This is actually the only full-length novel by Jane Austen that I had never re-read. I read it initially back in junior high when I first discovered Austen and quickly devoured all her books, but despite the fact that I enjoyed this one and made time to revisit all of Austen’s other books, I never made it back to this one.
That changed when Bonnets at Dawn did a Northanger Abbey readalong a few months ago. I was late to the party because I was finishing up some other books, but I finally managed to catch up and I’m so glad I did because I loved everything about it!
I decided to read, rather than listen to, this one because last year after my mom died I found an annotated edition of Northanger Abbey in her book collection and added it to my own. I’m so glad I did.
I had never read an annotated edition of anything before this (for the record, I read the edition annotated by David M. Shapard), but I ended up being very glad that my mom had bought this so I could read it. Otherwise I would have just blown through the audiobook in a week. While some of the notes in this edition were unnecessary, such as translating words or phrases I already understood, other notes were invaluable to getting the jokes Austen was making.
If you don’t know anything about Northanger Abbey, it’s one of those books with a story behind the story, and you really have to know the story behind the story in order to fully appreciate the story Austen is telling. I remember I still enjoyed the book when I first read it, even though I knew nothing about its background, but now that I have a better understanding of the world in which Austen was writing, I definitely appreciate the book so much more.
The story behind the story is that Gothic novels became a bit of a literary phenomenon, particularly in England in the mid-late eighteenth century. Since novels, as a literary form, were still new, they were generally looked down upon by critics and even novelists. Gothic novels in particular were generally considered to be trash, largely because women made up the majority of both the readers and writers of Gothic literature. Men were expected to read more “serious” things (i.e. nonfiction).
But as tends to happen when people deride something just because it’s female dominated, most people didn’t actually know what they were talking about when they claimed novels (and specifically Gothic novels) were basically trash. So, while a lot of people think Austen was making fun of the Gothic novel by writing Northanger Abbey, I think she was really making fun of people who deride novels and Gothic literature without any understanding of what they’re talking about. She does this by writing a satire of a Gothic novel, so it’s understandable how people could be confused, but that’s Austen for you. Nothing in her books is ever quite what it seems.
Austen tried to get the book published as soon as she was finished with it in 1803, but the publisher who bought it off her never published it and she apparently couldn’t afford to buy back the rights from him. Her brother, Henry, bought back the rights after her death and published it in conjunction with Persuasion. Since the literary world had moved on from Gothic novels in the almost 20 years between when the book was originally written and when it was finally published, many of the jokes in it didn’t land like they would have in 1803. You can imagine how much more difficult it is for a 21st century audience to get any of the jokes.
Northanger Abbey is about a young woman named Catherine Morland who is born to parents who are comfortably well off, but not very wealthy (by the standards of gentlemen and ladies in late eighteenth century England, but I suppose everything is relative), and they have something like 10 children. Catherine starts out rather tomboyish, but as she reaches her teen years, she becomes a voracious reader, particularly when it comes to Gothic novels.
Catherine’s parents can’t afford to travel much, but when a local, childless gentleman who owns most of the land around the town where Catherine lives offers to take Catherine to Bath for the season with him and his wife, Catherine jumps at the chance.
Some drama happens in Bath, but the important part is that Catherine meets Henry Tilney and falls in love with him almost immediately. When she meets his sister, Eleanor, they quickly strike up a friendship and Eleanor invites Catherine to come stay with them in their home … Northanger Abbey.
Catherine is thrilled at the prospect of visiting a real abbey and is somewhat disappointed to arrive and discover that many elements of the abbey have been updated. Nevertheless, she enjoys her stay with the family, and although she tries to be grateful to her host, General Tilney, she manages to catch on to the fact that he doesn’t always say what he means and that he tends to micromanage those around him. When he leaves on business for a few days, Catherine and her new friends enjoy their time without him immensely, despite some awkwardness between Catherine and Henry due to a blunder on Catherine’s part.
When Catherine hears that Mrs. Tilney died rather suddenly when Eleanor was away from home, Catherine immediately suspects the General killed his wife with nothing more to go on than the fact that he was not a very affectionate husband and that her death was sudden and took place when her daughter was away from home.
Catherine decides to investigate the rooms that formerly belonged to Mrs. Tilney, hoping to find evidence of a murder, or even Mrs. Tilney herself still alive, but kept prisoner by her evil husband.
Catherine has completely let her imagination run away with her because she has only read part of Ann Radcliffe’s book, The Mysteries of Udolpho, when the main character faints after seeing a “body” which turns out to be nothing more than a wax figure. It’s a little creepy, but nothing as sinister as an actual skeleton or prisoner. But Catherine hasn’t actually finished reading the book, so she doesn’t know that. Instead she jumps to conclusions about something she doesn’t actually know anything about (Radcliffe’s book or Tilney’s marital affairs). Hence my conclusion that Austen is not, in fact, making fun of Gothic novels, but is instead making fun of judging a book (or an entire class of literature) before you’ve even finished reading it.
