not to be putting yourself forward, and talking and giving your opinion as if you were one of your cousins-as if you were dear Mrs. Rushworth or Julia. That will never do, believe me. Remember, wherever you are, you must be the lowest and last" (ch.23)
Presumably Fanny has been on a diet of such diatribes throughout her childhood.
No wonder she finds it difficult to voice her opinions externally, even if she feels them internally.
@@DrOctaviaCox wow, thank you so much for the quotes! I recommended your channel to my book group. We read all of Austen‘s major works, The Watsons, Lady Susan and are now embarking on a Brontë project. One question was if Fanny Price and Jane Eyre are somehow similar.
For all her good and admirable qualities and her inner mental dialogue, I’m afraid I am guilty of finding her rather dull and passive. Even in Persuasion, most of the book is about Anne’s inner dialogue, but there’s never a dull moment, maybe because of captain Wentworth’s continued interest in her, despite an outward appearance to the contrary. The readers feel like it’s building upto something. Also I admire Anne Elliot much more than any other Austen heroine, as she is not naturally a very bold or confident person but she grows and matures into being strong and decisive, learning from her past mistakes and never once wavering in her love or loyalty. Also she never blames others for her circumstances.
It's interesting that you say that in _Persuasion_ ( unlike in _Mansfield Park_ ) readers feel that they are building up to something. Do you think, perhaps, that's because Anne Elliot's internal dialogue shows a development in her thinking, whereas Fanny Price expresses a strong opinion internally but that viewpoint remains almost exactly the same throughout the whole novel? In that sense, Fanny's thinking is static.
Yes, I agree! Fanny is my least favorite Austen heroine, she is far too passive and timid to be a satisfying heroine. Plus the fact that she marries her cousin, (yes I know it was common back then but blech!), makes it hard to root for them to get together.
@@DrOctaviaCox That is very true. She doesn't change with regard to the values she lives by.
@nidhird Persuasion is my favorite of Austen's too. And I agree with you that Anne has inner strength similar to Fanny Price. But I would disagree that she was always that way. And that Persuasion deals with the notion that too much stubbornness, too much inner strength is a vice more than a virtue. Anne does give in to peer pressure and she refuses Frederick which she later rethinks. Frederick cannot forgive her the sin of being persuadable and praises Louisa Mustgrove for implacability (that she is like a hard nut), but that trait later nearly costs her life while Frederick comes to understand that Anne's being willing to let him go under his circumstances at the time and how it might have hindered his career or cost him his life to have held him to his offer of marriage was an act of true love and sacrifice on her part which he'd grossly unappreciated. Its about knowing when to bend and when to stand your ground, Anne holding her ground in the end when its called for (and not marrying Mr. Elliott) and Frederick being willing to bend and forgive the woman who had once rejected him. It's about wisdom, that you need both traits to be truly strong. The character arcs in that book are amazing. And the forgiveness in the characters is heartwarming. It gives hope. That's why I love it so much.
I completely agree!
I can fully understand Fanny choosing to do the right thing and resenting Mary for “saving” her. If you’ve never had that friend “save” you from the attentions of others and revel in the gratitude they expect in return. I can understand Fanny in many aspects as being very human on many levels.
Indeed. Austin takes on the very complicated emotions between “frenemies”. I think that Miss Crawford sees Fanny as a rival to Edmond’s attentions and she seeks to juvenile Fanny. Thus herself appear more womanly and ready for marriage in Edmunds eyes. The frenemies theme in modern times is a common Hollywood trope.
@@DeeWaterlily I don't think Mary Crawford sees Fanny as a rival AT ALL and that is part of what makes Fanny so sad and downtrodden is that everyone never remembers or considers her! You get to see Jealous Mary when Edmund is at his friend with three sister's house and she could never be as nice to Fanny as she is if she thought she was a rival!
Yes! So many readers wrongly praise Mary for being a "good friend" when she's actually selfish and making herself the center of attention.
@@lovetolovefairytales yes, it honestly annoys me that people compare Lizzy and Emma to Mary Crawford. Emma might be the closest of the two but only on a surface level
Neither would dream of wishing an elder brother dead, even joking. Neither of them would be cruel to the man they loved as Mary often is to Edmund.
I don't think she thinks of Fanny as a rival, at all, she sees that Edmund loves Fanny (as a brother) and so wants to get in his good graces. That's the only reason she's friends with Fanny. And possibly the hope that Fanny will put in a good word for her
@@DeeWaterlily I don't think Mary thinks of her as a rival. She sees her as a tool, if anything.
She pays zero attention to her while the Miss Bertrams are there, she only willingly accepts her as a friend when the other girls are gone.
She also sees that Edmund likes Fanny and so interests herself with Fanny, much the same way she 'interested' herself in Tom's horses.
She drops her like a 100 pound rock once Fanny is no longer in a position to be used by her and only rekindles their friendship to ask if Tom is dying
I have loved the character of Fanny Price and the book of Mansfield Park from the first reading. I love Fanny for many reasons, and the main one is her integrity of self. There is not another character in the novel who has that. She is true to her herself despite all the obstacles against her, especially social norms and expectations from her elders and peers. For example, the play she does not want to takes part in, she does not, even though she longs to feel a part of a group.
She forces herself to do what is expected of her (at least on the outside, as Dr Cox shows). Just by being herself, she inspires comparisons with other characters and puts them in relief. She is the deep still waters to their reflections; and when we look at deep still waters it is the clear reflections that we notice and wonder at, at first. This self-effacing enables her, consciously or not, to bring into prominence the behaviours of others (I'm thinking particularly of Mrs Norris, who eventually hoists herself on her own petard). In Portsmouth, when she becomes a little freer (again when no one takes much notice of her), she is able to reflect her own needs and values, and brings a little space, a little peace, into a chaotic place.
She loves deeply and faithfully where others, even readers, feel she ought not; I think this is because gratitude for what she has is one of her saving graces. Fanny makes (or inspires others to make) very slight changes that eventually result in positive consequences. Her deep perception and understanding of the different characters around her shield her from making the mistakes they do, and eventually enable her to delicately reach out to those who she perceives as wanting help.
Fanny's character is built on being bullied and oppressed from youth in various ways by various people. However, the kind attentions of just one person made an alternative path to follow. It would have been easier for her to grow up as a nasty victim, but instead she becomes kinder and more insightful. This shows enormous strength of character. She has a very clear sense of what to her is right or wrong, and her judgement of other's behaviours, revealed through her thoughts, shows this. This is not to say that she is not judgemental - she is! But one must take into consideration of the influences she has been under since childhood and the times she lived in.
Her character is validation that quietness, awareness of others, integrity and small actions can result in beauty for others as well as self. There are quiet, self-effacing girls who are heroines in their own sphere. In the end, Fanny is the centre the family oscillates around, though they are not quite aware of it. Fanny being Fanny could not help everyone in this grim world - there was too much damage done - but the greatest villains betray themselves and are seen much more clearly against the backdrop of Fanny's virtue. They are forced to move away, leaving Fanny to bring harmony to what was left.
The whole book would be a tragedy, an exercise in degrees of misery, if it weren't for the insightful, moral, integrous, deep, grateful, self-effacing, resilience of the 'insipid' Fanny Price.
Fanny Price suffers from being the heroine after Lizzie Bennet. She does not bend when the pressure to do so is almost overwhelming. She endures
Absolutely Catriona. I think "she endures" is a good way to summarise Fanny Price. And perhaps this might owe a nod to Samuel Johnson ("Amongst her [Austen's] favourite writers, [was] Johnson in prose", _Memoir of Jane Austen_ by her nephew James Edward Austen-Leigh (1869)), who famously wrote: "Human life is everywhere a state in which much is to be endured, and little to be enjoyed" ('Rasselas', 1759, ch.11).
