Where do we see instances of Austen relating her characters to others?

"To be a character in Austen is to get continually contrasted, juxtaposed, related to others, and, as such, to help build the thematic architecture that critics then discern" (Woloch, 43).

"Oh! She is the most beautiful creature I ever beheld! But there is one of her sisters sitting down just behind you, who is very pretty, and I dare say, very agreeable" (Pride and Prejudice, 50).


Since Elizabeth is the main character of the novel, we must question why Austen includes all of the sisters in her novel. According to Alex Woloch, the other members of the family exist in order to compare and contrast Elizabeth to them. We see an example of this in the scene where Mr. Bingley hosts his first ball; this is the first moment when the Bennet girls meet Mr. Bingley and his company, and he is instantly taken with Jane's beauty. Not only does he dance with her twice, while only dancing with everyone else once, but he claims, "She is the most beautiful creature I ever beheld! But there is one of her sisters sitting down just behind you, who is very pretty, and I dare say, very agreeable" (P&P, 50). Bingley describes Jane in terms of being the "most beautiful," meaning that of all the ladies there, she possesses the most beauty, but only describes Elizabeth as "very pretty" and "very agreeable." This means that while Bingley believes Jane to be the fairest, Elizabeth merely falls under the category of pretty, something that most other women could fall into, which suggests a sort of hierarchy with Jane being at the top.

Happiness, P&P, and paper updates

"The inhuman practice of slavery and the terrible disruptions of war were among the most obvious, but they were of a kind with a whole battery of barbaric customs, prejudices, injustices, and false beliefs that Enlightenment thinkers believed had long prevented the majority of human beings from attaining their natural end. Like those twin evils of religious superstition and fanaticism, accumulated customs and prejudices barred human beings from living as they should. Remove them, and happiness would flourish" (McMahon, Happiness, 215).

"This was praise, of all others most extraordinary, most opposite to her ideas. That he was not a good tempered man, had her firmest opinion. Her keenest attention was awakened; she longed to hear more..." (Pride and Prejudice, 262).

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Paper Update

"That configuration of concerns, or master configuration as it deserves to be called, found expression in and through a wide but quite specific range of subjects whose connection with one another is often not apparent at first glance" (Fried, Primacy of Absorption, 7). 

"But La Porte's commentary makes clear that what he himself found most compelling about the Pere de famille was what he saw as its persuasive representation of a particular state or condition, which each figure in the painting appeared to exemplify in his or her own way, i.e., the state or condition of rapt attention, of being completely occupied or engrossed or (as I prefer to say) absorbed in what he or she is doing, hearing, thinking, feeling" (Fried, 10).

I'm planning on expanding on Fried's idea of absorption by further discussing the "connection with one another [that] is often not apparent at first glance," which will be the differing levels of absorption. In order to be "engrossed," one must first begin "swallowing up or engulfing" something. If a person becomes too "engrossed," it leads to the "disappearance or assimilation" as we see in The Female Quixote. I think I want to bring in Greuze's painting Un Pere Famille (or another similar painting that shows absorption) to show that being engrossed doesn't necessarily have to lead to disappearance (shown through the various children). 

Two quotes & Paper update

"Writers have been using descriptions of their characters' behaviors to inform us about their feelings since time immemorial, and we expect them to do so when we open the book. We all learn, whether consciously or not, that the default interpretation of behavior reflects a character's state of mind, and every fictional story that we read reinforces our tendency to make that kind of interpretation first" (Zunshine, 4).

"'I certainly shall not. You know how I detest it, unless I am particularly acquainted with my partner. At such an assembly as this, it would be insupportable. Your sisters are engaged, and there is not another woman in the room, whom it would not be a punishment to me to stand up with'" (Pride and Prejudice, 50).

Going off of what Zunshine says about relying on descriptions of character's behaviors to inform us about their feelings, I thought back to Darcy and how, at the ball, he was admired for the first half, and then once every realized his character, they all hated him. I thought this was a pretty good example of that moment. We see how rude he is through his language, as well as his pride because he doesn't want to dance with another.
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Lately, I've been having struggling with where exactly I want to take this paper because I can't seem to think of a paper that I'd like to have written. My problem is what exactly to focus on, but I took your suggestion about drawing out the different definitions I have in mind for absorption, and after talking through it a bit it helped me out. I still want to focus on those three definitions and present them as a sort of spectrum or various levels (with "swallow up" being first, "engrossed" being second, and "disappearance" as the ultimate portrayal). My main text is still going to be The Female Quixote, and I'm going to focus a lot more on the language used as her "disappearance" (as opposed to a lot of plot summary I did before). I'm debating drawing in Betsy Thoughtless as a contrast -- one has too little thoughts (Betsy), while the other has too many (Arabella). I'm definitely going to use the quote you gave me ("He found the pensive Fair-one, in a melancholy Posture, her Head reclined upon one of her fair Hands; and though her Eyes were fixed upon a Book she held in the other, yet she did not seem to read, but rather to be wholly buried in Contemplation.") because I think it's a really nice portrayal of Arabella and one of the only moments where we actually see her reading. And in this quote I like how her posture is described -- not only does Lennox say she's in a melancholy posture, she does on to describe exactly what that looks like. It's interesting to note that although she's not looking directly at the book, she is still absorbed in it, which suggests just how absorbed she is. 

