On Monday, August 12, 2024 at 10:32:59 PM GMT+1, Arnie Perlstein <arnieperlstein@...> wrote:
MONDAY, JANUARY 2, 2017Galigai, St. Swithin, & Diana Parker: the dying Jane
Austen¡¯s ambition for immortality & gender justice
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I am VERY pleased and honored to announce that the 2017 JASNA AGM Steering
Committee has notified me that I am one of the lucky ones who will get to
deliver a breakout session talk in Huntington Beach, CA at the AGM that
will run from Oct. 6-8, 2017!!!!
......
This will be my third AGM presentation (2010 in Portland, OR and 2014 in
Montreal), and I will be counting the days (277 to be exact) till it
starts! And finally, for those who might be interested in coming to hear my
talk, here's the beginning of my blurb describing what I'll have the luxury
of 40 minutes to articulate in detail:
"Galigai, St. Swithin, & Diana Parker: the dying Jane Austen¡¯s ambition for
immortality & gender justice"
Nearly all Austen biographers, following her brother Henry (¡°in spite of
such applause, so much did she shrink from notoriety, that no accumulation
of fame would have induced her, had she lived, to affix her name to any
productions of her pen¡°) and her nephew James Edward (¡°little thinking of
future fame, but caring only for 'the queerness and the fun¡¯ ¡°), would have
us believe Jane didn¡¯t reach (or even wish) for literary immortality; that
she¡¯d be shocked to learn of her still widening fame 200 years after her
early death while at the peak of her powers.
I¡¯ve come to know a different Jane, a proud, ambitious artist; and,
ironically, I find the best evidence of her proud (but well-regulated)
ambition, not in her six novels, but, when physical death loomed large, in
her 1817 writings, in which she thrice asserted her power and her will to
survive¡at least, on paper!:
(1) in her late letter to old friend Anne Sharp (¡°Galigai for ever and
ever, the influence of strength over weakness indeed¡±);
(2) in her last fiction, the Sanditon fragment (¡°The world is pretty much
divided between the weak of mind and the strong; between those who can act
and those who cannot; and it is the bounden duty of the capable to let no
opportunity of being useful escape them. My¡complaints¡are happily not
often of a nature to threaten existence immediately. And as long as we can
exert ourselves to be of use to others,...the body is the better for the
refreshment the mind receives in doing its duty"); AND
(3) in her deathbed testament, the ¡°fanciful¡± ¡°When Winchester Races¡±
(¡°When once we are buried you think we are gone But behold me
immortal!...Set off for your course, I'll pursue with my rain.¡
Henceforward I'll triumph in shewing my powers¡¡±).
I¡¯ll start there, browse the novels & letters, then circle back to her
juvenilia; and show that, for her entire writing life, Jane not only wished
for immortality, she grabbed for it with both (far from mouldering) hands!
SUNDAY, JUNE 15, 2014
Queen Galigai, Queen Sarah, & Queen Jane: the lesbian subtext of Letter 159
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Ellen Moody wrote the following re Jane Austen's Letter 159 to Anne Sharp,
written not long before Jane's premature death at 41:
"Galigai de Concini forever.' I used to think this a reference to a witty
French philosophe's letters (very popular) suggesting a world of
Enlightenment Jane and Anne shared together as girls but Chapman says it's
a reference to a devastating story of a woman burned to death who asked
what she had used on her mistress to "charm" her-(the mistress was getting
back at this poor woman), answered the power of strong souls over weak. I
wish I knew the Voltairian context: he would be telling the story with sardonic
irony perhaps.. Anyway that must have been their motto: the source is as
revealing as the surface content. Strength influences weakness and yet you
are at high risk of destruction. Perhaps Austen believed this: the strong
personality, the person with inner strength to whom in her novels (her
heroines are this kind of person) she gave a romance happiness at the close
of her books as that is what her readers wanted.¡± END QUOTE
Ellen, your wish is my command¡ªhere first is Voltaire, in French and in
translation (which I know you don¡¯t need, but others might):
*¡°Le conseiller Courtin lui demanda de quel charme elle s¡¯¨¦tait servie pour
ensorceler la reine: Galiga?, indign¨¦e contre le conseiller, et un peu
m¨¦contente de Marie de M¨¦dicis, r¨¦pondit: ¡°Mon sortil¨¨ge a ¨¦t¨¦ le pouvoir
que les ?mes fortes doivent avoir sur les esprits faibles.¡± Cette r¨¦ponse
ne la sauva pas; quelques juges eurent assez de lumi¨¨res et d¡¯¨¦quit¨¦ pour
ne pas opiner ¨¤ la mort; mais le reste, entra?n¨¦ par le pr¨¦jug¨¦ public, par
l¡¯ignorance, et plus encore par ceux qui voulaient recueillir les
d¨¦pouilles de ces infortun¨¦s, condamn¨¨rent ¨¤ la fois le mari d¨¦j¨¤ mort et
la femme, comme convaincus de sortil¨¨ge, de juda?sme et de malversations.
