Skip to main content

Northanger Abbey, the end

This novel was one of Austen's earliest, if not the earliest published. I was reading her early unpublished work, Love and Freindship (sic) and saw some decided similarity between it and Northanger Abbey. Love and Freindship (sic) was written before Austen knew how to spell, and I find it nearly unreadable, even with grammar corrected. Northanger Abbey has emotional conflict arising from love, friendship, gossip, speculation and is overwrought and excruciating with satire and dry interjections from the author. The end had me cringing. How different from Mary Shelley's loving and lovely interpositions in her own works.

I feel discouraged from this work in continuing to read the rest of Austen. Technically now I have read all of her books, but I was going to re-read the big and cinematic three before watching the Masterpiece Theatres.

My focus as a writer of love has shifted considerably. In high school I tested every boundary I knew in my work and as I matured I decided most of those experiments were unsuccessful. I concluded that the most lasting love is found in faithfulness, fidelity, devotion, and I became more interested in chivalry, Camelot, and found my ideals in accord with Victorian romances, where the characters suffer dutifully through bad choices and are rewarded richly. However Austen's cynicism reminds me of the self-destruction possible in adhering to those ideals. There is some suggestion that Austen was disappointed in love and her cynicism was born from that. How can I ignore that kind of pain in my ideal Victorian world? How can I continue to paint the rose-colored pictures of successful and earned love when I have seen the devastation of those who followed the formula and failed to see results? Or, like Austen, do I spend too much time thinking about other people?

After reading any work of verisimilitude (sp?) I am left with the conclusion that life is a muddle, that there are no easy answers, a concept blanketed in what I learned in English class as "human condition."

And so I concede to this, I do the best I can, and the only thing I can positively promote in any of my works is hope, and as I feel that cynicism is the death of hope, I am tired of Jane Austen and will not be continuing the books for a while.

Popular posts from this blog

The secret to a happy home

I finished Marion Harland's guide tonight and I wonder ceaselessly at two things. 1. She is so down on America! Even more than I am. She complains of things in which I am so well-steeped I could not see them for what they were. In particular, American style and cookery. It is true that our food, which we count as so much more generous in portion than the overseas counterpart, is as coarse and indecorous as it is plentiful, but as an American woman I cast up my hands and declare I would rather spend my time on something else. She makes an interesting point about American women's fashions. In France women wear what looks good on them, and in America women wears what comes off the manufacturing line in the latest style. It is very conformist, and I have to admit I feel it in myself, for I would be embarrassed to wear something that is "out" even if it flattered me better. 2. Harland's other point I feel clearly from last night's experiences. I looked in my journ...

Helen Keller

Reading this Women of Influence book is causing me to remember another of my great childhood loves -- "The Miracle Worker," the story of Anne Sullivan and Helen Keller. It was Anne Sullivan I really loved, and still love -- it always made me heartsick to think of her sacrifice, devoting every waking minute to another human being, with almost no life left to herself, until she died in old age, and Helen Keller required another translator. But God -- she must have known it -- that's the best way to live -- it is to have every moment of your life swallowed in supreme goodness and satisfaction. No wonder I loved her, and no longer do I feel sorry for her -- I envy her. I thought of her today perhaps because when I was around eight or nine I grew aware that she and I shared the same initials "AS." Today is the first day that I am Amanda Monteleone at work, and I have written my initials "AM" dozens of times already. It's strange, but the satisfaction of...

Sprouts

Sprouts Originally uploaded by ladyhildegarde . I am getting sprouts. Hopefully they are carnations. It is such a beautiful spring day. It's good I'm taking the chance to come outside: I have craved a moment to reflect on something beautiful.