CRANFORD by Elizabeth Gaskell

First published in 1851 as a serial novel in Household Words, a magazine edited by Charles Dickens, Cranford is an engaging experience in long ago place and time and the lives of simple small town people.  Elizabeth Gaskell took a town that she knew very well – Knutsford in Cheshire – and crafted the fictional town of Cranford where she recounts episodes from the lives of three primary characters relating to their neighbors and daily events. 

While there may not be an intricate plot nor twists and turns of suspense and deep drama, we nevertheless are granted a well-crafted glimpse into another time and another way of life.

Elizabeth Stevenson was born in September of 1810, the daughter of a Scottish Unitarian minister and the youngest of eight children. After her father resigned his orders, her life took a more insecure turn as his employment endeavors re-formed and Elizabeth’s mother died, leading him to send Elizabeth to live as a dependent with an aunt and grandparents in the small town of Knutsford, Cheshire.

Elizabeth was sent for a typical “young ladies” education in the arts, classics and decorum and encouraged by her aunts and by her father to read, study and to develop in her writing. At 22 years old, she married a Unitarian minister, William Gaskell, in Knutsford and they went to settle in Manchester where he served as the minister Cross Street Unitarian Chapel.  

The tragic loss of children, places lived; neighbors and friends experienced… all became fuel for Elizabeth’s imagination as the years passed.  She began with a diary, wrote poems with her husband under the title -  Sketches Among The Poor - which were published in a magazine and there followed other small written works which developed her style.

It was after the Gaskells traveled to the continent that influences produced new ideas and her first work of fiction was published, Libbie Marsh’s Three Eras under the name “Cotton Mather Mills”.  

Elizabeth Gaskell wrote her major literary works in the second half of the century from a villa at 84 Plymouth Grove in Manchester, England.  Her social circle grew to include such writers as Charles Dickens, Charlotte Brontë, John Ruskin and the American writer Harriet Beecher Stowe. 

Her last work, Wives And Daughters, was published as an incomplete work in early 1865, a year after Gaskell died of a heart attack.

The Jane Austen Tea Society will begin our second study of British Victorian Authors with this charming Elizabeth Gaskell work and discuss over a Summer Book Breakfast to take place on Saturday the 12th of July 2014 at 10am.

There is plenty of time – start reading!

A Spring Read - Persuasion by Jane Austen

From Sir Walter Elliot’s copy of the Baronetage –

"ELLIOT OF KELLYNCH HALL.

"Walter Elliot, born March 1, 1760, married, July 15, 1784, Elizabeth, daughter of James Stevenson, Esq. of South Park, in the county of Gloucester, by which lady (who died 1800) he has issue Elizabeth, born June 1, 1785; Anne, born August 9, 1787; a still-born son, November 5, 1789; Mary, born November 20, 1791."

In this respected, landowning group is Anne Elliot.  And Anne is a woman with a past. 

Not an immoral or profligate past, but one in which she shared a great love with a young man of bright promise.  But this overlooked middle daughter of a vain and shallow father failed to be faithful to her own heart.  Instead she listened to her trusted confidant and the family’s close advisor, Lady Russell, her late mother’s best friend.  To Lady Russell, wealth and rank were essential for a good match.  The young man’s social status was considered unacceptable and his fortune nonexistent. And so Anne and her young man parted.

Now at 27 years old Anne lives a quiet life at her selfish family’s beck and call… but in the quiet of her mind… she remembers….

Published 1818, Persuasion was the last completed novel by Jane Austen. It was released about six months after her death, bound together in the same volume with another novel, Northanger Abbey, also centered in Bath. Since Jane became ill during the writing of this work, it did not receive some of the polishing and fine tuning that Mansfield Park and Emma had received, and readers sometimes find it less developed than her earlier works. It really had no designated title although Jane Austen referred to it as The Elliots.  The title of Persuasion was most likely given to the book by Jane’s brother, Henry before publication.

Even though they were bound together in publication, there are marked differences between Persuasion and Northanger Abbey… and for that matter, all of the other Jane Austen works.  For one, the heroine, Anne Elliot is - at 27 years old and according to her time period – considered to be past her prime and a “confirmed spinster”, unlike Elizabeth Bennet, Emma Woodhouse or the Dashwood sisters.  And the hero of her story has no landed estates, no history of wealth or privilege behind him…. just a will to succeed in his life and chosen career.

Jane Austen included much of her own life experience in Persuasion. She knew fashionable Bath well – both the good and the bad of it - and richly captured the intense social atmosphere, the superficiality of values and the not too subtle pressure to measure up.  Having two brothers who reached the rank of admirals in the navy, she also understood the world of Royal Navy and what it offered young men of the day in the way of social and economical advancement.  The ability for a young man to advance himself in society and enter the sphere of gentility was a new thing in Jane Austen’s world. For once a self-made man could change his future.