I agree that Fanny Price seems to suffer from not being Lizzy Bennet (but, then, many heroines do!), and - given that she's Austen's next heroine - the comparison between them perhaps appears more stark. When _Pride and Prejudice_ was first published, Austen wrote to her sister Cassandra (on 29th January 1813) that "I must confess that I think her [Lizzy] as delightful a creature as ever appeared in print, & how I shall be able to tolerate those who do not like _her_ at least, I do not know". Austen wrote this letter while she was still writing _Mansfield Park_ (which would be published the next year in 1814). Austen _knew_ how to write a "delightful" heroine, so I think we should pay attention to why Austen did not make Fanny Price "delightful" (in the way that Lizzy Bennet might be said to be).
I almost see MP as a thought experiment as what if Anne de Bough was the heroine. Fanny is Anne without the privileges and entitlement and Mary is kinda a shadow of Lizzie - someone who has her wit, energy and musical talent (and I think Lizzie is talented she just isn't dedicated enough become accomplished whereas Mary is) but without her moral compass and true kindness. Mary's almost the sort of person Lady Catherine believes Lizzy to be.
Except Mary is wealthy.
Well, Fanny did bed during the part of the book where the cousins decided to put on a play and she had been against it through most of that but then caved towards the end because Mary so aggressively hounds her about it while shoving her interest of Edmond into Fanny's face. I really hated Mary for that behavior, acting innocent but knowing exactly what she was doing.
I have always loved the character of Fanny Price because I could relate to her. Quiet on the outside and overlooked much of the time but with a busy mind and deep feeling. Most heroines are portrayed as confident and outgoing so it is nice to read about someone a little more like me. Through much of the book Fanny is pushed around but is also very strong in a way that many overlook. When she views something as morally wrong she holds her ground. That takes a lot of courage for someone in her circumstances; a young woman completely dependent upon the people who either neglect or take advantage of her.
Hello Dr Cox
I am humble bus driver but very enjoy jane austens work.
Both in the novels and most of the adaptations on screen
My own view i think people misunderstand fanny price
She is a very strong character who i believe controls herself very well also people must remember this a very time when the book is written and the treatment of women by society and men is different
I agree Steve - I think Fanny is often misunderstood. Her outward silence, for instance, is sometimes confused for inner silence. And she's really not silent inwardly at all! - we readers have access to a great deal of emotion that Fanny feels that she has to conceal from those around her.
I'm with you Steve.
I agree, Steve. I think Fanny shows her strength in patiently fulfilling her subservial family role and trying to limit her expectations, though she longs for Edmund. I don’t know anything about literature, but love Austen and reading novels in general.
I have always been attached to Franny Price, ever since I first read the book at sixteen ( a bit of a jolt for someone who spent their free time reading high fantasy) I can't properly express the frustration I felt when I tried talking to other people about this character, only to find them lukewarm at best or openly scornful of her at worst.
It took rereading Mansfield Park after college to finally understand why I liked Franny. She was as painfully introverted as I was in school.
She felt the same horror at being somewhere and not doing anything, just taking up space. The same inability to make their opinions understood (the scene where Mary insisted that Franny take a necklace chain she didn't want still gets a sympathy sigh from me.)
I have had a fondness for Fanny since first reading Mansfield Park as a teenager. She was the first Austen heroine with whom I could identify and has always been my heroine. Her life has a rich inner landscape hidden by her circumstances. This takes depth and strength of character.
I wonder if Fanny's unpopularity with many Austen readers has to do with her apparent lack of a sense of humour...? She observes other people's motivations & bad behaviour very clearly, just as Elinor and Elizabeth do, but I'm not sure that she retains much sense of proportion about them? And she definitely seems to lack Elizabeth's wryly humorous self-awareness of her own weaknesses/mistakes. Fanny is stubborn and has integrity, just like the other Austen heroines, but in her story the satirical humour seems to be entirely in the narrator's voice, rather than in her own mind's voice.
I think your interpretation is good but I always got the impression that Fanny was dead against the theatricals because the play was so risqué and she could see the potential for mischief between the young men and young ladies. And she was completely right, and later her refusal to jon in was vindicated. Her moral backbone seems to me to be a big theme in Mansfield Park.
I think that the problem with Fanny as a heroine isn't as it at first appears that she's passive and introverted and conventionally virtuous by the standards of the time, because Anne Elliot is also passive, introverted and conventionally virtuous and she's a much beloved Austen heroine. Anne Elliot has a rich inner world, and is capable of mature self reflection, learning from her experience and changing her mind. Fanny Price's inner world on the other hand is pretty unappealing by modern standards. She's rigid, immature and has a strong moral core (which is so archaic that it's alien and repulsive to a modern woman) which she uses to make harsh, rigid, immature judgements about other people that seem silly, hysterical and mean spirited by modern standards. So I think that Mrs Austen is right, Fanny isn't a satisfactory heroine, but it's not because she's insipid.
Couldn't have said it better
Persuasion and Mansfield Park are my favorite of Jane Austen's novels because the heroines are introverts. They are just as strong as the other heroines, but they have a different way of looking at things and acting on things.
Of all her novels, Mansfield Park is the one I have the most mixed feelings about. I liked Fanny Price a lot because I recognized myself in her (her hypersensitivity in particular), but I resented her for being so critical of Henry Crawford when he was actively trying to be a better person. I also resented Jane Austen for the whole ending. The fact that Edmund partly "raised" Fanny felt like he unconsciously groomed her to be what HE thinks a respectable lady should be. Sometimes it even felt like she would not allow herself to think differently from him (the way Mr. Collins acts with Lady de Bourgh). Throughout the book, I felt weirded out by Fanny's obsession and infatuation with her cousin. He literally was the only person to ever show her kindness in an environment where she didn't feel safe. He quickly became her only hope in this cruel, unjust world. Of course she would be in love with him ! For the most part, I thought that she would end up marrying Henry and I was glad about the idea of her outgrowing her dependance to Edmund. I would have prefered him to be a symbol of brotherly affection instead. But alas... That being said, I can't understand how anyone would think Fanny weak or insipid given that she is the most resilient character in all of Austen's novels. She stands her ground whatever the consequences, even if she doesn't do so in an obvious way. I've come to realise that the way we feel about fictional characters says more about ourselves than it does about the characters. The question is not whether Fanny Price is indeed insipid, but rather what makes us think so in the first place. The fact that I was frustrated by the development of the story says more about me than it does about the book.
Isn't the point that Crawford's attempts to be better are just shallow play-acting, as his actions with Maria prove immediately after Fanny refuses him?
Henry isn't a man of high moral character like Edmund, but they strongly resemble each other in their complete disregard for Fanny's clearly expressed distaste for the former's persistent attentions. The author states that had Henry exercised self control Fanny would eventually have married him. But I firmly believe she would have come to regret it. Mary Crawford knew her brother well, and she expected him to tire of Fanny. Courtesy, not constancy, was her highest expectation of her brother if he married Fanny.
Fanny is very intelligent and has keen perception of character. She sees through Henry Crawford right away while others are charmed by him. Her rejection of him during his self-improvement attempts merely show the power of her intelligence. Her keen intuition warns her that Crawford’s attempts to be a better man are shallow and insubstantial, as is shortly proved when he runs away with Maria.
Granted, I haven't read Mansfield Park in nearly 40 years (Heavens! I'm OLD!), but I remember being sorry for Fanny rather than annoyed by her. To me, insipid equates to boring. She isn't boring. She is to be pitied. She couldn't help falling in love, nor could she change her place in the family's pecking order. At least she is self-aware enough to see her circumstances honestly.
Dr. Cox - Thank you for your analysis.
I think that in Mansfield Park, Jane Austen taught that the character of a person can be demonstrated more by their actions and influence than by their words. Austen had likely thought about the admonition of the New Testament that “by their fruits ye shall know them.” Austen wrote Fanny as a character of power and strength by showing what good happens around her, rather than by giving her words to make her an outwardly compelling and charming subject.
She accomplishes part of this with strong contrasts. Mary Crawford is obviously entertaining and sharp witted and sure to dominate a room. Maria and Julia make immediate impressions on everyone around them. But the reader understands they are empty people, who do little of benefit for anyone.