La mar¨¦chale fut ex¨¦cut¨¦e (1617), et son corps br?l¨¦.¡±*
Counselor Courtin asked her what magic she had used to cast a spell upon
the queen: Galigai, outraged against the counselor and a bit miffed with
Maria de Medici, answered: ¡°My magic spell was the power that strong
spirits may have upon the weak.¡± This response did not save her, several
judges were intelligent and just enough not to support the penalty of
death, but the rest, influenced by public prejudice, by ignorance and still
more by those who sought to reap the plunder of those unfortunates,
sentenced both the already deceased husband and his wife to death¡ªfor
sorcery, Judaism and miscreancy. The mar¨¦chale was executed (1617) and her
body burned.¡±? Voltaire, *Essai sur les m?urs et l¡¯esprit des nations et
sur les principaux faits de l¡¯histoire, depuis Charlemagne jusqu¡¯¨¤ Louis
XIII*, ch clxxiv, 7¨¨me lettre (1756)
It is obvious from the above that Voltaire sympathized with Galigai, and
that he didn¡¯t buy the prosecutor¡¯s theory of massively corrupt, even evil
Rasputin-like influence that harmed many French people.
From my further consideration of, and digging beneath, JA¡¯s cryptic meaning
in alluding to ¡°Galigai for ever and ever¡± in Letter 159, beyond my
comments in my previous post, I not only continue to adhere to the belief
that this was a mantra expressing? JA¡¯s longstanding secret bond with Anne
Sharp, as two single gentlewomen treated as less than equal to the
gentlemen around them, but also as having a sexual aspect as well¡ªi.e., it
was an expression of a very romantic friendship between JA and Anne,
expressed at the very moment in JA¡¯s life when she was in effect already in
her deathbed, and therefore likely to be the most truthful, uncensored
expression of JA¡¯s deepest feelings. In short, JA was pouring her heart
out? to a woman she loved very deeply, more than as a purely platonic
friend.
And in that same vein, I believe, after reading up a good deal today about
the relationship between Maria de Medicis and Eleonora Galigai de Concini,
that at least a part of the widespread hatred & demonization of Galigai¡ªthe
horrible cry of ¡°Burn the witch!¡± repeated in countless varied ways a
thousand times, over millennia, all over the world, against women who in
any way transgressed, or seemed to transgress, against the cruelly unfair
restrictions imposed on their gender--was due to the perception that
Galigai was not merely manipulating Maria, who was after all mother of the
King of France, for gain and power, but the added extra inciting factor
that her manipulation was believed to be at least partly based on a lesbian
relationship between them.
And that would be strikingly similar to another royal scenario that played
out in England less than a century after Galigai was put to death, and, in
that regard, I leave it to an 1844 commentator to give you part one of the
explanation of that connection¡.
*Notice of Windsor in Olden Times *by John Stoughton, at p. 222:
¡°No reader of English history can fail to associate with the reign of Anne
the name of Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, whose history is also linked to
the locality of Windsor by several interesting incidents. There, in her
palmy days, she gave examples of the marvellous influence which she had
acquired over her royal mistress, an influence which it has been well
remarked, was the same as the sorcery which Leonora Galligai avowed to her
judges over Mary de Medicis¡ª "the power of a strong upon a weak mind." She
was appointed by the queen ranger of Windsor Park, an appointment which she
greatly valued, and had a residence there appropriated for her use, to
which she was much attached. The lodge of the park, she remarks, was a very
agreeable residence; and "Anne had remembered, in the days of their
friendship, that the duchess, in riding by it, had often wished for such a
place." The castle was the scene of many a visit from "Queen Sarah," as she
was popularly called, till her influence was undermined by the intrigues of
the famous Mrs. Masham, that singular personage in English history.¡±
¡and the Booklist synopsis for the recent biography of ¡°Queen Sarah¡± by
Ophelia Field to give you part two:
¡°Though the life of Sarah Churchill (1660-1744), first duchess of
Marlborough and original matriarch of a still-thriving dynasty, has been
well chronicled through the centuries, Field still manages to provide new
insight. Sarah's intimate relationship with Queen Anne serves as the
natural centerpiece of this biography. One of the queen's most favored
companions for a great number of years, Sarah eventually blackmailed Anne,
whom she believed to have unceremoniously dumped her for another female
friend. Intriguingly, Sarah threatened to expose Anne as a lesbian, an
accusation that would have implicated Sarah in her own attempted slander of
the queen. Such a gutsy power play was par for the course for a savvy
operator who used any backdoor source available to her as a woman to wield
social, political, and economic power in a man's world. Married to one of
England's greatest generals, she exploited whatever and whomever possible
in order to advance the Whig party or to increase her already immense
´Ú´Ç°ù³Ù³Ü²Ô±ð.¡±
I think JA was well aware of both of these very famous royal power plays,
including their sexual aspects, and included them not only in that brief
code in Letter 159, but also in various of her novels¡ªbut that last point
is a topic for another day.
Letter 159 to Anne Sharp, Part Two: the Dying JA¡¯s Alter Egos: Galigai de
Concini & St. Swithin!
