“If Emma doesn’t know, then her flirting with Frank isn’t something to get that mad about, even with what she said to Miss Bates. Because by the time Emma starts, like, trying to be nice to her and invite her along in the carriage and just– I mean, she sends back the arrowroot. She sends it back. She’s sending a message. She could have just– she could have just been like, even– I mean, sending it back? It’s arrowroot.”
Category: Jane Fairfax
Explaining what I’ve uncovered in Jane Austen’s “Emma”
❧ Between Chapter 1 and Chapter 32 there are a total of 4 exceptions to the Miss Bates Rule.
❧ How “Miss Bates”—the device—commonly works.
❧ Finding Frank on those walks with Mr. Dixon, Miss Campbell, and Jane.
❧ The piano scene is romantic?
What did the Campbells know when they hoped a few months of Highbury air would ‘entirely cure’ Jane?
Wait, did Mr. Dixon and Miss Campbell fall in love at Weymouth, too? And was Frank on those walks with Jane, Miss Campbell and Mr. Dixon? Of course he was!
CH 38: “Jane on one arm, and me on the other”
“I am not helpless.” Miss Bates is just blinking “ERROR, ERROR, ERROR” at this point, trying to make sense of what Frank is doing, and not having any success. Why is he taking her arm? Since it can’t be to escort her into supper, maybe he thinks she’s about to fall over?
I know Miss Bates is much more than a device, no matter how I sound when I get over-enthusiastic
Jane Austen uses one single picture in the ABC game to show us how carefully attuned Miss Bates is to her niece’s well-being and when the word “Dixon” lands like a slap on Jane’s heart and Miss Bates somehow feels it.
“Aye, very true, my dear,” cried the latter, though Jane had not spoken a word—“I was just going to say the same thing. It is time for us to be going indeed…”
Exact Words 