On the other hand, Fanny is weak and quiet, but her power is shown by what slowly happens around her over time. Austen did not describe Fanny by Fanny’s words or wit. Instead, the reader is forced to learn Fanny’s character from her outcomes over the long term. As time goes by, the main characters become more and more dependent on Fanny. Lady Bertram comes to depend on her. Edmund comes to depend on her. Sir Thomas Bertram comes to depend on her. Frank Crawford comes to adore her. Mary Crawford starts to see Fanny as someone she wants to follow. Fanny even positively benefits the members of her immediate family from a distance. It seems like the entire family begins to rotate around quiet and weak Fanny. And those who fall under her influence all become better people.
Austen has somewhat the same approach with Elinor in Sense & Sensibility, and with Ann in Persuasion. But it is not entirely unexpected that capable daughters like Elinor and Ann would come to have a strong influence in their families. With Fanny, it is unexpected that a stray and undereducated cousin, who should be far below all four of the Bertram children, would end up being the most dominant person in the family. Fanny quietly wields an influence that ends up being even greater than the mighty Elinor and the strong Ann.
Fanny is the hero we all need more of. She makes everyone better, without needing attention or admiration. Thank you, Jane Austen, for this magnificent heroine.
Fanny's situation was totally, utterly different from that of any of the other heroines. She was the only one who came from a working class family, and her presence at mansfield park was an anomaly, in the novel itself, as mrs.norris keeps pointing out at every opportunity. The bennets may not be as wealthy as the bingleys or the darcys. but they were owed courtesy, according to the social norms, because they were still gentry. Elizabeth Bennet could not have displayed wit and an independent attitude if mr.darcy was not even obliged to acknowledge her. whereas, Fanny is actually invisible to all except her kind cousin, and the lady of the house who sometimes needs her caring services.Jane Austen must have strayed from her comfort zone in writing Fanny's character. She must have had little contact or even interest in working class people,in her own life.She had no authorial devices to make her interesting beyond making her straightforwardly selfless, loyal and hopeful in the face of hopelessness. She is the kind of heroine one finds in the works dealing with poor folk - characters who was un-apologetically selfless, restrained and keep their hope even though they have little to look forward to, in contrast, all her other characters are self assured, and are selfless only in an understated or offhand way - they are what we now call 'cool'.
We all would like to be Lizzy Bennett but I have always seen more of myself in Fanny, so I like to hear positive opinions of her!
I found this a very interesting episode. One of my friends shocked me years ago when she declared Fanny too insipid and frustrating to read about. I have never thought that Fanny was insipid or particularly passive. She’s just a very strong introvert. In fact, I have always seen her as an extremely interesting character!
One of the issues with MP that I find fascinating is that Fanny is the only central Austen character who grows up as a displaced child in another family. She's not exactly adopted by the Bertrams but she is one of, I have no idea how many, children from that time period who were sent off to richer family members to be raised. Austen's own brother Edward had a similar experience, so it had to be a somewhat common occurence. Being 'discarded' by your family has to have an enormous impract on a child's development and sefl-esteem, and I think if Austen had made Fanny an outgoing, vivacious girl who freely spoke her mind, the Betrams would have sent her packing back to Portsmouth ASAP!
Except he was raised as an only child and heir, from what I remember hearing. That's not to say there couldn't be separation anxiety. Informal adoptions, especially when relatives had no children of their own, was quite common.
In Emma, Frank Churchill is sent to live with, and become the heir of his Aunt after his mother dies. He even takes her last name. Much is made of how he hardly visits his father and misses the wedding, but a case could be made to justify feelings of resentment and abandonment towards his father.
Fanny's character has one foot in the world of Charles Dickens. True, the Bennett sisters, the girls in Sense and Sensibility, and other such characters don't have much to look forward to, either. But there are different degrees of 'don't have much to look forward to'
As someone who is an introvert I do identify with Fanny, and I understand her interior looking life. But I can also see how compared with Lizzy or Emma she might appear as a less interesting fictional character. In real life people do often misinterpret an introverts quietness as passivity or as lacking something to contribute. How much of her passivity is her nature and how much is forced by the circumstances she finds herself in is an important question. She definitely exhibits the survival mechanisms that those who experience trauma and abuse often are forced to develop.
I have wondered if Fanny may actually be closest to how Jane herself was. I can imagine Jane in her circumstances as the poor relation being supported by her brother and who suffered from health problems, perhaps often being in situations where she sat to the side and observed society around her without being noticed. That ability to go unnoticed may have contributed to her ability to so richly capture the society she lived in. It is my experience that people quite often become unguarded around an introvert, revealing thoughts and actions that they hide from others they perceive as more in the thick of things.
From her few letters that survive I can't say that I've ever pictured her that way.
And I think it's a bit of both. She sounded a bit timid by nature, even at home, but being introverted by mayor would make the adjustment to Mansfield that much more brutal.
I've always liked to wonder how different, or the same to a lesser degree, she would have been has she been raised at home.
when i started reading austen by the age of 14, i started with P and P and loved it ( and still do). over the the years i read all her novels and its mansfield park which turned out to be my go to book, when im in a bad mood.
it took me about 20 years and lot of rereading of this novel to appreciate Fanny over Lizzy Bennet or Anne Elliot. She is strong and bright, a bit like the quiet kid in school who always helps you with math.
compared to Lizzy, who ,to honest ,is a bit shallow at the beginning, Fanny has a strenght of mind and moral, and im always sad, that it was mr. crawford who detects this fact first in mansfield Park.
Like a lot of people who doesnt talk that much, by choice or otherwise,she observes and sees people for who they are. a rare gift in mansfield , since erveryone else is pretending to be different than they are. besides maybe from Lady Bertram but shes so shallow that it is negligible.
Fanny is shy by a education and position in life, but her mind is strong and her instincts of right and wrong in a moral way , not a societal, are crystal clear. And it took even the stubborn mr. Crawford quite alot of energy to even slightly convince Fanny of his more or less good intentions. But he and all his actions helped to give her the self-assurance she gets to recognize her own worth and the worth of her feelings .
but i think that even being married to Edmund doesnt change the family dynamic more drastic than Marias and Mr. Norris absence.
in my humble opinion Fanny is , with Anne Elliot and Elenore Dashwood, one of the strongest of austens characters.
I think it took me over 30 years to appreciate Fanny. I hated her "meekiness" when I was younger. But now can appreciate her strenght.
This is interesting. I have never thought of Fanny as insipid. She is carefully walking a path through life where there is danger at every step, either physical, emotional, or moral. To be honest, I think I relate to Fanny because we have similar internal processes and rarely show what we are feeling on the outside. I would hate to be though insipid because of it.🤔
When I first read this book I was amazed at Fanny's strength -- leaving a family where she was important among her siblings, to a family who hardly noticed her -- she had to learn the necessity of pleasing by serving, without imposing her opinions. In surroundings where her opinions would have been of no importance, she developed the ability to keep her thoughts to herself, no matter how strongly she felt, and was able to keep true no matter how much others went astray. I feel that she became introverted by necessity, not by nature. Absolutely NOT insipid.
I grew up in an abusive household and I relate more to Fanny Price and Anne Elliot than I do to Emma Woodhouse.
I always liked Mansfield Park but I never really articulated to myself why. This video and the comments beneath it are starting to explain why:)
Excellent! Octavia
Anyone who thinks Fanny is stupid for not standing up for herself has never experienced continued abuse. I am glad for them. Not only is she an introvert, but she is constantly emotionally abused, unintentionally by most, and intentionally by Aunt Norris.
I have always loved Fanny, from the first time I watched the 1983 BBC mini series, through all of my readings. I loved watching her grow from lonely, abused girl, to the glue that held her family together and a mentor to a younger sister, although that sister had a "happier temper".
I personally don't think that the problem is "modern" audiences, but a lack of understanding Fanny's situation.
My favorite thing about Mansfield Park is that Fanny keeps trying to bring up slavery aka "the business in Antigua" that is vaguely referred to, and nobody will talk about it. Adds some dark humor and a dash of social commentary.
The "business in Antigua" is off-stage, but is fundamental to understanding much of _Mansfield Park_ , I think (especially the themes of dominance and cruelty that run through the novel).