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¡°¡But how you are worried! Wherever Distress falls, you are expected to
supply Comfort. Lady P. writing to you even from Paris for advice! It is
the Influence of Strength over Weakness indeed. Galigai de Concini for ever
& ever.-Adeiu.¡±
Le Faye¡¯s footnote re Galigai de Concini reads as follows: ¡°RWC gives the
explanation: Eleonore Galigai, a maid of honour to Maria de Medicis,
married Concino Concini, and was burned as a sorceress in 1617. When one of
her judges asked her what charm she had put on her mistress, she replied:
¡®Mon sortilege a ete le pouvoir que les ames fortes doivent avoir sur les
esprits faibles.¡¯ [¡°My sorcery was the power that strong souls must have
over weak spirits.¡±] Voltaire, Essai? sur les Moeurs, Ch. 175. JA may have
owed her knowledge to Lord Chesterfield (see his letter of 30 April 1752;
or to Edgeworth¡¯s The Absentee, Ch. 3¡±? END QUOTE FROM LE FAYE/CHAPMAN
From my research today, I believe JA and Anne Sharpe knew all about
Galligai de Concini from several different sources, and not just the
Chesterfield and Edgeworth. Let¡¯s look at each of them now:
First, here is the passage in Lord Chesterfield¡¯s Letter that Chapman
cited, in which the worldly wise Lord eloquently touts the value of
practical life experience over purely intellectual knowledge, when it comes
to human nature. When I read this passage, I think of Jane Austen herself
as a writer, and I think of strong-minded characters like the Luciferian
Charlotte LUC-as and LUC-y FERrars!:
¡°The man 'qui a du monde' knows all this from his own experience and
observation: the conceited, cloistered philosopher knows nothing of it from
his own theory; his practice is absurd and improper, and he acts as
awkwardly as a man would dance, who had never seen others dance, nor
learned of a dancing-master; but who had only studied the notes by which
dances are now pricked down as well as tunes. Observe and imitate, then,
the address, the arts, and the manners of those 'qui ont du monde': see by
what methods they first make, and afterward improve impressions in their
favor. Those impressions are much oftener owing to little causes than to
intrinsic merit; which is less volatile, and hath not so sudden an effect
*. *Strong minds have undoubtedly an ascendant over weak ones, as GALIGAI
Marachale d'Ancre very justly observed, when, to the disgrace and reproach
of those times, she was executed for having governed Mary of Medicis by the
arts of witchcraft and magic. But then ascendant is to be gained by
degrees, and by those arts only which experience and the knowledge of the
world teaches; for few are mean enough to be bullied, though most are weak
enough to be bubbled. I have often seen people of superior, governed by
people of much inferior parts, without knowing or even suspecting that they
were so governed.¡±
Next, we have the passage from Edgeworth¡¯s *The Absentee*,which is a
lighter, comic version of the archetype, in which the quick-witted Mrs.
Dareville repeatedly ¡°dares¡± to tweak the vanity of the slow-witted society
snob Lady Clonbrony. Here¡¯s the end of that scene, where Galigai is
referred to:
¡°Having with great difficulty got the malicious wit out of the pagoda and
into the Turkish tent, Lady Clonbrony began to breathe more freely; for
here she thought she was upon safe ground: 'Everything, I flatter myself'
said she, 'is correct and appropriate, and quite picturesque.' The company,
dispersed in happy groups, or reposing on seraglio ottomans, drinking
lemonade and sherbet beautiful Fatimas admiring, or being
admired¡ª'Everything here quite correct, appropriate, and picturesque,'
repeated Mrs. Dareville.
This lady's powers as a mimic were extraordinary, and she found them
irresistible. Hitherto she had imitated Lady Clonbrony's air and accent
only behind her back; but, bolder grown, she now ventured, in spite of Lady
Langdale's warning pinches, to mimic her kind hostess before her face, and
to her face.
[More examples of Mrs. Dareville¡¯s mockery of Lady Clonbrony, then¡]
'Salisbury!¡ªexplain this to me,' said a lady, drawing Mr. Salisbury aside.
'If you are in the secret, do explain this to me; for unless I had seen it,
I could not have believed it. Nay, though I have seen it, I do not believe
it. How was that daring spirit laid? By what spell?'
'By the spell which superior minds always cast on inferior spirits.'
'Very fine,' said the lady, laughing, 'but as old as the days of Leonora de
GALIGAI, quoted a million times. Now tell me something new and to the
purpose, and better suited to modern days.'
'Well, then, since you will not allow me to talk of superior minds in the
present days, let me ask you if you have never observed that a wit, once
conquered in company by a wit of a higher order, is thenceforward in
complete subjection to the conqueror, whenever and wherever they meet.'
'You would not persuade me that yonder gentle-looking could ever be a match
for the veteran Mrs. Dareville? She may have the wit, but has she the
courage?'
