(4) Domesticity and Historicity in Early Nineteenth Century Novels.
(J. Austen, M. Edgeworth, and W. Scott).
T h e B r i t i s h R o m a n t i c P e r i o d (1785 - 1830)
[See "Background for Topics 2-5..."]
J a n e A u s t e n ( 1 7 7 5 – 1 8 1 7 )
L i f e :
- b. in a moderately Tory family
- her cousin died on the scaffold in Fr., her 2 brothers served as officers against Napoleon B. x but: never personally politically committed or involved in inter- / national affairs
W o r k :
< Maria Edgeworth
- limited subject: provincial E gentlefolk = society defined in terms of land, money, and class
- limited form: intricate, spare, and ironic novel of manners = examines and criticises the values men and women live by in their everyday social lives
- untouched by the political, intellectual, and artistic rev. of her age; conservative against the current radical enthusiasm:
(a) the war:
- at the margin even in novels introd. naval officers as characters
> Mansfield Park (1814) and Persuasion (1818)
(b) the agricultural depression, destitution, and rural pauperism:
- only as an occasion of genteel charity, or for scolding the poor ‘into harmony and plenty’
> Lady Catherine de Bourgh of Pride and Prejudice (1813)
(c) her conc.:
= getting married = the central preocc. for young leisure-class ladies with no oth. career than domesticity open to them
- against a realistic background = the test for her F protagonists of the practical sense, moral integrity, and knowledge of the world and oneself
- obliges the reader to participate in the moral processes of disciplined learning and judging
- advocates the merits of good conduct, good manners, sound reason, and marriage as an admirable social institution
- never scorns love x but: demands the complementary qualities of self-knowledge, self-discipline, and practicality
- her protagonists can be as intelligent as Elizabeth Bennet of Pride and Prejudice, or as witty, egotistic, and independent as Emma Woodhouse of Emma x but: all finally brought to mature judgement and, by proper extension, emotional fulfilment
Sense and Sensibility (1811):
= her 1st publ. novel
- gently ridicules the cult of sensibility, sentiment, and passion by an ironic exposure of affectation and by a steady affirmation of the virtues of restraint
- balances maturity against impulsiveness
Pride and Prejudice (1813):
- opens with one of the most famous lines in E lit.: ‘It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.’
Mansfield Park (1814):
= perhaps the most pragmatic and the least romantic of her novels
- touches on the slave trade and the roots of the Br. upper-class’s wealth in corruption and exploitation
Emma (1816):
= perhaps the most perfectly construed, the best, and most representative of her novels
- concl.: the rebellious E. finds her personal liberation within the enclosure of the society by learning to respect and use its rules
Northanger Abbey (1818, posthum.):
= chronologically her earliest novel x but: publ. posthum.
- ridicules the taste for Gothic terrors and unsophisticated romances in her time
< incl. an elaborate parody on A. Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794)
Persuasion (1818, posthum.):
- connected with the Northanger Abbey:
(a) orig. bound up in one vol. and still so issued
(b) both set from part in the health resort Bath (A. lived there for several y.)
M a r i a E d g e w o r t h ( 1 7 6 7 – 1 8 4 9 )
L i f e :
= connected with Ir.: her understanding based on her grasp both of her family and the Ir. nation’s history
- sympathised with the oppressed Cath. majority x contradictorily convinced of the superiority of E manners
=> cherished the visionary hope of the regeneration both of the landowning aristocracy and its nation
W o r k :
F e m i n i s t W r i t i n g s :
- conc.: radically criticized esp. the inadequacy of contemp. women’s education
Letters to Literary Ladies (1795): a feminist essay
The Parent’s Assistant (1796 – 1800): in several vol.
Practical Education (1798): in collab. with her father
I r i s h N o v e l s :
= subtle, comic discourses on the present state of society
- employed an interplay of voices, incl. that of the author as ed. and annotator
- set immediately before / after the Act of Union (= The United Kingdom of GB + Ir., 1801)
- attempted to counter a potential alienation of the land-owning class from its tenantry
Castle Rackrent (1800):
= probably the 1st novel to repres. society in a specific region in a given historical period => the 1st true regional novel and the 1st true historical novel
= probably also the 1st family saga, and the 1st novel to use the device of an unreliable narrator = an observer of, rather than a player in, the actions he chronicles
- conc.: the 4 generations of the Rackrent family, and their inheritance > conversion > failure > dislodgement by the son of the narrator = the family steward
- incl. a pointed glossary ‘for the information of the ignorant English reader’ = interpreted both a way of speaking and a way of observing
The Absentee (1812):
- on the desertion of Ir. by an aristocracy drawn by the magnet of E fashion after the Union
- conc.: the return of a Lord and Lady to their Ir. estates, encouraged by their son
- the Lady’s attempts to buy her way into the London high society ridiculed, the Lord’s finances ruined as a result of his wife’s lifestyle > the debts paid by their sensitive son on condition of their return to live in Ir.
- ‘absentees’ = the new generation of voluntary exiles
- concl.:
(a) the necessity of return of the aristocracy to their tenants driven by their absence to the state of a ‘wretched, wretched people’
(b) the revival of principle, example, leadership, and good management of the disenchanted ruling class
Ormond (1817)
S i r W a l t e r S c o t t ( 1 7 7 1 – 1 8 3 2 )
L i f e :
< admired J. Austen
< admired M. Edgeworth = has done more twd completing the Union than the legislative enactment
- aimed to do the same for his own country
=> achieved a broad pop. understanding of Scott. history and culture
W o r k :
= universally pop.