Austin also tries to bring in the happenings there through Tom's illness. His angst at what happens comes out in his delirium. Austin, being a woman and being confined to her world of English gentry living in the countryside had no window into the wider world. She was necessarily handicapped in the matter of knowing the wide world. But still, she does try to fit in what little she must have gathered about the world. I always found that remarkable about Mansfield Park
@@owl6218 I also think it's because Jane Austen is far more in the position of a Fanny Price than a Bertram daughter. While she wants to say something about the morality of slavery she is also dependent on the charity of her rich relatives- to let her visit, to conduct business on her behalf, to help fund her books, for carriage rides to the city and hopefully for an inheritance. I think we put so much of our modern sensibilities on her. Even at living only at Mansfield and Portsmouth she is more traveled than Emma or Catherine Moreland who never left home until she was 17!
She, Fanny Price, is a heroine I've always appreciated since I first encountered her (probably in 1976). I relate to her. Much of my action in between my ears.
I think Fanny’s personality shy, reserved, and quiet and her nature submissive (we can’t all be bold leaders). She is moved to Mansfield Park at age 8 (was it 8? Or 7) and her shyness is compounded with abuse, put downs, and devaluation, especially by Mrs Norris, pretty much upon arrival. She fights through her shyness and the constant put downs to a place where she feels fairly comfortable and useful. Her quietness does not mean she is not perceptive and her strength shows in her (passive) resistance to marrying Mr Crawford. By the time she is grown and most of the marriage and flirting action happens in the book, she could not have put up an active resistance. If she had gone against her inclination and yelled (politely) back at someone, she would be suspected of being ill or not in her right mind or something because it would have been so out of character and she would have lost the fight. I think Austen does a good job showing what it is like to be very shy and very self conscious and very concerned with rules and manners and morals. She is not a traditional heroine but why does every heroine have to be the same?
I hadn't really given it this much thought, but I do remember thinking that Fanny and Edmund were the only two sane people in the entire cast. I loved how quiet, steady, and real she was (to me, at least). I thought I loved her because the whole book was her point of view. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that anyone likes Mrs. Norris or Mary Crawford... I found Mrs. Norris unbearable and something was just off about Mary Crawford.
I really enjoyed your explanation/ interpretation of Fanny!! I am quite introverted and I tend to stick to what I know to be moral or right (to the dismay of my rebellious teenage friends) so I’ve always related to Fanny. My favorite line from Mansfield Park is “her thoughts and reflections were habitually her best companions”. Fanny may be a bit passive on the outside, but Austen gives us a glimpse into her internal thoughts and reflections which are not passive in the slightest. Justice for Fanny!!
A beautiful quotation - and one which sums Fanny up exactly. She dwells with her own thoughts.
A Psychiatrist would say Fanny had a "strong ego".
*ego strength*
_. . . in psychoanalytic theory, the ability of the ego to maintain an effective balance between the inner impulses of the id, the superego, and outer reality. An individual with a strong ego is thus one who is able to tolerate frustration and stress, postpone gratification, modify selfish desires when necessary, and resolve internal conflicts and emotional problems before they lead to neurosis._
1. You have convinced me to read Mansfield Park again. You already had with your video on the worst marriages in Austen (I just discovered your channel so forgive me if I am viewing things out of order!) but this continues that. 2. Fanny's characterization makes sense for someone who is horribly bullied. I was bullied throughout my childhood and I was extremely withdrawn outwardly in my teenage years but very inwardly reflective. The idea of being overlooked and forgotten really rang true to my experience, especially the hurt that comes with it. I am especially interested in rereading the book with that perspective. I think my initial disappointment with Fanny was the lack of wit. Emma is my favorite Austen heroine--she is the one I identify the most with now--and while P&P is not my favorite of the books, the banter is strong, and Fanny does come off as lackluster when compared to Lizzie and Emma and the like.
Many thanks for your message, Rachel. Mansfield Park is well worth multiple readings! - so I’d definitely recommend reading it more than once. And - as you suggest - the wit of the novel comes much, much less from the characters themselves, and far more from the wry observations of the narrative voice.
Perhaps people dislike Fanny because she does have such a strong moral centre and sticks to her guns. Most of Austen's heroines are flawed like most of us are. We can identify with them because of it. We do hate a 'goody two shoes' in general. Fanny denies herself popularity in order to do the right thing and that takes great strength of character. I haven't read Mansfield Park for about 40 years so I may be misremembering, but she is a character who has been expected to keep in the background and not put herself forward. She is rather like a fish out of water growing up in Mansfield Park. One wonders how she might have been different, more lively, more confident if she had stayed in Portsmouth. This passage shows how her thoughts are far from the impassive and 'insipid' character she is accused of. I think you've made a good case for her.
Thank you very much, Viv. Yes, that's a great way to put it - and she denies herself popularity (and an easier life, arguably) by refusing to overlook others _not_ doing the right thing.
@@DrOctaviaCox I really love your close analysis of the text in these posts. It is astonishing how a choice of word can change or define a subject and point of view. I'd better get Mansfield Park out for another whirl. Youve wetted my appetite.
@Dr Octavia Cox A great touch to mention the late Tony Tanner whose chapter on Mansfield Park is excellent. I only half agree with him when he refers to Fanny Price as passive. She's passive in her actions towards herself but not always with other people. “You will hurt yourself, Miss Bertram,” she cried; “you will certainly hurt yourself against those spikes; you will tear your gown; you will be in danger of slipping into the ha-ha. You had better not go.” This is very metaphorical as Fanny is trying to stop Maria Bertram endangering her marriage to Mr Rushworth. Also Fanny rents book for Susan from a circulating library and buys betsy a knife to solve this dispute. When Fanny starts to genuinely consider a life with Mr Crawford she takes into account that he would almost certainly allow Susan to come live with them. Do you have an opinion?
Well done Dr Cox. Mansfield Park has always been my favourite of Austen's works, and Fanny is totally undervalued as the novel's heroine.
Thank you for this. I only read the book once and I remember that I could relate to Fanny a lot.
I might seem insipid from the outside but from the inside I am completely the opposite and only the people who know me well know that.
I always saw Fanny's imagination, through her stories, as the key to her. Not insipid, but forced into appearing so, in order to fulfill the station she was regulated to within the household. She had no choice in her day to day situation, but her refusal to marry Crawford speaks to a hardened resolve and her real character. There are many types of heroine's. Fanny survived what she was born into, her upbringing(or lack thereof)and got what she ultimately wanted.
Watching this video has made me appreciate even more what a down to earth breather was MP compared to P&P. They are completely opposite novels on so many levels. I made this connection while watching though YMMV: P&P shows the JOYS of a “union” overcoming background differences while MP shows the DANGERS of a “union” that does not. Elizabeth and Darcy’s clashes is rewarded with deeper understanding and ultimately reconciliation and happiness, while Fanny’s “union” to Mansfield Park (and later culminating in her marriage to Edmund) shows how mentally scarring a union could be when it is unequal in so many ways and also lacking mutual empathy and understanding. MP also begins right off the bat with another poorer girl marrying a rich guy (the Bertrams) almost like picking up right off where P&P left off, but it slides into the more melancholic area because the Bertrams while having love and fortune are a highly flawed couple. Unlike Darcy who initially somewhat looked down on Elizabeth but it turned out mostly harmless and ended up with a satisfying union of equality, Fanny suffered this “looked-down upon” for half of her life, the damages to her mentality shows in how uncomfortably withdrawn, guarded and sensitive she became as an adult compared to Elizabeth. Fanny might actually have another tangible reason for rejecting Henry other than the ones Austen proposed: she suffered the consequences of being raised in a materially prosperous and respectable home but treated with less dignity than not. That may account for a large part of her character that tends to disregard wealth, or as Mary Crawford puts it, untouched by ambition. That is also why she is able to see through Henry when so many others have not, because she already suffered the consequences of living a superficially ideal but innately unideal situation firsthand. Fanny sounds very different from Austen’s primary characteristics and kudos to her for being able to capture a heroine that is so different from what she personally experiences.