But it seems that the real heart of Miss Austen is found in the concern that she reveals for the plight of young women of her time who were pressured to accept uncomplimentary connections based on social level or wealth or to refuse those based only on love and respect where social status did not measure up.  The helplessness of young women without wise champions was dear to her heart and shines through her particular treatment of Anne Elliot.

 

"Elizabeth had succeeded at sixteen to all that was possible of her mother's rights and consequence; and being very handsome, and very like himself, her influence had always been great, and they had gone on together most happily. His other two children were of very inferior value. Mary had acquired a little artificial importance by becoming Mrs. Charles Musgrove; but Anne, with an elegance of mind and sweetness of character, which must have placed her high with any people of real understanding, was nobody with either father or sister; her word had no weight, her convenience was always to give way — she was only Anne.”

- Jane Austen, Persuasion Chapter 1

 The Jane Austen Tea Society has happily returned to a study of our beloved Regency author’s works in the order in which they were published. Our sixth and last selection will be Persuasion with a Spring Book Discussion to take place on Saturday the 26th of April 2014 at 10am.

There is plenty of time – start reading!

Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen

“No one who had ever seen Catherine Morland in her infancy, would have supposed her born to be an heroine. Her situation in life, the character of her father and mother, her own person and disposition, were all equally against her.”

Northanger Abbey – Chapter 1

Catherine Morland was a reader and a dreamer.  From modest means and one of ten children born to a country parson, she was normally “pleasing” in appearance but pronounced “pretty” when she was absolutely at her best.

However - below Catherine’s unremarkable exterior beat a heart that dreamed wildly of dark brooding mysteries, untamed heroes and dungeons filled with… well, she wasn’t quite sure, having been soundly brought up as a clergyman’s daughter.

But we all know that immense, vivid and unknown worlds open up when you lift the cover of a book.  And if you happen to admire the novels of Ann Radcliffe as Catherine did, you could easily believe that the Abbey that you are visiting might just hold the “horrors” that haunt your daydreams.

The Jane Austen works Sense & Sensibility and Price & Prejudice were in process and amidst revisions when Jane Austen completed a book that she initially entitled Susan. Written in 1798 – 1799 and revised for the press in 1803, Miss Austen sold this work for £10 to a bookseller in Bath. He allowed Susan to languish on his shelves until 1816 when Jane’s brother Henry purchased it back into their control, with the bookseller woefully unaware that the writer of this novel now had four popular novels released and much admired.

Jane Austen crafted revisions and renamed Susan as Catherine after the heroine was renamed.  But after her death in July of 1817, Jane’s brother posthumously published the work later in the year with the title Northanger Abbey as the first two of a four-volume set, which also included Persuasion.

There is a comic lightness to Northanger Abbey but also a serious undercurrent of what may happen when life is lived like a Gothic novel.  There can be a danger in believing that life is the same as fiction or even in the simple act of believing everything that you hear without first exercising a balanced discernment regarding the speaker or subject.

“A well-informed mind is the best security against the contagion of folly and vice. The vacant mind is ever on the watch for relief, and ready to plunge into error, to escape from the languor of idleness. Store it with ideas, teach it the pleasure of thinking; and the temptations of the world without, will be counteracted by the gratifications derived from the world within.”

Ann Radcliffe, The Mysteries of Udolpho

The Jane Austen Tea Society has happily returned to a study of our beloved Regency author’s works in the order in which they were published. Our fifth selection will be Northanger Abbey with a Winter Breakfast & Book Discussion to take place on Saturday the 25th of January at 10am.

There is plenty of time – start reading!

Emma by Jane Austen... For October!

"Doing just what she liked; highly esteeming Miss Taylor's judgments, but directed chiefly by her own. 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....”

Emma – Chapter 1

Emma Woodhouse appears to have everything. 

Unlike most of Jane Austen’s heroines, she is not concerned about finding security in marriage, acquiring more money or avoiding relatives who are bullies.  She is clever, pretty, wealthy, spoiled and overly confident in her own powers of perception and persuasion… 

Where will it lead her?

Before she began Emma, Miss Austen is said to have written, “I am going to take a heroine whom no one but myself will much like.”

And she was highly successful. For nearly 200 years later, readers are still conflicted over whether to love or hate Emma Woodhouse. Austen skillfully and lovingly created a central character in this comedy of manners that fearlessly interferes in other people’s lives and prides herself in being an expert and intuitive matchmaker.  Admired and adored by both her widowed father and Miss Taylor, her kind-hearted governess, Emma possesses one unfailing and unbiased voice into her life – neighbor to her family home of Hartfield, Mr. Knightley.  But will his voice of reason and truth break through her fearless meddling and determined self-deception?

"Mr. Knightley, in fact, was one of the few people who could see faults in Emma Woodhouse, and the only one who ever told her of them...."