'Yes; no one has more courage, more civil courage, where her own dignity,
or the interests of her friends are concerned. I will tell you an instance
or two to-morrow.¡±
Even though I believe JA did indeed read both Lord Chesterfield¡¯s letters
AND *The Absentee, *I believe JA was also very familiar with Mary Hays¡¯s
1807 biographical sketch of Galigai, which itself was a condensation of a
much longer bio published by Bayle a half? century earlier:
LEONORA GALLIGAI, a Florentine, the daughter of a joiner, and the nurse of
Mary de Medicis, by whom she was greatly beloved, accompanied Mary into
France on her marriage with Henry IV in 1606. Leonora, plain in her person,
but possessed of wit and talents, wholly governed the queen her mistress,
whom she attended as woman of the bed-chamber. She gave her hand to Concino
Conceni, afterwards marshal d'Ancre, who was also a native of Florence, and
who came into France with the queen. Conceni, through the influence of his
wife, rapidly obtained wealth and employments. The domestic jars which
embittered the life of Henry IV are attributed to the machinations of this
Florentine pair, who found their account in abusing the confidence of their
mistress.
After the death of Henry, the Concernis, by their ascendency over the
queen, obtained yet greater powers; and, by their rapacity and insolence,
offended the nobles, and disgusted the nation. The marquisate of Ancre in
Picardy was purchased by Conceni; who was also made governor of Amiens,
Peronne, Roie, and Montdidier. He was afterwards created a marshal of
France, and first gentleman of the bedchamber to the young king. Two
hundred gentlemen attended him when he appeared in public, beside the
servants to whom he allowed wages, and whom he was accustomed to call his '
thousandlivre poltroons.' He removed at pleasure the counsellors of the
king, whom he replaced with his own creatures; disposed of the finances,
distributed the offices of state, and by terror crushed all who opposed him.
Leonora, thus arrived at the pinnacle of fortune, affected the most
ridiculous fastidiousness. The princes, princesses, and first personages of
the kingdom, were prohibited from coming to her apartments, while it was
accounted a crime to look at her. The people terrified her, she declared,
and made her dread lest they should bewitch her by gazing in her face.
Wearied at length by the complaints of his courtiers, and the exactions and
caprices of the Italian favourites, Lewis XIII determined to rid himself of
their usurpations; for which purpose he gave a commission to Vitri, a
captain of the guards, who received orders to dispatch Conceni, by pistols,
on the drawbridge of the Louvre. This sentence was accordingly executed
April 24, 1617. The body of the unfortunate favourite suffered, after his
death, the vilest indignities [gory details, followed by¡] Leonora heard of
the fate of her husband with little concern, except for her own interest.
Without shedding a tear, or expressing a regret, she appeared solicitous
only for the preservation of her jewels. Having enclosed them in her bed,
she caused herself to be undressed and placed in it; but the officers of
the provost, sent to search her chamber, compelled her to arise, and
discovered the treasure. 'You have killed my husband,' said she, 'does not
that satisfy you? Let me be permitted to leave the kingdom.' When informed
of the indignities practised on the body of Conceni, she appeared somewhat
moved, yet she shed no tears. After a pause, she declared that her husband
had been a presumptuous insolent man, who had deserved his fate. It was
three years, she added, since they had separate apartments; that Conceni
was a bad man, and that, to rid herself of him, she had determined, to
retire into Italy, and had prepared every thing for her journey. This
assertion she offered to prove. She behaved with great confidence, as if
she had nothing to apprehend, and even expressed a hope of being taken
again into favour.
She was first carried to the Bastile, and afterwards committed to the
*Conciergerie, *or prison of the parliament, by which she was tried. Having
been condemned to lose her head, and have her body consumed to ashes, she
pleaded pregnancy; a plea which was over-ruled by her own confession, that
she had lived apart from her husband for three years. Convicted of high
treason against God and the king, she suffered her sentence with firmness
and courage, July 8th, 161*7.*
She was accused, with her husband, of having judaized, and practised magic
arts; which, with judicial astrology, were, in those times, seriously
professed. On being questioned by counsellor Courtin, respecting the kind
of sorcery which, she had employed to gain an ascendency over Mary de
Medicis, she sensibly replied, 'That she had used no other magic, than that
power which strong minds possess over those that are weak.'
With that background, I now express my agreement with Claire Tomalin¡¯s 1999
assessment of this allusion in Letter 159, which is that JA saw herself as
a strong minded woman condemned by society as a ¡°sorceress¡±:? ¡°Suddenly,
surprisingly, she invokes the 17th century French ¡®sorceress¡¯ Eleonore
Galigai de Concini, who, according to Voltaire, told her judges before she
was burned that her magic was simply the force that strong spirits exert
over weak ones¡Was it Eliza who read Voltaire and told her about Eleonore?