Unfortunately I personally think her male protagonists fall a little short in this novel that contributed to its unpopularity. A lot of people rooted for Henry Crawford not because he is the attractive, rich and sociable “bad boy”, except his passion and perception is contrasted by Edmund, who is unclear perhaps whether he married Fanny out of convenience. While he understands Fanny better he lacks the comprehension of her more heroic qualities such as selfless, passionate love, which Henry does. Ultimately however neither is actually a great match for her. This is sort of analogous to Fanny unable to find an ideal home in either her birthplace Portsmouth nor adoptive home MP. Had Austen perhaps overdone it and made it too much of a grievance against “the sparkly & bright” P&P? It just seems to me Fanny is having such a tough time in the novel. If only Henry and Fanny could find some comprisable middle ground, this would’ve been a very different novel…
What an interesting take on problematic Fanny! In the intro to one of my copies of MP, the editor points out that, despite her 'passivity,' Fanny in the end gets everything she wants. In fact I think she is the only one to do so.
I like all the Austen characters because they’re very relatable. I liked Catherine Moorland for example. She reminded me very much of myself: not always aware of people’s behaviors or intentions, a bit over imaginative, extremely apologetic for any little thing gone wrong, and a huge book fanatic. I also liked Fanny price because she was shy, (also like me), and she was determined in what was right and wrong, even in personal decisions. And I think that’s a good female role model. You don’t need to scream “you’re a manipulative coward!” From the rooftop to a bad person. You just need the courage to give that person a determined “no!” And move on! No means no. Not even if you bribe me.
Your analysis was very interesting to me as I'm currently struggling with Mansfield Park as a novel. I have a hard time relating to Fanny, partially because she seems so passive to the outside. I could hardly find anything to connect with her so far but maybe now I know where to look for something.
Thank you Doro. I hope so!
I think it can help if one thinks of Fanny as a person who is imprisoned within her own mind because she feels so paralysed by and unwelcome in the world she has to exist in.
There’s a relatively obscure 1980’s miniseries of Mansfield Park which has the best performance in Fanny, IMO. The rest of the miniseries is not that great, but I loved how the actor and director interpreted her character. There may be one or two low-quality clips floating around on CZcams.
After finding your videos, I purposely looked for one on Mansfield Park's Fanny price, and you had it. Thank you. I agree with your analysis of it on many levels. Like many, I didn't like nor admire Fanny price when I first read the book, but the more often I read it, the more I admired her strength of character even if I didn't agree with her. I don't think I would have liked her, though to be honest, I don't think I would have liked anyone in Mansfield Park. In fact, it is a rare novel in that you can enjoy it even though you don't identify with nor particularly like anyone in it. They are all very flawed people, including Fanny. An interesting aspect I find about Mansfield Park is the more open portrayal of the pull between social traditional norms and sexually 'liberal' behavior as represented by the Crawfords. The first being rewarded and the second, if not being punished, then definitely not rewarded. In her other novels, they may touch on the Madonna/whore complex, see Lydia vs her sisters and Mr Darcy acting to protect Lizzy's reputation, however, it isn't shown quite so blatantly as it is in MF and how it really isn't very far away.
Dear Octavia Cox, I would very much like the BBC to take notice of you - it is fascinating and enlightening to listen to your presentations - A voice from Denmark
My favorite line from Mansfield Park, which made me finally enjoy the novel, comes close to the end--where the narrator reflects that Fanny's joy comes at the cost at everyone else's misery. Her cousin is disgraced, her aunt embarrassed, her uncle not so wealthy and unable to consolidate his fortune through his children's marriage (no more clawing one's way up the social ladder, or even staying at the same rung!), and her lover, well, he's been appropriately abashed. That's when I realized--Fanny's hilarious! She's meant to be priggish with a heart of gold, long-suffering but so very obvious about it, with a backbone of steel. And her happy ending is such a wonderful about-face from the passage outlined in the video. She's come from the margin of the play to the center of the action.
Recently I watched The Stitch in Time exploration of the portrait of Lord Mansfield's niece, Dido Belle, and her cousin. Fanny and Dido are in a loose parallel to each other--the poor relation, educated at the family's expense, made into some kind of steward, and petted by the family patriarch. Except that Dido was enslaved by her own father and then her uncle, and only won her freedom at his death. I wonder if Jane Austen had heard of the portrait, or at least wondered at the difficulty of that woman's position, both favorite, relative, and enslaved property.
Mansfield Park has always been the hardest of the Jane Austen novels for me, and didn't quite make sense until I read about Lord Mansfield's landmark ruling. Fanny is part of that class of religious abolitionists, who take their faith deadly seriously--to the point where she surrenders her material comfort for her own truth, and makes the best of it. She cleans up her house, does her best to educate her rather willful favorite sister, and she's certainly not saintly about it, she's wonderfully irritable! It took me three reads and Dr. Helena Kelly's book, but I learned to enjoy her. I may not like her, and Mary Crawford is so wonderfully inappropriate and crass, but Fanny makes me laugh.
And on an unrelated point--I think it's a shame Charlotte Bronte stopped reading Jane Austen at Pride & Prejudice, because she would've enjoyed Mansfield Park, particularly the ur-evangelicism of Fanny & Edmund. Except, of course, Fanny goes for the wealthier version of St John, rather than waiting for the dissolutions of Henry Crawford to wreck his health and weaken him enough so he can't degrade her if she hands over her economic autonomy to him.
As for Fanny being 'selfless' in her feelings in the immortal words Tori Amos 'I could escape your world if I thought she was the better girl' but she sees through Mary and I think knows deep down Edmund is blind to Mary's faults and they are not compatable. There's a certain amount of values dissonance as both Fanny and Edmund come across as unbearably sanctimonious as they had different values in a different time especially in the play which to us in the modern age comes across as a storm in a teacup. However I respect Fanny for sticking to her guns while Edmund ditches his morality to chase after Mary - I guess Edmund conforms to to two tropes that really annoy me - sanctimous hypocrite and hormone blindness - the later has two cruder euthasisms I won't use here.
I totally agree - I think Fanny would have done the selfless thing and tried to get over Edmond if Mary Crawford had actually been a good match for him. Fanny sees Mary's avariciousness and lack of principle very clearly, so she can't possibly want that for Edmond.
Fanny has a problem, I think, in that she’s the moral centre of the book, and devoted to Edmund - and both endorse a casting-off of Maria that’s pretty brutal. The standards of the day demand it, of course, but Austen’s other books show a bit more flexibility: Lydia is allowed to visit her old home to say goodbye, Colonel Brandon stands by his fallen ward, and the latter, at least, is taken as a sign of kindness. It never seems to occur to Fanny that Maria should be treated more mercifully - indeed, she’s appalled that Mary suggests it - which leaves the modern reader, at least, with a bad taste.
But she does genuinely make sacrifices for her principles; she doesn’t demand others pay any price she wouldn’t expect to pay herself. Refusing Henry Crawford is the most obvious, but one that I like is the moment where she refuses the theatricals. Earlier, we’ve heard Edmund plead with Maria not to take part, and when she brushes him off by saying it would be rude to criticise the choice of play, he tells her that what she ought to do is set a quiet example by simply saying she felt unable to take it on. When Fanny is pressed to take a part, that’s exactly what she does: ‘It would be absolutely impossible for me,’ she says, while keeping all criticisms to herself. A higher-status girl might be recognised as showing leadership there - Edmund argues it would be an act of leadership in Maria - but Fanny can’t get away with it, and is rejected and berated by everyone.
So I think we can see Fanny as being a character with leadership qualities who has, from her childhood, been absolutely forbidden to lead. The narrative mentions that in her Portsmouth childhood, her younger siblings looked up to and relied on her; aptly enough for the child of a serviceman, she has a kind of soldierliness when there’s a need to be useful. And back in Portsmouth again, she takes a leadership role with Susan, the only sibling she’s allowed to influence, to dramatic effect. Given freedom of action, Fanny becomes active - but in Mansfield, she has none. The only power she has is the power of refusal and of keeping her private opinions independent, and she exercises those with tremendous willpower.
