开云体育

Tamar,

That is an excellent parallel you draw between the three Ward (weird)
sisters, and Maria, Julia, and Fanny, which was surely intentional on JA's
part.

As for your comment about the novel title being about a place, I'd argue
(and I am not original in this) that Mansfield Park the estate is a symbol
of the British colonial slavery aristocracy/wealthy class oppressing
everybody else (not only plantation slaves, but also poor and displaced
white people, and all women). Similarly I believe Northanger Abbey the
estate is a symbol of the domestic Gothic horror of ordinary English
marriage.

Austen's social critique was wide-ranging - the entire system, resting on
the cooperation of church, state, military and monied interests, was her
target.

ARNIE

On Thu, Nov 21, 2024 at 4:04?PM Tamar Lindsay via groups.io <dicconf=
[email protected]> wrote:

IMansfield Pafk is not titled after a main character (like Emma) nor a
character trait (P+P, S+S). It is named after a place (like Northanger
Abbey). It would be possible to consider MP as a study of the t hree
estates: metaphorically man's field but in civilization, a park, not a
forest. Even the forest seen is artificial. It's a story of three sisters
whose marriages reflect three levels of society - the one who ran off and
married down for love (the seaman), and seems content, the one who married
up (we don't know for certain that it was for money and property but that
seems likely), and the one who married Propriety (the churchman). The
nominal heroine and her two cousins are another set of three - one runs off
to marry for love, one marries for money and then tries for love, and Fanny
who is all propriety and marries the churchman.