Whoever it was, ¡°Galigai de Concini for ever & ever¡¯ wrote Jane, her own
spirit strong enough for a sorceress.¡± And in a 2013 book chapter entitled
¡°Getting to Know Miss Jane Austen: Images of an Author¡±, Rana Tekcan, a
Turkish scholar, strongly endorsed Tomalin¡¯s reading:? ¡°Tomalin¡connects
the strong spirit of the sorceress not with Anne Sharpe but with JA herself
about to face death. Tomalin entitles the chapter ¡°The Sorceress¡¯ and
surrounds the quotation with details of her illness and her last attempt at
³¦´Ç³¾±è´Ç²õ¾±³Ù¾±´Ç²Ô.¡±
But the still bigger picture I see, is that JA writes this to Anne Sharp as
a code already so familiar between the two of them from past interactions,
that it needs no explanation, beyond stating the mantra. I believe JA is
indeed speaking about herself and Anne, as two persecuted co-conspirators
in the heresy that two women without formal education could be wiser and
(by deception) more powerful even than those invested with real power in
their world, mostly men.
And¡there is also in Galigai the idea of a smart woman who gains power not
through her physical attractiveness, but through her sharp mind. We are
reminded of Lady Susan, Lucy Ferrars, Mary Bennet, Charlotte Lucas, Mrs.
Smith and (yes) Harriet Smith¡ªwho use their wits to gain what they seek.
And also such women are viewed as dangerous by the patriarchy, and so are
demonized as witches and often violently disposed of¡ªthat persecution is as
much part of why JA mentions Galigai to Anne Sharp as the powerfully sharp
female mind.
And that¡¯s when I connected the dots I show in my Subject Line¡ªof course JA
wrote Letter 159 only 6 weeks or so before she wrote her final poem,
Winchester Races, which I have written about many times as JA¡¯s swan song
of defiant, indomitable spirit. She will not be silenced, she may even have
been quietly put? to death (Ashford¡¯s novel is not a ridiculous flight of
fancy, it is grounded in Letter 159, Winchester Races, and the references
to poison in Sanditon and Emma). But JA¡¯s strong spirit, and her writings,
will survive!
No wonder Anne Sharp kept this one letter so sacred, and passed it on (as
Le Faye describes its provenance) so that it would eventually (in 1926)
emerge into the light of day for the world to see.
TUESDAY, JUNE 17, 2014
"Galigai de Concini for ever and ever" & "The men shan't come and part us,
I am determined. We want none of them; do we?"
<>
In Janeites, Rita Lamb responded to my suggestion that Galigai de Concini
may have been persecuted in part because of a public perception of a
lesbian relationship between Galigai and Maria de Medicis:? "Arnie, I did
as I was bid but found only modern speculation on a forum :(? Is there a
reference to a contemporary source that links Galigai and rumours of
lesbianism?? I get the impression that, after her execution, any possible
smear was thrown at her; but I don't know that this included 'sexual
deviancy' as well as witchcraft."
I replied as follows:
Well, the quote I provided the other day from an 1844 commentator DID
explicitly draw a parallel between Galigai and Sarah Churchill, and went
further and called that linkage "well remarked", meaning that a number of
other commentators of that era must also have noted the striking
parallelism of situation, so I'll repeat those 1844 remarks now:
*Notice of Windsor in Olden Times* by John Stoughton, at p. 222:
¡°No reader of English history can fail to associate with the reign of Anne
the name of Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, whose history is also linked to
the locality of Windsor by several interesting incidents. There, in her
palmy days, she gave examples of the marvellous influence which she had
acquired over her royal mistress, an influence which it has been well
remarked, was the same as the sorcery which Leonora Galligai avowed to her
judges over Mary de Medicis¡ª "the power of a strong upon a weak mind." She
was appointed by the queen ranger of Windsor Park, an appointment which she
greatly valued, and had a residence there appropriated for her use, to
which she was much attached. The lodge of the park, she remarks, was a very
agreeable residence; and "Anne had remembered, in the days of their
friendship, that the duchess, in riding by it, had often wished for such a
place." The castle was the scene of many a visit from "Queen Sarah," as she
was popularly called, till her influence was undermined by the intrigues of
the famous Mrs. Masham, that singular personage in English history.¡±
While I freely acknowledge that John Stoughton did NOT allude to lesbianism
in either historical situation, I believe JA made that association as well,
and, given all the lesbian subtext I and other Austen scholars have found
in her novels, I think JA and Anne shared an admiration for the defiant Don
Juan-like middle finger that Leonore de Concini gave to her persecutors,
even when she knew she was doomed. I think JA and Anne must have spoken
often of that powerful female role model, courageous in the face of
imminent horrible death.
And....as I reflect further on it, there is the same feeling in JA writing
"Galigai de Concini for ever and ever" in Letter 159, that I first noticed
4 years ago in the words spoken to Elizabeth Bennet by the mysterious
female whisperer when Elizabeth is so busy watching Darcy's every move at
Longbourn the first time he shows up there late in the novel:
""The men shan't come and part us, I am determined. We want none of them;
do we?"
That rarely noticed passage may, upon examination, seem only like a
rallying cry to female friendship, but I hear in it, as well, a rejection
of men that is also physical and not just social.
And, by the way, 4 years ago, I concluded that the mysterious whisperer was
Mary Bennet, and now I am even more sure of it, because I just noticed just
how strikingly parallel the whisperer's words are to the following sentence
spoken only a few pages earlier in P&P, by Mrs. Bennet:
"The subject which had been so warmly canvassed between their parents,
about a twelvemonth ago, was now brought forward again.