A person in a situation this dysfunctional, with no further power to act, may well be frustrating, but when I read the book I mostly feel frustrated for Fanny rather than by her.
I think the difference between what happens to Lydia and Brandon's ways is that they were seduced (by the standards of the time) by men that had no concern for them.
Maria on the other hand was married. She went into it willingly and happily. Going by a religious perspective that would be a far, far greater affront.
@@DestinyKiller I think that is exactly right. Lydia and Brandon's ward were unmarried women; they did not, as Maria did, commit adultery. They did not break marriage vows. I don't think it occurs to any "right-thinking" character in the novel that Maria should be treated more mercifully. In fact, Sir Thomas might have chosen to disown his daughter, but he decides to continue to maintain her, which by the standards of the time, might be considered merciful.
I really dislike Edmund a lot more - he's such a santimonius hypocrite. I'm glad Fanny got him in the end but only because that's what she wanted. I also think Edmund was grossly insensitive and lead by the dumb stick.
Edmund was just the worst. I was rooting for Henry, until he went back to his "ain't trash" ways.
I felt no one was good enough for Fanny. I hated the ending.
I blame the hormones. He came to his senses later on and became a far better person, no doubt.
Edmund values Fanny to the extent that she reflects his ideas and agrees with him. He sees her as his 'Mini-me'.
He’s her cousin, I’m seriously like grossed out at that but I guess it was the times... that’s why I couldn’t connect to the love story, I was shipping more Mr. Crawford but he had to go and be vain again 🤦🏻♀️
Fanny Price was always my favorite heroine in all Austen's works. I don't believe her insipid at all, I think she's quite sharp actually. She totally sees through all of the "improprieties" in the acting scheme. She's just too loyal to snitch on her cousins, and she's too humble to put her thoughts ahead of others. It's not uncommon for people to *say* that looks don't matter to them, they only care about the content of others' hearts and characters. But with Fanny, that claim is tested. She is not funny or charming, but she is sweet, loving, kind, loyal, and dutiful. A true heroine.
Fanny being a poor relation didn't really have much authority in the household, she was keenly aware of her position. When she rejected Henry Crawford she was returned home, this showed her position within the household. Fanny and Mary Crawford are perfect contrasts in Regency women. Mary has position so her more loose version of morality and some of the people she associates with does not define her. Fanny being of more modest position her virtue and standing within the family is central to who she is, she doesn't have the latitude to be as transparent as Mary Crawford.
Illuminating, as always. On the whole I think you are right. I'm just not convinced by your comments on Anna's "couldn't bear Fanny". I think it's perfectly possible for someone to say they "couldn't bear" a heroine they found insipid. Fanny's insipidity early in the novel is annoying. What I don't see is just how anyone could still find Fanny insipid after she resists Henry Crawford and is proved to have been right about him in the end.
Fanny is perhaps the Austen heroine I identify with most. Or at least did at the time I read MP. It's been awhile. I remember so strongly empathizing with her being sent away at a young age (I experienced something similar) and growing up with low self-esteem but a strong sense of morality and justice that often left me feeling alienated from those around me and unable to participate in the things others were doing.
Fanny has so many strong personalities around her and they all either think she should be someone she's not or think she's ridiculous for not pursuing happiness the way they are. She very rarely gets approval from anyone and yet she manages to stay true to herself and her sense of right and wrong even when doing what's right causes her inner turmoil.
I agree 100% that she is stronger and more passionate than she is given credit for and I think a lot of the hate directed her way may be because people see realities in her story that mirror their own lives but that they're not quite comfortable with.
Lizzy and Eleanor are perhaps the Austen characters I most aspire to be like. But in the end I have more in common with Fanny and Anne.
My least favourite Austen heroine is Catherine but I think I would be less impatient with her girlish naiveté now that I've grown out of that myself.
Thank you for so interesting analysis! Maby you could explain why having a theatre at home was such a big deal? It always baffled me.
It is puzzling - especially as the Austens themselves frequently put on theatrical productions at Steventon. I think it's less to do with the act of putting on a play in and of itself but the choice of play, called 'Lovers' Vows'. Readers experience Fanny first reading the play and her horror at its impropriety and immodesty:
"The first use she made of her solitude was to take up the volume which had been left on the table, and begin to acquaint herself with the play of which she had heard so much. Her curiosity was all awake, and she ran through it with an eagerness which was suspended only by intervals of astonishment, that it could be chosen in the present instance, that it could be proposed and accepted in a private theatre! Agatha and Amelia appeared to her in their different ways so totally improper for home representation-the situation of one, and the language of the other, so unfit to be expressed by any woman of modesty, that she could hardly suppose her cousins could be aware of what they were engaging in..." (ch.14)
The "situation" of Agatha is that she is unmarried but has a child.
The "language" of Amelia clearly worried the translator of the play too. Elizabeth Inchbald (who translated 'Lovers' Vows' (1798) into English from the German original 'Das Kind der Liebe') wrote in the preface:
"The part of Amelia has been a very particular object of my solicitude and alteration: the same situations which the author gave her remain, but almost all the dialogue of the character I have changed: the forward and unequivocal manner in which she announces her affection to her lover, in the original, would have been revolting to an English audience: the passion of love, represented on the stage, is certain to be insipid or disgusting, unless it creates smiles or tears: Amelia’s love, by Kotzebue [in the original 'Das Kind der Liebe'], is indelicately blunt, and yet void of mirth or sadness: I have endeavoured to attach the attention and sympathy of the audience by whimsical insinuations, rather than coarse abruptness..."
Fanny also knows that the play would anger and upset Sir Bertram. As a dependent, she is keenly aware of his temperament, and does not dare to arouse his ire. Even in his absence, his domination of the family is absolute in her mind. Of course, she is precisely correct in his reaction!
So glad I found this. My opinion, I read the books many yrs ago, so I am mainly going by the depiction of her character (2008). She was the poor relation, so she knew her place. It wasn't a moral block for her to refuse Crawford's proposal, rather she saw him playing the same game with Maria. She would've been sent right back to her parents if she mentioned Maria's behavior towards Henry C - his behavior didn't really matter because she was already in love with Edmund and she wasn't about to lose that for anything. I know, marrying a cousin, but they did that...Fanny also cared for Edmund a lot because he was very ethical.
I feel fanny price “s inner world and emotions are sufficiently depicted if not better than any other heroines in jane Austen “s books. Given her condition living as a companion with her aunt and their family, she really didn’t have much choice than being complacent and pliant; however, we still can see her inner integrity and righteousness when it comes to misconduct (refusal of the marriage which takes so much fortitude !). The psychological insights are permeated through this book which is the highlight of its entirety. Dr Cox, can you tell us what you think of the writing in Emma ? I saw your video on it but when I read the novel, I feel the second half of the book gets a bit overbearing due to the repetitive minute details of the chit chat and the emphasis on characterization like miss bates and mr wood house. I feel the satire was overly done as their idocy is already established and the repetition of the chitchat is rather annoying. What do you feel ?
_Emma_ is a very difficult book, and I think it gets more difficult the more you unpick it & see just how much work Austen does with each sentence. Yes, I too think that Miss Bates and Mr Woodhouse (and Mrs Elton too) are easy to read as annoying characters, and so many people might dismiss _Emma_ as a result. But I think Austen is incredibly brave to write a novel about how boring life can be! And how repetitive. And how mundane. Part of Emma's state of imprisonment is that she's trapped in the boredom of life in Highbury, and the dreary, petty, dull conversations that go on day after day after day after day.
@@DrOctaviaCox thank you so much ! Very well said !! 💓💓💓🌹🌹🌹🌹
Emma is my favorite book of all time and I think that the overbearing nature of the other characters is part of the point. Emma is surrounded by people who will never match her. She adopts Harriet as a project, but she's honestly just as mundane as everyone else and can't keep up with her as well. Miss Bates is desperate to be pleasing and self-depreciating because she knows her actual lot in life, Mr. Woodhouse is obsessed with sickliness, and we as the reader are invited to join Emma in feeling superior to the both of them. What I love about Austen and her writing, especially in Emma, is that I always feel like she loves her characters and their flaws, and she pokes fun at them with fondness. It feels almost like a hug.