Henry catches Catherine snooping around and immediately guesses (correctly) what she’s doing and why, and he’s understandably upset. How would you react if someone told you they thought your father killed your mother?
Catherine is devastated, but Henry doesn’t seem to hold it against her and they quickly resume their friendship until a few days later when the General comes home from his business trip and immediately evacuates Catherine from the abbey. It’s interesting to note that, up until this point, the general would hardly let Eleanor get a word in edgewise, he was constantly talking over and for her. But when it comes to very rudely kicking out their guest who has done absolutely nothing wrong (he doesn’t know about the snooping), he refuses to speak to Catherine, sending Eleanor instead to do his dirty work for him.
The general doesn’t even give Catherine any money for the trip. Fortunately, Eleanor thinks of it just in time and loans Catherine some money.
Nor does the general provide her with a chaperone or one of his own many coaches. Instead, he expect her to go by post, which was improper at the very least, and potentially dangerous for a young woman.
Catherine is utterly bewildered as to what she could have done to deserve such abuse. She is certain that Henry never would have told his father about her snooping around and suspecting him of murder and/or imprisonment. Henry, by the way, was away from the Abbey when Catherine was so rudely kicked out.
After Catherine spends a few days at home pining for her love, whom she is sure she has lost forever, he appears out of the blue and explains that his father had been led to believe Catherine was an heiress, and so he had been courting her for her money. When he learned otherwise, he kicked her out, and when Henry found out about all this, he rushed to Catherine’s home to apologize to her in person. Oh, and also to propose to her. The general ends up giving his consent to the marriage when he realizes that, while Catherine is not as wealthy as he was originally led to believe, nor is she as penniless as he was later told she was.
There’s a lot of debate as to whether Henry Tilney is the best Austen hero or the worst. A lot of people accuse him of being a mansplainer, largely because of his reaction to finding Catherine snooping around his dead mother’s rooms, which, come on! How would you react if you invited someone to your house, only to find out that they thought your father murdered your mother, and they deliberately violated your privacy and the privacy of your family in order to prove their completely baseless accusations?
I heard one person point to the fact that he says that they’re in England in the age of enlightenment and these things just don’t happen here anymore as an example of his ridiculous mansplaining. Yes, he’s wrong, but you can’t tell me you haven’t had a conversation about systemic racism or sexism with someone who says “This is America!” and/or “This is the 21st century! That stuff doesn’t happen anymore!” Despite the plethora of video evidence and testimony after testimony after testimony showing otherwise.
I will admit that some aspects of Henry’s relationship with Catherine are a bit cringeworthy. She’s only 17 and he’s in his – what? 20s? 30s? He’s significantly older than she is, so there is a sense that he’s guiding her and teaching her, but I’d chalk that up more to their age difference than gender politics.
Second, I think he learns from her, too. In his introduction to the book, Shapard says, “Even with the knowledge of his father’s faults, [Henry] had underestimated the lengths to which the latter might go. Thus the episode undermines the slightly self-satisfied and condescending manner Henry has adopted at times toward Catherine – especially when he, in confessing the full extent of his father’s baseness, must undergo a humiliating penance before her, one that serves as a counterpart to her penance before him in confessing her delusions regarding his mother’s death. The result is an ending that unites the hero and heroine in a relationship of greater equality than before.”
So there.
There’s also plenty of talk in the book about Henry’s knowledge of muslin and voracious reading of Gothic novels. He’s not reprimanding Catherine for not reading poetry (as many characters in novels of the time did) – he’s meeting her on her level. One expert said he’s comfortable in female spaces and I think that’s so true and it’s one of the reasons I love him so much. He doesn’t feel emasculated by talking about muslin or the works of a female author.
Henry specifically talks about reading one of Radcliffe’s novels with his sister and leaving her to devour the rest of the book when she had chores to attend to, which is both hilarious and adorable. My dad and I sometimes read books out loud to each other on long car trips and I treasure those memories and can’t help appreciating the fact that Eleanor is getting that same experience with her brother.
It also makes me think of a time shortly after the first Harry Potter book came out. One of my younger brothers was just the right age for that book when it came out and I don’t know how he discovered it before the rest of us did, but he devoured that book and could not stop talking about it. None of the rest of us had read it yet, so he had no one to talk to about it with (can you remember a time when you couldn’t talk about Harry Potter with everyone?) so my dad started reading the books just so my brother would have someone to talk about them with. And I can’t help but wonder if Henry is doing the same thing for his sister. Their mother is dead, she has no sisters, and they live in a fairly remote area, so who else does she have with which to talk about these things? Henry might have decided to start reading Radcliffe’s novels just to have something to bond over with his sister.
Also, he’s really nice to his sister. +50 points!
Finally, I love Henry’s sense of humor. When we first meet him in Bath, he pokes fun at societal conventions. A little later, he teases Catherine about the horrors she’s sure to endure in a real abbey. He’s hilarious and I would absolutely love to have a conversation with that dude.