"As soon as ever Mr. Bingley comes, my dear," said Mrs. Bennet, "you will
wait on him of course."
"No, no. You forced me into visiting him last year, and promised, if I went
to see him, he should marry one of my daughters. But it ended in nothing,
and I will not be sent on a fool's errand again."
His wife represented to him how absolutely necessary such an attention
would be from all the neighbouring gentlemen, on his returning to
Netherfield.
"'Tis an etiquette I despise," said he. "If he wants our society, let him
seek it. He knows where we live. I will not spend my hours in running after
my neighbours every time they go away and come back again."
"Well, all I know is, that it will be abominably rude if you do not wait on
him. But, however, that SHAN'T prevent my asking him to dine here, I AM
DETERMINED. We must have Mrs. Long and the Gouldings soon. That will make
thirteen with ourselves, so there will be just room at table for him."
Please note the striking parallelism--both are spoken by a female, both use
the archaic word "shan't", both say "I am determined"...and both are about
the entry of a man into a female enclave--but whereas Mrs. Bennet is
determined to ask Bingley to dine at Longbourn, I say Mary Bennet, who has
heard her mother and does NOT agree but does not wish to risk speaking her
disagreement openly, chooses instead the clever deception of? mimicking her
mother's vulgar speech pattern to disguise her own identity, and to turn
her mother's words 180 degrees upside down, to make them the voice of
female solidarity and the rejection of male intrusion into a female
enclave, seeking to reverse her mother's invitation for invasion.
And that was the world that JA and Anne Sharpe shared, I believe, one of
female solidarity PLUS something that could only be "whispered" in code
between them.
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2014
Galigai de Concini, Harriot Freke, and Elinor Joddrel: A Chain of Covert
Lesbian Allusion Culminating in JA¡¯s Mary Crawford (& in JA¡¯s Letter 159 to
Anne Sharp)
<>
Four months ago, I wrote a series of blog posts about Jane Austen¡¯s cryptic
reference in Letter 159 (written to Anne Sharp in the last year of JA¡¯s
life) to the ill-fated Galigai de Concini, the particular friend of Maria
de Medicis:
¡°But how you are worried! Wherever Distress falls, you are expected to
supply Comfort. Lady P. writing to you even from Paris for advice! It is
the Influence of Strength over Weakness indeed. Galigai de Concini for ever
& ever.-Adeiu.¡±
That series of posts culminated in one¡.
¡in which I made a *prima facie *case for Jane Austen having intended, by
that reference, to communicate a strong but coded *lesbian* subtext, which
she meant to be decoded and understood only by its addressee, Anne Sharp. I
have long believed Anne Sharp to be one of the two women (along with Martha
Lloyd) with whom JA had some sort of intense (but, in Anne¡¯s case,
obviously almost entirely long-distance) lesbian relationship.
Today, while researching an entirely different, but still very cool, veiled
allusion to Edgeworth¡¯s *Belinda* which I just spotted in one of JA¡¯s
novels, I also chanced upon evidence that strengthens my above claim for
lesbian subtext in JA¡¯s Letter 159¡ªthat evidence is the following passage
in Chapter 17 of *Belinda*, entitled ¡°Rights of Woman¡±:
"And will you make me lose my bet?" cried Mrs. Freke "Oh, at all events,
you must come to the ball!¡ªI'm down for it. But I'll not press it now,
because you're frightened out of your poor little wits, I see, at the bare
thoughts of doing any thing considered out of rule by these good people.
Well, well! it shall be managed for you¡ªleave that to me: I'm used to
managing for cowards. Pray tell me¡ªyou and Lady Delacour are off, I
understand?¡ªGive ye joy!¡ªShe and I were once great friends; that is to say,
I HAD OVER HER ¡®THAT POWER WHICH STRONG MINDS HAVE OVER WEAK ONES,¡±' but
she was too weak for me¡ªone of those people that have neither courage to be
good, nor to be bad."
"The courage to be bad," said Belinda, "I believe, indeed, she does not
possess."
Mrs. Freke stared. "Why, I heard you had quarrelled with her!"
"If I had," said Belinda, "I hope that I should still do justice to her
merits. It is said that people are apt to suffer more by their friends than
their enemies. I hope that will never be the case with Lady Delacour, as I
confess that I have been one of her friends."
"'Gad, I like your spirit¡ªyou don't want courage, I see, to fight even for
your enemies. You are just the kind of girl I admire. I see you have been
prejudiced against me by Lady Delacour; but whatever stories she may have
trumped up, the truth of the matter is this, there's no living with her,
she's so jealous¡ªso ridiculously jealous¡ªof that lord of hers, for whom all
the time she has the impudence to pretend not to care more than I do for
the sole of my boot," said Mrs. Freke, striking it, with her whip; "but she
hasn't the courage to give him tit for tat: now this is what I call
weakness¡¡±? END QUOTE
Of course, Mrs. Freke (pronounced, not coincidentally, like Henry
Crawford¡¯s famous ¡°freaks¡±) is Harriot Freke, who is, many of you know, one
of the two characters mentioned first when the topic of closeted lesbians
in the literature of Jane Austen¡¯s era is raised---Elinor Joddrel from
Fanny Burney¡¯s *The Wanderer *being the other.
