This reads like a blog post. Quickly written, social media rules. Thanks for understanding.
This is about the letters between Mary and Fanny in Mansfield Park, so you must indulge me in a little naming convention talk first. I will get it in every chance I have because with Jane Austen’s way of writing, of not hitting you over the head with things, with her “exquisite brushwork,” she is going to use that most-engrained of all social markers to it’s fullest.
The conventions matter most to the plot in Emma. Without a fairly nuanced understanding of the rules of address easily half of what is going on in Emma is just erased from the plot, but in Mansfield Park it’s also easy to miss some of Austen’s fine, detailed brush work if you don’t give those conventions their full weight. (I forget half the time myself. I’m catching more now without much conscious thought, but most of it still flies by me.) Of course when Henry calls Fanny, “Fanny” and she draws back in displeasure that’s about Crawford using her first name—about taking a big liberty of intimacy—but in the notes between Mary and Fanny giving appropriate weight to the names they’re using turns Fanny’s reply into the sharp-edged little weapon it is.
Mary is all, “I’m so glad we’re going to be sisters!” and Fanny writes back, “Thank you for the honour of your note. Here is an icicle.’
What characters call each other is so important in Austen.
(I sidetracked into Persuasion, but I’m glad I did.)
He calls her “Anne.” Again.
So when Captain Wentworth says, “no one so proper, so capable as Anne”, that’s everything. It’s not “important,” it is EVERYTHING.
Watch what Captain Wentworth calls everyone else. Watch the intimacy-level markers. He just jumped from third to first level with Anne. Twice. “Musgrove” is friend level, and in a group of close, intimate friends this is completely normal between guys, but that’s still not intimate, intimate. Not family or husband-wife intimate. No woman could call Darcy “Darcy,” but Bingley can. Not at a ball or a dinner party, but around friends. But there is literally no set of circumstances where Captain Wentworth could properly call Anne Elliot “Anne”—as she is situated—to anyone else. (With the probable exception of his clergyman brother, in private.) The rest is all “Mrs. Harville” and “Mrs. Charles Musgrove” and then “Anne” just falls like a bomb. Like a beautiful, quiet bomb. “Anne.”
“Then it is settled, Musgrove,” cried Captain Wentworth, “that you stay, and that I take care of your sister home. But as to the rest, as to the others, if one stays to assist Mrs Harville, I think it need be only one. Mrs Charles Musgrove will, of course, wish to get back to her children; but if Anne will stay, no one so proper, so capable as Anne.”
Jane Austen, Persuasion ❦ Chapter 12
Naming conventions are a little tricky in the “intimacy” realm—they’re simple outside families—and so even once I knew how important names were, Persuasion stayed tricky. But if you love Austen and haven’t factored in what people are calling each other to each other and to others—in all those moments where it’s not pointed out—well, basically I’m jealous. Because you have the joy of being able to reread novels you know and find both broad strokes and nuance that will make them all, or almost all, bright shiny and new. (It matters least, by far, in P&P.) The naming conventions create their own little coded language, and they’re a code ready-made for Jane Austen. They’re markers of thought, respect, closeness, rank, and countless gradations of all four quietly woven throughout the story. Once you think about it, of course Austen is going to use that to its fullest, most brilliant, extent. She explores social situations, especially between classes, and she paints with a very fine brush. So while I don’t think I can ever really make those “Anne’s” hit my unaccustomed ears the way they would have a couple of hundred years ago, I seems certain that Austen’s first readers would have felt that “Anne” viscerally. Felt it, and known it, as eight years swept away. A man cannot call a woman he is not related to by her “Christian name” until they are engaged. (Of course we know that from Sense and Sensibility, but then we forget again and don’t notice, because we aren’t brought up in a society where it’s a foundational part of our lives, something that we take for granted.)
I wrote this last year when I was brand new. I think it’s the second thing I wrote and I wrote it fast. But although a new essay is much needed and near the top of my To Do list, and though I blush thinking about how clueless I was, as far as the names go I think it’s solid on the rules.