@@DrOctaviaCox I agree, Emma was very difficult for me to read through. I really enjoy all the others, just not that one.
I feel deeply for Miss Bates and I admire her too. No other character in Austen's novels displays such fortitude and wisdom under severe restrictions and alarming future prospects. As she is so dependent on the kindness of her neighbors for simple survival, she is to be commended for expressing appreciation and gratitude with such heartfelt sincerity.
I really dislike Emma for bullying Miss Bates. How Mr. Knightley could have any regard for her afterward is beyond my understanding.
Well, maybe not, she did take his just criticism to heart and humbly undertook to correct herself. And that is admirable.
I did read MP as a teenager in my mother tongue and really much enjoyed the reading. Now, a couple of weeks ago I revisited MP for the first time through an audiobook in English read by Karen Savage. I too enjoyed the experience of listening to the story, Fanny's struggles within her family, her character development through adolescence, the portrayal of all the other characters and the hint to broader and complex main social issues that are timeless or still impact problems of our time nowadays. It's such an interesting book and I would love to listen to more analyses of MP.
The only thing MP left me unsatisfied with as a 30 year old woman is Fanny's final choice of a marriage with her cousin Edmund.
All her life she was told that she has to be thankful and happy for her position at Mansfield Park no matter how much she was neglected by both her aunts and all her cousins except Edmund. Looking back it feels to me that her experiences and her upbringing taught her that her happiness is dependent on Mansfield because for her it's either Mansfield or her birth family. Is it not sad and harsh that her uncle did never send her to another place except the two? She did never meet other people of other circles except the ones her cousins were acquainted with. So Edmund Bertram ends up being the only decend man in her life to look up to except her brother William. And after an awfully long while Edmund will let Mary Crawford go, finally accept her goals in life, be heartbroken... and he will switch to Fanny, rather quickly, for my taste. So although I understand Fanny's feelings for Edmund and still think it's a pity she had no more intercourse with men of character she was not related to, Edmund's change of feelings to Fanny feels a bit rushed to me, leaving me unsatisfied about the marriage of the two and the end of the book.
Fanny was not a spineless little nonentity. When under pressure to accept Henry Crawford from the whole family, including Edmund, Fanny stood her ground. Her banishment to Portsmouth was intended by Sir Thomas to encourage her to be more compliant, but instead it gave her some autonomy and independence and secured her an ally in her sister, Susan. Plus, it gave Henry Crawford time to discredit himself and from that, caused Edmund to become disillusioned with Mary Crawford. Fanny's refusal to participate in the play was an early clue that she could only be controlled so much.
I finally subscribed to your channel😊. I'm enjoying the Austen videos especially. Thank you for discussing Fanny and for treating her as a fully realized character and not a place holding, afterthought. I'm not sure I agree with one person's comment about her marrying Edmond as a symptom of Stockholm syndrome, but I am still thinking it over. She is more challenging than people might realize, or why else would she be talked about so much?
She doesn't have a forward, modern personality so I see many not engage with her character. Your discussion and the comments show she has more to offer than at first read. I've always thought Fanny had plenty to offer all the characters in the book but that they didn't know or wonder why they should treat her as more than an afterthought. Edmond had the personality to treat her kindly when they were young and stayed friends with her as an adult. He only falls into neglect of her when he is dazzled by Mary when she flirts with him. Which definitely shows he hasn't had many flirtations with charming, young ladies. Haven't we all watched at least one friend be dazzled by the attentions of someone we thought wouldn't be good for them?
Even Fanny starts to or almost bends to the attentions of Henry? Then to regain her resolve that he is too unsteady for her? Maybe she is too accommodating with the Mansfield family, and people in general, but she isn't easily swayed by pretty words and a few sweet gestures. She is supportive because she is that sort of person. Not because she has no principles or backbone. Fanny is just quiet towards others, until her type of opinion and support are needed. Even if Edmond never offered her marriage, she would have gladly stayed for the safety, security, and support of Lady Bertram. Some would say that lacks spirit but I think it shows her loving heart and her unselfishness.
The discussion here shows that many discover Fanny after rereading the novel and gaining a better perspective of her quieter type of heroism. I have always liked that about Austen. Not all of her heroines are a Lizzie, Emma, or Marianne. It shows even a meek character can have a happy ending. Not all romance is flashy and open. Sometimes it happens slower than we would like but it can and does happen if we are willing to wait for it. (Please do not think I don't see the inner dialogues of the three characters I mentioned to contrast Fanny. I do understand they had thoughtful, inner dialogues and had inner changes take place to help them grow. Their journeys are favorites also.)
Thank you for discussing Fanny. This was my share of her journey. Plus I just watched the 1980s adaptation of Mansfield Park, available on Amazon Prime. So she was on my mind.
Fanny shines through in her letters to her brother William( a sailor at sea) and her commitment to be constant with the letters. Fanny also shines through whenever William visits...🙂
Yes. Henry Crawford sees Fanny clearly when he observes her love for her brother William, and that's when he starts wanting her. He wants that love for himself, not realising that he would have to deserve it and not just claim it.
I may have read Mansfield Park at a younger age and not been fond of the heroine Fanny Price at that time. I’ve just recently reread the book and instantly saw Fanny Price differently. Fanny lives a very active internal life relative to the weakness of her physicality. Although she will share much of herself with those she feels a like-mindedness with and is secure in their relationships. She stands firm in her moral decisions even thorough the blandishments and urgings of those around her, even her favorite cousin, Edmund. Even though it is in her nature to want to be useful and it’s her habit to give way too those of a superior class. She remains steadfast in the face of entire theatrical party and holds the thoughts and expectations of her uncle as of tantamount importance.
Mansfield Park is very true to the way things happen in real life; messiness of feelings, unrequited love, jealousy, determination to not betray one's better self but not always living up to that etc.
I find Fanny Price very frustrating here in the 21st Century, but I relate to her a lot. The complexity and nuances of her internal struggles are amazing and multilayered. I think Jane Austen does a great job of portraying them. I want Fanny to speak up, but even with the more extensive freedoms of women in the 21st Century, there are knots of problems that I find myself in where expressing myself would feel as hopeless as Fanny's situation does to her. I have definitely experienced people liking me or agreeing with me or "helping" me for the "wrong" (inaccurate) reasons in the ways portrayed as happening in Fanny's life. I think the book is fascinating and very well done. I think in the last chapter, however, Jane Austen loses faith in her audience and conducts an explanation of everything that goes on far too long. I would have preferred that she let the story speak for itself, or with at least a shorter exposition at the end. Thank you for your in depth readings - I very much enjoy them!
Goodness, I didn't realize how utterly relatable Fannie was...I have DEFINITELY felt exactly like her in many social situations, usually in large groups (not the jealousy, but definitely that horrid sense of wanting to engage, not being sure how, and so feeling as though you don't exist).
Dr Cox, Could you please sometime talk about the Crawfords and how charming they are. Mansfield Park is the only Austin novel in which I can imagine an alternative ending-- if only . . . i.e. if only Henry could have been saved by Fanny. I think we know it would not be a good alternative when Mary talks about how Henry will still love her even when he inevitably starts cheating on her. That offhand bit really shows how bad the Crawfords are. But I can't help it! The Crawfords are fun! Even though I know they're bad (like Trollop's Stanhope family) they are so seductive! I guess Austin succeeds in getting the reader to experience the danger they present.
Yes, I think they are supposed to be seductive. And do we resist their temptation...? That's the challenge, I think, that Austen poses to the reader.
This is so interesting because I (a casual fan of Austen) always explain Fanny doing exactly the right thing always. She doesn’t feel comfortable with the play and ultimately doesn’t give in to peer pressure, she resists the rakish charms of the wrong man, she waits for the right one, she never envies the capital of others (though she didn’t really live in poverty). But to have her explained as not doing the right thing, as failing her contemporary heroines is fascinating
I haven't read this book, I must get round to it
_Mansfield Park_ is definitely not Austen's easiest book, but well worth the effort.