F i c t i o n :
- creator of the 19th c. historical novel
- historical romance = based on ‘marvellous and uncommon incidents’ in the realm of history
(a) Scott. novels:
- romantic view of Scott. past: altered the order of events, etc. to suit his own Unionist and Tory ends x but: kept fidelity to the spirit of the past
- conc.: Scott. affairs against the background of the observation of a pragmatic, often E, outsider
- characters: the best from middle / lower classes with their dialogues in Scott. vernacular to emphasise their individuality
- avoidance of the Scots dialect except for dialogues => accessibility to a wide audience
- setting = Scotland divided by factions [Jacobites x Unionists, Highland clansmen x urban Lowlanders, etc.]
- protagonists = exposed to conflicting ways of seeing, thinking, and acting
=> an evolutionary clash of opposites leading to a progressive future
- no more a fancy dress of Gothic fiction: fictional heroes encounter historical ones in his own imaginative and ideological interpretation
Waverley (1814, anonym.):
= his 1st novel, his following novels advertised as ‘by the author of Waverley’ => the series of novels on similar themes written during the same period also known under the collective name the ‘Waverley novels’
- set in the mid-18th c.
- conc.: the gradual involvement of the Englishman Waverley in the ‘The Forty-five Jacobite Rising’ (1745 = the 2nd major rising, a part of a series of military campaigns attempting to restore the Stuart kings to the thrones of En. and Scott. [and GB after 1707 = the union of En. and Scott. to the Kingdom of GB])
Guy Mannering (1815):
- set in the late 18th c. = the time of lawlessness, with smugglers operating along the coast and thieves frequenting the country roads
- conc.: the fortunes and misfortunes of the protagonist as predicted on his birth by the eponymous astrologer, incl. his kidnapping as a little boy after witnessing the murder of a customs officer by smugglers, his struggle for heritage, etc.
The Antiquary (1816):
= a Gothic novel of family secrets, hidden treasure, hopeless love, benighted aristocracy, and a mysterious, handsome, young M character
- the eponymous character, an amateur historian, archaeologist, and collector of items of dubious antiquity = not the protagonist x but: a central figure for, and a sardonic commentator of, oth. more exciting characters and events
Rob Roy (1817):
- set in the early 18th c. in ‘The Fifteen Jacobite Rising’ (1715)
- conc.: the son of an E merchant’s journey to the Scott. Highlands to coll. a debt stolen from him
- the eponymous character x but: not the protagonist = based on the historical figure of the infamous Scott. folk hero and outlaw Robert Roy MacGregor x but: the story completely fictional
Old Mortality (1816) and The Heart of Midlothian (1818): parts of a 7-vol. series of novels publ. in individual vol. during the period of some 15 y., also known under the collective title Tales of my Landlord
(b) Non-Scott. novels:
Ivanhoe (1820):
- set in the late 12th c. En.
- the eponymous character and protagonist = son of one of the remaining Saxon noble families among at the time overwhelmingly Norman nobility
- conc.: the protagonist’s return from the Crusades [= the war of Christian Europe to conquer the Holy Land of Jerusalem from its Muslim occupants] seriously wounded, his falling out of favour with his father due to his unsuitable courting of the Saxon Princess Rowena and his allegiance to the Norman King Richard I [= ‘Richard the Lion-Hearted’], etc.
- described the conflict btw the Saxons x the Normans, the exemplary protagonist as a model of a Saxon adapting to the life in Norman En, and: the jousting knights, burning castles, and damsels in distress characteristic of the adventurous historical novel
The Talisman (1825) and The Betrothed (1825):
= parts of a 2-vol. miniseries, also known under the collective title Tales of the Crusaders
- set in the 12th c. Crusades period
- questioned the medieval code of chivalry and military honour
- lengthy explications of historical detail and artificial dialogue attempted to establ. authenticity
Kenilworth (1821): set in the 16th c. En. of Elizabeth I (1533 – 1603, reign 1558 – 1603; = the ‘Virgin Queen’, immortalised by E. Spenser as the ‘Faerie Queene’)
The Fortunes of Nigel (1822): set in the early 17th c. En. of James I (1566 –1625, reign 1603 – 25)
Quentin Durward (1823): set in the 15th c. Fr. of Louis XI (1423 – 83); conc.: the exiled Scott. knights at the courts of the king > the upright innocent abroad makes his way through mazes of corruption
Redgauntlet (1824): probably his finest non-Scott. novel; conc.: the dying flame of Scott. Jacobitism in a clash of perspectives of one romantic x a phlegmatic character
P o e t r y :
- narrative poetry of energetic and rushing metre, varying line-length, and wandering stress within the lines
- also introd. shorter lyrics / songs into the narrative
- with Waverley abandoned narrative poetry > displaced by G. G. Byron
The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805): conc.: a 16th c. family feud; incl. sorcery, alchemy, and metaphysical intervention
Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field (1808), The Lady of the Lake (1810), Rokeby (1813)
Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border (1802 – 3): a coll. of previously uncoll. ballad folk-poetry and his own verse
Literature
Abrams, Meyer Howard, ed. The Norton Anthology of English Literature. New York: W. W. Norton, 1993.
Barnard, Robert. Stručné dějiny anglické literatury. Praha: Brána, 1997.
Sanders, Andrew. The Short Oxford History of English Literature. New York: Clarendon Press, 1994.
Other Sources
Jelínková, Ema. Semináře: Britská literatura 1. ZS 2004/05.