And so of course a woman like Harriot Freke [who is, famously and
obviously---from the title of Chapter 17, for starters---a parody of Mary
Wollstonecraft---who had died an awful death only 3 years before *Belinda *was
published] would have known about, and then plausibly invoked in an ironic,
but favorable light, Galigai de Concini, who, as my above linked blog post
indicated, was rumored to have had a lesbian influence over her powerful
patroness, Maria de Medicis, hence the smear about being a ¡°witch¡±.
And, stepping back for a wider literary perspective, as my Subject Line
hints, now I also see Jane Austen (via the character of Mary Crawford,
whose lesbian interest in Fanny Price was depicted in Rozema¡¯s *Mansfield
Park*, and has subsequently been unpacked in scholarly fashion by myself
and also by my friend Aintzane Legaretta) and Fanny Burney (via the
character of Elinor Joddrel in *The Wanderer*, published 2 months
before *Mansfield
Park*) BOTH responding, in different, complicated ways, to Edgeworth. In
particular, Mary can be seen as a subtle, wittily understated version of
Edgeworth¡¯s wittily over the top original, Harriot.
And finally, as I also stated as I began this post, this also makes it that
much more likely that I was right on the money in seeing a lesbian subtext
in JA¡¯s allusion to Galigai de Concini in Letter 159 to Anne Sharp. It
really is a great chain of covert literary allusion, and it really gives
serious pause to wonder about some covert coordination between Jane Austen
and Fanny Burney in 1813 when both were composing their respective novels¡ª*The
Wanderer *was discussed by several speakers at the latest JASNA AGM, and I
recall enjoying hearing Elaine Bander speak brilliantly about parallels way
back at the 2005 (and see the *Persuasions *article on that topic that
Elaine wrote back then).
Jane Austen¡¯s infinitely subtle allusions for ever & ever!
On Mon, Aug 12, 2024 at 2:06?PM Ellen Moody via groups.io <ellen.moody=
[email protected]> wrote:
Ah.? Well you have to have read the book.? My question is about the art of
the book. Is Ashford imitating Austen in her use of the first
person narrator. The lesbian feelings are presented subtly and the
friendships very convincing.? I would not recommend the book as a few other
of the
sequels I've read I'm surer about, but don't condemn the book until you've
read it, no? Ellen
On Mon, Aug 12, 2024 at 4:56?PM Nancy Mayer via groups.io
? <regencyresearcher@...> wrote:
It does depend on whether others have read the book as to whether or not
they can answer you. I haven't read the book. I do think? that there are
many who want to read lesbian feelings between Jane and Martha, and Emma
and Harriet. That sort of thing is hard to distinguish from a close
friendship, even today. It is very hard to distinguish in a society
where people often kissed on meeting friends. This wasn't only the case
then, it
is still the practice in some cultures today.? When I was a child there
were some men I didn't? want to be near because they wanted to kiss? on the
lips which I hated.? Of course, Martha lived with the Austens for
many years.
As to Emma, I think that despite her claiming to be a matchmaker that
she hadn't yet been awaken to? sexual desire. She liked? Harriet as a friend
because harriet was pretty and it gvae Emma a bit of a feeling
of superiority of "Look at me being the patroneness of an orphan." Not an
admirable trait.
On Mon, Aug 12, 2024 at 4:37?PM Ellen Moody via groups.io <ellen.moody=
[email protected]> wrote:
? Oops.? I meant also " how innocent or ignorant of the seriousness of body
sexuality Miss Sharpe is."? Freudian slip. Ellen
On Mon, Aug 12, 2024 at 4:35?PM Ellen Moody <ellen.moody@...>
wrote:
You're right, Nancy, to imagine Henry as seducing one after another
of
the women he's related to by marriage, really because they're there,
does make him into a base man. I wonder how much Ashford thought
about
it, but she does make him into a murderer too.
That's why I wondered if we are to take Miss Sharp's inferences and
silent sleuthing as akin to Emma's. My question is, Hasanyone
suggested that we are to read Miss Sharpe in this book? as eventually
we are taught to read Emma. Emm's imaginings about Jane Fairfax are
gross.? That she is having an affair ith her best friend's husband.
That they are adulterers. To me these fancies show how innocent or
ignorant of the seriousness of body sexuality Emma is. You see I am
wondering if these spun stories are all in Miss Shrpe's mind. Jane
may
look ominous but she never agrees with Miss Sharpe aloud.
I don't mean to imply Miss Sharpe is a repressed sex starved old
maid,
rather that like Emma she is venturing into ground that can make for
real hurt for other people.? We are in this book led to dislike
Elizabet Austen as keeping the Austen women from the cottage offer at
the same time feel sorry for her with Edward not willing to give her
one night alone in bed. She fires Miss Sharpe when told this
revelation.But you might expect her to do more, give her a bad
character.