I'm still struggling a bit with the definitions and how exactly to go about showing them and explaining them, so I think that'll be my next step in thinking about the paper.

Week 11: Melancholy & Madness

"They inhabit a literary, not a real, madhouse and their function is to illustrate not the state of the insane, or even the thin proximity of madness to sanity, but the follies and delusions of contemporary society" (The Madness of Multitude, 81)

"Falsly the mortal part we blame

Of our depress'd and pond'rous Frame,

Which till the first degrading Sin

Let thee its dull attendant in,

Still with the other did comply;"

("The Spleen," lines 26-30)

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Brainstorming for Final Paper:

Topic:

-Examine three different modes of absorption ("to swallow up or engulf," "to be engrossed," "the disappearance or assimilation into something") and how they are portrayed

-What are the differences between these three modes? Are some more dangerous than others?

-What does the portrayal say about the mode of absorption? Do we find similarities/differences between modes?

Different Modes with Texts:

-"To swallow up or engulf"

1. Laputians --> harmless, humor
2. RED example --> devouring book, harmless?

-"To be engrossed"

1. Laputians? --> eyes pointed inwards, don't pay attention to surroundings unless prompted to do so, starts to get more harmful
2. Greuze painting --> postures & gazes point towards engrossed, seen as good thing in this case, because religious

-"To disappear, be assimilated"

1. The Female Quixote --> Arabella takes on language (provide more evidence and less summary this time), disappearance into the world of romance becomes dangerous

-Texts suggest that based on these three modes, if absorption goes unchecked (or is not for religious purposes) can lead to danger -- i.e. Arabella jumping into lake to prove point. 

-See if can work in The Coquette anywhere

Paper Proposal

   For my final research paper, I want to build on paper two and explore Absorption in a little more detail. In the last paper, I focused on three definitions of absorption, and I'd like to do that again. This time, though, I'd like to specifically focus on the varying ways in which a person can be absorbed and how these ways differ (or are similar) to each other. For example, one of the definitions was "to be engrossed" and another is "disappearance through, or assimilation into." To me, being engrossed means that your attention is completely occupied, whereas disappearance means that nothing else exists but this book and you've slipped into the world of this book. In essence, these different ways are like varying levels, starting with "swallowing up," moving to "being engrossed," and then "disappearing."

   As for texts, I'd like to focus on The Female Quixote a little more. I felt like I did a lot of summary last time, and didn't pull out a lot of evidence, so I'd like to look more at her language while incorporating the idea of modeling her life after these books as a sort of 'script.' I'm also going to explore further what 'levels' of absorption are in the book, because I'm curious to see if I can point out specific moments of each type.

   Like last time, I'd like to draw in the Reading Experience Database and Un Pere de famille (Greuze),  but I think I might pull in another painting that depicts absorption, so that I can show that it's not just novels, but other types of work. I'm also going to look at ECCO. Within each of these specific works, I'm going to look at how the author or artist chooses to portray about the work and what this says about the piece.

Week 11

"...But what has been the result?---a profound conviction that the neglected education of my fellow-creatures is the grand source of the misery I deplore; and that women, in particular, are rendered weak and wretched by a variety of concurring causes, originating from one hasty conclusion" (Vindication, 3).

Let sin, that baneful evil to the soul,
By you be shunn'd, nor once remit your guard;
Suppress the deadly serpent in its egg.
Ye blooming plants of human race divine,
An Ethiop tells you 'tis your greatest foe;
Its transient sweetness turns to endless pain,
And in immense perdition sinks the soul. (Wheatley, 7)

Boredom in Rambler 191

What are some examples of these "incitements" in Rambler 191?

"Boredom, however, includes as a component the "need for intense mental activity," a need that in the bored person cannot find gratification by generating its own impulse but seeks "incitements" from the outside world as a means of decreasing tension" (Reading, Writing, and Bored, 4).

"Those vacancies of time which are to be filled with books, I have never yet obtained; for, consider, Mr. Rambler, I got to bed late, and therefore cannot rise early; as soon as I am up, I dress for the gardens; then walk in the park; then always go to some sale or show, or entertainment at the little theatre; then must be dressed for dinner; then must pay my visits; then walk in the park; then hurry to the play; and from thence to the card-table..." (Rambler 191, 2)

When reading Boredom Chapter 1, I was especially struck by the fact that the word "bored" didn't exist until much later, and that it is a modern construct used to describe this state of mind. I was particularly interested in the descriptions of boredom in Chapter 1; I know what the word bored means -- I have been bored before -- so when I see it written in texts I don't need a further explanation of how the person is acting. The descriptions Spack includes in the chapter came before the word existed, though, so it's not written anywhere in the texts, which leaves one to figure out the tell-tale signs of boredom.
For example, in the description of the Medieval Monk, he "look about anxiously," "sigh," "goes in and out of his cell" and "frequently gazes up at the sun, as if it was too slow in setting." In other words, he keeps looking around to find something to do, sighs because he can't find anything to occupy his mind, starts pacing to pass the time, and frequently looks at the sun to see if time has passed.

In Rambler 191, we see similar "incitements" as those above. The girl has been confined to the house for three months and is not allowed to pass her time in the ways that she used to (mentioned above in the quote). Bellaria feels the need to constantly be busy ('the "need for intense mental activity") but she cannot occupy her mind on her own,  and must look to the outside world to occupy her mind, hence all that she does in her day -- it keeps her away from boredom.