You should, as Dr Cox said it's not an easy read, but I believe that comes down to really how awful the characters surrounding Fanny are not the character of Fanny herself.
It's an extremely rich book though full of a lot of wonderfully terrible bits of dialogue and foreshadowing by Austen.
Thank you for bringing this thought out. No, I can see how people might think Fanny was insipid when she was first coming to Mansfield as a girl. But, after a time she develops a very solid gyroscope of morality inside herself and in fact she is as bold as a lion. Bold but quiet. That's a very desirable woman.
oh yeah, Fanny passively takes a role in Lovers Vows and passively accepts Henry's proposal
One of the things I loved best about Jane Austen's novels is the individuality of the characters. She didn't write a formula type of heroine, just like her storylines weren't the same thing all over, with just a few token changes. I didn't want to read "Mansfield Park" with the same leading lady as "Pride and Prejudice" or "Emma", much as I liked Elizabeth and was entertained by Emma and her misguided matchmaking. Fanny was her own person, just like Catherine and Elinor and Anne. This goes for the other characters as well; when I read about Mr. Knightley I don't think of Mr. Darcy, and Captain Wentworth doesn't remind me of either of them. It's all the individuality that makes Jane Austen such a great author, and I think that quality is missing in too many modern ones.
I love how you explain Jane’s preciseness and skill, even the hidden treasures of understanding. Amazing that her works can be interpreted in opposite ways. ALWAYS happy to listen to your thoughts on any of her writing. Thank you
Very brave of you Dr Cox in taking a view different from that of the late distinguished Tony Tanner and many others but I think you are quite right. Because of Fanny’s position in the family she is absolute powerless. Her freedom of action is under almost the greatest possible constraint. Yet in spite of the enormous pressure she is put under to take part in the play she alone does not give way. She also bravely sticks to her principles and holds out against all the pressure put on her, this time with Sir Thomas weighing in, to marry Henry Crawford, as she alone, typically, can see his true nature. I was very interested too in the first passage you quote and which I think I did not much attend to when I last read the book. Certainly she is jealous. But in spite of suffering gravely she does not give way to almost overwhelming emotion but, Job-like, bears it. I wonder which of Jane Austen’s characters suffers most? Fanny? Elizabeth Bennett when she realises she is in love - hopelessly she must think - with Darcy? Emma, when hit with the devastating irony that her deeply misguided manipulations have conspired to ruin her own happiness for ever? The hysterical Marianne or the silent suffering Elinor? Anne Elliot? Or perhaps Jane Fairfax in the utterly brilliant “Emma”? As it happens I have the book by T Tanner that you picture. Of course I admire his analyses but I do not find every one of them completely convincing. In contrast I find it easy to accept the points revealed in Professor J Mullan’s book and videos and of course the insights shown to us in your own excellent and perceptive close readings.
A beautifully chosen scene. This is precisely why Fanny Price is my favorite Austen character, and it's where the filmed adaptations can't rise to the challenge: her inner life is her only life; so onscreen she's a lump on the couch. But she hangs onto herself- she's a fixed point while everyone around her wavers and eventually falters, revealing Fanny's true worth. There can be more than one kind of heroism. We're just as stodgy as ever in the 21st century about demanding that our heroes- and especially our heroines- conform to certain expectations. Fanny is no feminist, and had little hope of being one. She's treated as furniture. "She is not a Miss Bertram". That's ultimately her most apparent virtue. She is a triumph over invisibility.
I think Mansfield Park is perhaps the cleverest novel I have ever read. Jane Austen hits on what I can only describe as the upside-down-ness of life. Mary and Henry Crawford seem, and are, nice friendly people with lots of social graces on the surface, but are (to quote dear Jane) 'darkened but fancying [themselves] light.' They appear kind to Fanny, but actually selfishly misuse her as badly as her cousins do. It is a book in which people reveal themselves for what and who they really are, I know of no other novel like it. It's a deeply religious book, the book of the soul, and Fanny is 'the meek' person who 'inherits the earth.' Jane Austen's wit is certainly there, but in a different way from P & P or Emma, because there are no comic characters. As always with Austen: blink and you miss it. It's my all-time favourite novel.
Fanny doesn’t demonstrate any personal growth. She is moral. She doesn’t suffer sensibility. But she is stagnant.
The film adaptation of this novel is interesting, gives Fanny a bit more flavour
The 1999 film version of _Mansfield Park_ (dir. by Patricia Rozema) actually puts some of Jane Austen's own words from her letters into the mouth of Fanny. That's bound to make her more lively! The 1983 BBC version is much closer to the novel, but is - frankly - rather a dreary watch.
I think Fanny does grow. She starts out having no place in the world at all but in the end she discovers where she belongs -- and it's not a simple "She belongs with Edmund." She belongs where there is order and gentleness and that is ultimately in her Uncle Bertram's world. She belongs with Aunt Bertram, who also has her character arc because she no longer takes Fanny for granted.
@@DrOctaviaCox I haven't found an adaptation I can watch because they all try to turn Fanny into Elizabeth Bennett. Fanny is a case of still waters running deep and instead they try to turn her into a waterfall.
Perhaps Fanny belongs with Edmund because that is where she has decided that she belongs?
I'm not sure that Lady Bertram really learns anything, does she? She simply replaces Fanny with Susan. "Susan remained to supply her place. Susan became the stationary niece ... Susan could never be spared ... she was soon welcome and useful to all; and after Fanny's removal succeeded so naturally to her influence over the hourly comfort of her aunt, as gradually to become, perhaps, the most beloved of the two." (MP ch.48)
It is a peculiar thing to try to turn Fanny into Elizabeth. Especially because Austen writes them so decidedly differently. If you want Elizabeth, why not just adapt P&P?!
Interesting views. Life however presents as it’s all simply views and opinions. One person sees a story, in one light, whereas another person may view it from a totally different perspective. The intellectual mind, can dissect, whereas the novel may effect the reader on an emotional level. The author may be exploring certain themes, whereas the readers may be reading a book for leisure, pleasure. Comments are impermanence, opinions change over the years. People can be observing from, judgemental, emotional, mood, fashion. The author can only give one a glimpse, of fictional characters. Everyone is coming from a different past, experiences, which will influence one in their, uneducated, or educated evaluation, of the novel and what effect it has on the reader. ☺️
Absolutely Trish. Reading anything is definitely subjective, and each reader will read every text with different biases. It seems to me that that's part of the wonderful beauty of literature.
Mansfield Park has changed for me, each time I've read it, as have the other novels by Jane Austen. I enjoy the comments and your answers.
Fanny is certainly a timid character, but she isn't insipid. Her strong feelings for her brother, her willingness to stand out against the majority in opposing the play, and her willingness to come back to Mansfield Park with no expectation of any better treatment than she's experienced prior to her exile to Portsmouth, are facets of her character that to my mind oppose the characterization of insipidity.
I love Fanny! She is so steadfast and one of the most moral characters in JA's works. As a people pleaser and more introverted, I related to her way more than many of the other heroines.
I absolutely love your channel Dr. Cox! I was wondering if you might be able to do a video about Mary Crawford from Mansfield Park. I find her to be one of the most intriguing characters across Jane Austen's books. She seems so complex and I would absolutely love to better understand her. And on the same note, I'm also very intrigued by Caroline Bingley. I was wondering if you could do a deep dive into her as well? Thank you very much for your time!
I loved Fanny Price. My sisters dislike her. I don't think they understand the position she lived with. Poor and dependent, made to feel less worthy than her cousins. Yet Fanny has the strength of character to stick to her guns when she feels she is right. She is discerning, seeing both Crawfords' actual characters instead of how they intend others to see them. I also liked the character of Julia. She defends Fanny and her char
Thank you for such a qualitative video!!!! I felt like I am back in university ❤️
You're very welcome!
to my mind Fanny's outstanding characteristic is her resilience and her steadfastness; her extraordinary integrity.