It becomes a more interesting book if Miss Sharpe is a delusionist --
against this idea of mine is nowhere do I feel enough irony directed
at Miss Sharpe as there is plenty of irony directed at Emma in the
first third of Austen's Emma where she misleads Harriet so badly and
is (I'd say) malicious over Mr Martin's letter, when she claims he
could not have written it.
What do you think? do you feel Ashford wants us to believe Miss
Sharpe
is correct? Or deluded?Catherine Morland is another Jane Austen
heroine castigated for her imaginings -- yet she has intuited
the cruelty and coldness of the General.
Let's admit his is an underlying pattern in both NA and Emma, only
Emma is more seriously blamed, as having no grounds for accusing Jane
Fairfax while Ctherine Morland feels the tyranny of General Tilney
The material about lesbian spinsterhood and erotic feeling between
Jane and Miss Sharpe is only vouched for by Miss Sharpe.? Jane is
kept
far from the stage (as she is not in parts of Hornby's Miss Austen) I
admit I liked the insight into the strong feeling between Jane and
Martha, as I do Catherine's in effect on behalf of her bullied
friend,
Eleanor Tilney (tha Henry, another Henry, concedes, his father makes
life miserable for his sister) but (again like Austen's Emma) Miss
Sharpe sees romance where maybe there is none. Ilike Asford's
sympathy for Anna Lefroy.
Not fair to the real Miss Sharpe, an impoverished upper servant yet
gentlewoman, trying to survive. I have liked to see Anne and Jane as
friends since I read the book The Secret Sisterhood,
Thank you for answering at all, Nancy, I was hoping someone would.
Could anyone answer my real question? Is the first person POV in
Ashford modelled on the first person POV in Emma?? Ellen
On Mon, Aug 12, 2024 at 3:24?PM Nancy Mayer via groups.io
? <regencyresearcher@...> wrote:
The sort of thing as having Henry go around raping and
impregnating women
turns me off completely/ There is not the slightest bit of truth
to the
charges and sounds like one of? Arnie's? hidden stories. Henry
probably
wandered from the path of strict probity but he didn't do it
within the
family. The bankruptcy of his bank wasn't even? due to his
malfeasance
though probably to his bad judgement.
? I can even somewhat understand why many want to picture Lord
Byron as a
deep dyed scoundrel while praising the hypocrite Shelley, but
Henry-- why Henry? .. Nancy
On Sun, Aug 11, 2024 at 12:20?PM Ellen Moody via groups.io
? <ellen.moody= [email protected]> wrote:
I¡¯m almost to the end of Lindsay Ashford¡¯s Mysterious Death of
Miss
Austen.? The trouble with reading books that get very little
respect
and even less serious literary criticism is ¾±³Ù¡¯²õ very difficult
for
someone like me to guess or know what the general response might
be.
I
had gotten just into the book last time, and this time I shall
finish
it. It¡¯s achieved some mild notoriety among Janeites & Austen
scholars
who read Austen sequels. The notoriety is from Ashord¡¯s
having? decided
Henry Austen poisoned his sister with arsenic because she
realized
just how many of his sisters-in-law or nieces, bored endlessly
impregnated he fucked away with. The theory in the book (Anne
³§³ó²¹°ù±è¡¯²õ
the narrator) is Henry Crawford is a partial portrait of Heny
Austen.
Eliza had no interest in him, maybe she was lesbian? Not oddly,
¾±³Ù¡¯²õ
not famous for a convincing portrait of Jane and Anne Sharp
as lesbian
spinster. EEven until today the common reader wants to
erase lesbianism.
I liked the book on some of the grounds I liked Hornby¡¯s Miss
Austen,
a convincing sympathetic portrait of Cassandra, Jane, Martha and
the
women. What I¡¯ve not seen mentioned anywhere in the commentary
there
is is ¾±³Ù¡¯²õ a first person narrative solely from Anne¡¯s POV, with
no
corrective.? It somewhat resembles Austen¡¯s Emma
So I am wondering if Ashford meant us to judge Anne as having
gone
over the top in her fabrications the way Austen¡¯s Emma did.
Noone but
her in the book enunciates the plot, she reads Jane as agreeing,
but
nowhere does she (admitted Ashford makes Jane worried, ominous,
uncomfortable when Miss Sharp hints at all she surmise).I admit
there
is no sense of an implicit narrator regarding Miss Sharp with
irony
(as there is of Austen towards Emma) Probably few would bother to
think this out, and ¾±³Ù¡¯²õ a lesson to me not to not waste my time
reading Austen sequels unless (as in a book I was reading and
never
got to review) if the sequel is half-mocking, modernizes Austen
has
some celebrity name pushing it (like Wade¡¯s play, The Watsons)
I think the reason it receives as much commentary as it does is
Ashford has read the Austen letter and documents with care in
the same
way Gyneth Hughes and David Nokes did before Hughes wrote Miss
Austen regrets. Ellen
Ellen Moody
Arnie Perlstein