Emma - Chapter 1

Emma was published in December of 1815 in three volumes and was dedicated to the Prince Regent, George Augustus Frederick, at his request.  This uncle to Queen Victoria was Prince Regent from 1811 – 1820 and was not a favorite of Jane Austen. Actually Austen was “invited” to dedicate one of her works to the Prince and with this 4^th publishing novel, she reluctantly complied.

Emma

By Jane Austen

To

His Royal Highness

The Prince Regent,

This Work Is,

By His Royal Highness’s Permission,

Most Respectfully Dedicated,

By His Royal Highness’s

Dutiful

And Obedient

Humble Servant,

The Author

This fourth published book  - and the only Austen novel to be named after its heroine - was the last to appear before Jane Austen died in 1817 and includes more detailed and vivid detail than any other Austen novel.  It is rich in Regency detail, customs and flavor and conversation that rings true to readers of any time period.

The Jane Austen Tea Society has happily returned to a study of our beloved Regency author’s works in the order in which they were published. Our fourth selection will be Emma with an Autumn Brunch and Book Discussion to take place on Saturday the 26th of October 2013 at 10am.

There is plenty of time – start reading!

Mansfield Park - Volume I – Chapter 1.

About thirty years ago, Miss Maria Ward of Huntingdon, with only seven thousand pounds, had the good luck to captivate Sir Thomas Bertram, of Mansfield Park, in the county of Northhampton, and to be thereby raised to the rank of a baronet’s lady, with all the comforts and consequences of an handsome house and large income.

All Huntingdon exclaimed on the greatness of the match, and her uncle, the lawyer, himself, allowed her to be at least three thousand pounds short of any equitable claim to it.

She had two sisters to be benefited by her elevation; and such of their acquaintance as thought Miss Ward and Miss Frances quite as handsome as Miss Maria, did not scruple to predict their marrying with almost equal advantage.

But there certainly are not so many men of large fortune in the world, as there are pretty women to deserve them.

Mansfield Park - Volume I – Chapter 1.

MANSFIELD PARK by Jane Austen

"'I think the man who could often quarrel with Fanny,' said Edmund, affectionately, 'must be beyond the reach of any sermons.'"

A child sent far from home and all that is familiar to live with unknown relatives...  Will this sudden uprooting give her the chance of a better life? Or will it make it worse by throwing her into the path of unkind people and different privations?  

Will this difficult change to her existence bring hope and new opportunities? Or will it only benefit her by assuring food to eat, clothes to wear and a roof over her head?

How does a sensitive young child cope with the knowledge that she has been given up by her parents?

It is remarkably easy to turn to those who give us kindness when we are lonely. How thankful we feel. But when does simple gratitude turn to passionate love in a lonely and vulnerable heart?

And most importantly - how does Argus Filch’s cat figure into discussions regarding Mansfield Park?

These questions may be answered as you read through this third published work by Jane Austen but you will need to give the book careful attention and thought.  It is challenging in its depth but rewarding in its value of Austen’s expert execution.

Written at Chawton Cottage between February 1811 and 1813 and published July 1814, Mansfield Park remains one of the most serious and controversial of Austen’s major novels.

We are pulled into personal feelings of conflict by Austen’s expert writing.  What do we think of Fanny Price?  The tendency may be to think of her as priggish or occasionally as a - how else is it to be said - a wimp? 

But does Fanny Price have a strength of character and a moral integrity that makes her admirable and worthy of emulation?  The complex characters in this edgier Austen novel merit examination.   Give them consideration and reflection as you read.

If you have ever experienced being the “outsider” in a group then you might feel an undercurrent of empathy for this young woman.  She lives with a group of people that she is never allowed to feel quite on equal footing with or recognized as their equal.  Over the years she forms a knowledge of herself that allows her to stand firm in the face of opposition. And sometimes that very self-possession brings its own rewards… even love and admiration.

The Jane Austen Tea Society has happily returned to a study of our beloved Regency author’s works in the order in which they were published. Our third selection will be Mansfield Park with a High Tea and Book Discussion to take place on Saturday the 13th of July 2013 at 2pm.

There is plenty of time – start reading!

Elizabeth's mind was too full for conversation, but she saw and admired every remarkable spot and point of view.  They gradually ascended for half a mile, and then found themselves at the top of a considerable eminence, where the wood ceased, and the eye was instantly caught by Pemberley House, situated on the opposite side of valley, into which the road with some abruptness wound.  It was a large, handsome, stone building, standing well on rising ground, and backed by a ridge of high woody hills; -- and in front, a stream of some natural importance was swelled into greater, but without any artificial appearance.  Its banks were neither formal, nor falsely adorned.  Elizabeth was delighted.  She had never seen a place for which nature had done more, or where natural beauty had been so little counteracted by an awkward taste.  They were all of them warm in their admiration; and at that moment she felt, that to be mistress of Pemberley might be something!

Volume Three - Chapter One