Notes on Jane Austen - The Six Novels

 

W. A. Craik, Jane Austen: The Six Novels. 1965. London: Methuen & Co., Ltd. 1977. 210 p.

Notes taken by José Ángel García Landa (c. 1983).

Introduction

(2) "Her greatness lies less in the way in which she combines the artist and the moralist; hers is a perfect, because a natural, reconciliation of the two, and in none of her six completed novels does either the artist or the moralist have to give way." Jane Austen appeals to all reasonable and rational qualities of the reader.

1. Northanger Abbey

Literary burlesque and social & moral comment come eventually into opposition: an unsatisfactory work. Austen is unwilling to take on much personality as a narrator [!]. Action is seen through the mind of an immature and ignorant but raturally right-thinking heroine. Austen is exceptional in presenting congruous scenes with serious and comic characters and being equally happy with them. Use of cliché by characters, vs. minds governed by cliché in her best achievements. In Northanger Abbey there is little interplay between minor figures, (21) "a fault of the plot is that as Catherine's character becomes more psychologically interesting, it becomes less so as a liteary force". [Aristotelian] unity. She depicts the steady passage of time over a short time without momentuous incidents—all are momentuous through selection. Little detail of scenery, no inanimate (or indeed animate) objects are described, no symbolic values added — only as they act as characters. Little need to describe physical features or expression; conversation renders character. The style lacks in personal mannerisms: it is Augustan, precise and easy. The humorous characters confuse important and trivial matters and do not advance the conversation. (31) "Jane Austen can make the most apparently commonplace topic reveal the discussion of personal principles and conduct, both social and moral, which is at the heart of all ther novels." 

(2) Sense and Sensibility

(32) "Sense and Sensibility resembles Mansfield Park in being in places not only serious but solemn." Irony is confined to lesser figures. Elinor is a faultless character, too much weight is placed on her. The plot requires the main character to be passive, which is a serious drawback. Elinor is an ideal balance of sense and sensibility. The novel is based on a patterning of character, symmetries, etc. Jane Austen guides the reader, Elinor is her main mouthpiece; Brandon is used to comment on her. Willoughby becomes suspect when his character is not commented on. The best way of using minor characters: "she uses a few traits and applies them to a wide variety of subjects" and functions. Rank or wealth are not estimable in themselves for Jane Austen, but only because of the opportunities they allow. All the characters are gentry: there is no place for servants in Jane Austen's literary schemes. Character and plot are balanced in Jane Austen's novels—but the plot of Sense and Sensibility is more mechanical and there are some coincidences and improbabilites (less than in Dickens, Hardy, etc.). The settings and the weather are used as an organizing force—they are not symbolic, though. A strong sense of time and place. (57): "An abrupt opening to a scene is therefore clearly deliberate (...) Jane Austen's own abruptness emphasizes Lucy's awkwardness." Money concerns, figures, etc. equivalents only in Trollope. (61): "Jane Austen does not merely analyse a situation, she reproduces it so that the time it takes the reader to grasp its implications appears to delay the narrative no more than it would arrest the action in real life."