Mansfield Park
July 27th 2006 14:36
Mansfield Park by Jane Austen - Image from Wikipedia.Org
Jane Austen takes a 180 degree turn from the lively heroines of her more popular books Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility, to the timid and quiet Fanny Price of Mansfield Park. In fact, while lively and charming women were the object of Austen's approval in her earlier works, the connotations are altogether different in this book. It seems that Jane Austen does not recommend lively manners in this novel. There is, in fact, an opposition throughout this novel between what is socially right, and what is morally right.
And this is just one of the things that the novel explores, which in turn makes this a pleasure to read. I have to admit that I found the first 15 or so chapters uninteresting, but even so the said chapters are, in my opinion, required to understand what the heroine, Fanny Price, went through before she was fully accepted and praised for who and not for what she was.
And to those who like reading "Cinderella" types of stories, this book would be for you too. Fanny was adopted by her rich Uncle and Aunt, Sir Thomas and Lady Bertram, upon the suggestion of her other Aunt, Mrs. Norris. She grows up with her cousins, Tom, Edmund, Maria, and Julia, but was always treated as inferior to them.
Tom, being the eldest son, is spoilt beyond all reason, while Maria and Julia are indulged incessantly by Mrs Norris, and are brought up to think that they are perfect through beauty, fortune, and education.
Fanny, meanwhile, was always in the shadow and service of her cousins and Aunts, for fear of being branded "selfish and ungrateful", which was what Sir Thomas ended up calling her anyway when they were talking about her suitor. Only Edmund shows her kindness, and Fanny returns this with much gratitude and love.
Romantics would also find this book intriguing, as the bulk of the book is spent in the entangled relationships between the characters, all the way from the moment siblings Mr and Miss Crawford comes to the scene, 'til the end of the novel. Who would who end up with?
I actually like this novel, maybe because of its somber and serious undertones. If only the characters end up with other people, I reckon the romances would have appealed more in today's generation. But at the moment, I think that it would bring out "ews" more than "aws" if these kinds of romantic relationships blossomed today. I also found Fanny hard to like, but I still admired her complex personality which ultimately helped her resist giving in to what she thought was wrong.
I rate this novel:
7.5/10
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