This is another example of Austen¡¯s ambiguity.
What does ¡°there¡± in *¡±There, not to be vulgar, was distinction, and merit."*
¡°There¡± could refer to 1. Jane Fairfax or 2. Highbury.
Liz Anne
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On Oct 21, 2024, at 09:27, Nancy Mayer <regencyresearcher@...> wrote:
?The word vulgar did not have any meaning of obscenity,it just meant
"common" such as the common people- laborers and such. The word still
retained the meaning it had when the Vulgate Bible was published-- the
Bible in the language of the common people which at that time was Latin. I
think, Emma means that assessing Jane's looks wasn't something a person of
the gentry and up would do-- though , of course, they did.
Nancy
On Mon, Oct 21, 2024 at 1:31?AM Arnie Perlstein via groups.io
<arnieperlstein@...> wrote:
[Jane¡¯s] eyes, a deep grey, with dark eye-lashes and eyebrows, had never
been denied their praise; but the skin, which she had been used to cavil
at, as wanting colour, had a clearness and delicacy which really needed no
fuller bloom. It was a style of beauty, of which elegance was the reigning
character, and as such, she must, in honour, by all her principles, admire
it:¡ª*elegance*, which, whether of person or of mind, she saw so little in
Highbury. *There, not to be vulgar, was distinction, and merit."*
As Emma contemplates Jane shortly after Jane's arrival in Highbury in Ch.
20, she grudgingly acknowledges the elegance of Jane's style of beauty, and
feels she must admire it, in comparison to what she sees in other females
in Highbury.
Why does Emma then think, "not to be vulgar", that this constituted Jane's
"distinction and merit". Is it Emma's sense that Jane is no great shakes to
stand out in Highbury, because there is no real competition? If so, then,
Emma is in effect, undercutting her admiration as soon as she thinks it,
because in fact, she is jealous of Jane's elegance but hates to admit it?
Or
is Emma, in her snobbery, characterizing her thoughts as "vulgar" for some
other reason I am missing?
ARNIE