Despite having focused on what people call each other in Austen novels for a year—ever since Emma—I still missed this one. I still totally missed the power of this huge, beautiful, Austenly-understated dramatic moment in Persuasion on my first three reads. But in my defense, it’s difficult. There’s a group of related characters from related families and almost everyone is being called by their first names. It’s like camouflage to my modern eye and modern sensibilities. Oh, but when I did catch it—when I heard it, because I was listening and walking—a chill ran up my spine and I got literal goosebumps. Tears were involved. I was walking down the sidewalk past the post office and said, out loud, ”Like they’re engaged!” Because for a time, half a lifetime ago, before Anne started memorizing sad poems and poring over the Navy list, Captain Wentworth was “Frederick”to her and she was “Anne” to him. They were head over heels in love, engaged, and allowed to call each other by their first names. And they likely reveled in the privilege of that sanctioned and rare intimacy. (I think most couples did.) She probably mourned the fact that she would never hear him call her “Anne” again, and it probably cut her twice as deeply every time she heard him say “Miss Elliot.” Then suddenly, just like that, she’s Anne again. Or she’s still Anne. Twice she hears her name just fall from his lips, and the beauty genuinely is that he doesn’t know what he’s done. Doesn’t notice that he has just bared his soul. Doesn’t realize how much he still loves her because he hasn’t even admitted it to himself, or catch that he just revealed it to her before he has even admitted it to himself. That’s what makes it so true. I’m not sure I could pass by Wentworth’s “you could never change to me” blunder, but I feel him not noticing this all the way down to my toes. It’s just a slip, but it’s a slip that says everything. It makes me take a second look at that self-deceiver earlier on, and makes me notice that whatever else he’s doing, in each and every scene we are quietly pointed to where his attention is, and now I cannot but suspect that in Captain Wentworth’s mind she has always been “Anne.” (Regardless of the lies he’s been telling himself.)
But back to Fanny and Mary. Or should I say Fanny and Miss Crawford?
So sisters get special privileges. When it comes to names, only family can call each other by first names to others. Elizabeth can say “Jane is upstairs” to the neighbors if she wants to and so can Mrs. Bennet, but it’s just immediate family. That’s inner circle stuff, and this obviously takes on a lot of social importance. Implicit in Mary’s emphasis on “Fanny” is the relevance of special privilege. Notice how Lydia and Mrs. Forster (Pride and Prejudice) have become intimates—call each other by their first names—but Lydia still refers to Mrs. Forster as Mrs. Forster to everyone else, despite calling her “My Dear Harriet” in her elopement goodbye. But also, Fanny doesn’t want to be Mary’s sister in any way, and they both get that half of Mary’s “Hey sister” is about Mary and Edmund, and Fanny doesn’t want any part of that. “Sister? I know exactly what you’re thinking. Get back in your ‘Miss Crawford’ box and stay there.” But there was a third position: friend. Maybe not best friend, but there’s definitely room for friendlier.
And so Mary’s note is full of ‘I’m so thrilled you’re going to be my sister’ joy. “My dear Fanny,—for so I may now always call you…” Congratulations, new sister!!
“My dear Fanny,—for so I may now always call you, to the infinite relief of a tongue that has been stumbling at Miss Price for at least the last six weeks—I cannot let my brother go without sending you a few lines of general congratulation, and giving my most joyful consent and approval. Go on, my dear Fanny, and without fear; there can be no difficulties worth naming. I chuse to suppose that the assurance of my consent will be something; so you may smile upon him with your sweetest smiles this afternoon, and send him back to me even happier than he goes.—Yours affectionately, M. C.”
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park ❦ Chapter 31
But Fanny is not having it. That’s one thing I always hold against her a little. She is legitimately confused here, but had she shown even half the generosity of spirit toward Mary as she showed toward Susan, who knows what might have happened? Oh, I guess that would kind of ruin the story, huh? (I’m kidding. I mean, not about it ruining the story, of course it would, but I didn’t just now figure that out.) Still, knowing it would ruin the story doesn’t stop me from judging Fanny for it. Fanny, you’re too up tight and it’s a little ridiculous. And girl, you are rough on poor Mary here. What did she ever do to you? Yes, she “left Fanny to her fate.” I’m not exactly Team Mary, but it’s hard to be Team Fanny sometimes, too. You don’t have to be her sister, but you could have tried to be more of a friend.
Actually, no, I’m still Team Fanny. It’s weird, even the stuff I hold against her I don’t really hold against her. She tries too hard and is too downtrodden not to love.
Her note back to Mary has a sweet, bewildered tone to it, but there are knives in every “Miss.” Mary went straight into Sister Zone and Fanny’s counteroffer didn’t even concede Friend Zone. And if Fanny can deliver this kind of blow without ever thinking an unkind thought I guess that, in itself, is a skill.
“I am very much obliged to you, my dear Miss Crawford, for your kind congratulations, as far as they relate to my dearest William. The rest of your note I know means nothing; but I am so unequal to anything of the sort, that I hope you will excuse my begging you to take no farther notice. I have seen too much of Mr. Crawford not to understand his manners; if he understood me as well, he would, I dare say, behave differently. I do not know what I write, but it would be a great favour of you never to mention the subject again. With thanks for the honour of your note, I remain, dear Miss Crawford, etc., etc.”
Jane Austen, Mansfield Park ❦ Chapter 31
“Sister? Bitch, I ain’t even your friend.”
Exact Words 