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.’
Tag: emma
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?
If Frank Churchill believed Emma knew the truth…
He’d almost confessed, and suddenly Emma asks Jane to dinner. And then after talking about Jane’s walk to the post office Emma says how nice Frank’s handwriting is, and then she takes Jane’s arm to escort her into the dining room? That’s it, Emma must know.
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!
The Piano Scene: through Jane’s eyes
Which, no Frank did not just tell a beautiful woman that he would have “given worlds —all the worlds one ever has to give—” for anything, let alone another half hour to dance, because he wanted to get away from Miss Bates!
And Jane responds with maybe the most magical sentence of the novel, because it’s all right there.
“She played.”
How I got here and those “Reading Jane Austen podcast” references
The question of why I was forgetting Jane was forming somewhere in the recesses of my mind, but before the question had time to become fully formed I had tripped over the springs and mirrors operating Miss Bates.
The Miss Bates Traveling, Talking Circus: Chapter by chapter
It wasn’t until later—once the unmistakable pattern was clear—that I went, “OH MY GOD, THE LETTER! Of course! That little minx has been toying with us all along!”
Miss Bates is a circus. Miss Bates is a blind.
Like, I know Jane Austen didn’t literally say, “I will write a circus, and I will call her Miss Bates,” but I am going to pretend that she did, and you can’t stop me.
Jane, Jane! What’s in a name? Mrs. Elton’s most unpardonable sin.
What Mr. Knightley cannot fathom is that anyone—even Mrs. Elton—could address someone with the dignity and pride of Jane Fairfax like an inferior to her face. And by calling Miss Fairfax “Jane,” Mrs. Elton is indeed “continually insulting” her.
The conversation between Mrs. Weston, Mr. Knightley and Emma about why Jane Fairfax “consents to be with the Eltons” in which Emma calls EVERY SINGLE POINT right can lead me into what I need to say about Jane Austen’s ‘Emma’
I like it not only because it’s a very particular way of bringing forward points that the author wants us to be aware of—like the conversations in Pride and Prejudice at Bingley’s when Jane is sick—but also because half of what Mr. Knightley says needs the “rules of address” translation tweak to be properly understood, plus the bonus to make it all perfect, because Jane Austen counterintuitively allows Emma to be very precisely and exactly right on every point in her summation. (And you need her saucy lead-in to make the perfection fully sparkle.)
Exact Words 