Lady Susan/The Watsons/Sanditon by Jane Austen
Posted in Other fiction, Reading Reviewed at 12:00 on 19 November 2022
Penguin Classics, 1974, 211 p, plus 25 p Introduction by Margaret Drabble, 4 p Social Background, 3p Note on the Text and 9 p Notes. First published 1871.
This is a combination of shorter pieces which Austen either abandoned during her life time or were unfinished at her death. They show all the usual Austen hallmarks – the actual or assumed search for a husband, the subtleties of class distinctions, balls/dances, a firm grasp of nuance and a particularity to the phrasing.
The first, Lady Susan, takes an epistolary form, a then dying fashion Austen had employed for an early draft of Sense and Sensibility before she ditched it for a more modern third person narration. Lady Susan – “the most accomplished coquette in England” as another letter writer describes her – is recently widowed yet has caused havoc in the marriage of the Manwarings and steered another man away from the object of his devotions. She is also determined that her daughter Frederica will marry the man she has chosen for her. Austen handles the form well even though she ends it rather abruptly. I actually felt disappointed that it had not been developed into a full novel.
In The Watsons, which seems as accomplished as any of Austen’s finished novels, Emma Watson has returned to her family home after many years staying with an aunt. As a result she is a novelty to local society. At her first ball she dances with a ten-year old boy who was disappointed by the woman who had promised to take a turn with him. This catches the attentions of both Lord Osborne and Tom Musgrave. Austen apparently discussed with her sister Cassandra how The Watsons would pan out and a paragraph at the end gives a précis. It is much as you would expect from Austen.
Despite Austen’s terminal illness there is no drop-off in the quality of her writing in the fragment of Sanditon she managed to complete but the focus has shifted from personal relationships and marriage prospects to an examination of the nascent brash commercialism which would mark the Victorian age. Again it displays her customary acuity and observation.
Pedant’s corner:- In the Introduction; “more rejoicing …. that one can imagine” (than one can imagine.) In the Social Background; Mr Edwards’ (Mr Edwards’s. Edwards’s appears lower down the same page.) Otherwise: many Austen spellings – agreable (many instances, agreeable,) dependance (dependence,) staid (stayed,) every where (everywhere,) advice (advise,) desert (dessert,) inflexions (inflections,) anti-sceptic (anti-septic,) sopha (sofa,) – voilently (violently,) Sir James’ (Sir James’s,) “?.” (doesn’t need that full stop.) Adeiu (many times, Adieu,) “The Edwards’ invitation to (The Edwards’s invitation.) “The Edwards were people of fortune” (The Edwardses,) Mrs Edwards’ maid (followed two lines later by “Mary Edwards’s opinion”,) ‘I am he only one among them that have escaped with a whole heart’” (that has escaped,) “that she did it in unwillingly” (no need for the ‘in’,) “where the tables was prepared” (either ‘table’ or ‘were prepared’,) “the Mr Tomlinsons” (strictly ‘the Misters Tomlinson’ but abbreviating it to ‘Mrs Tomlinson’ would be completely wrong,) “encroaching on the Edwards’” (Edwardses,) several more instances of Edwards’ instead of Edwards’s, a missing comma at the end of a piece of direct speech, “told what he had ate himself” (eaten,) “the Miss Watsons” (the Misses Watson,) Hollis’ (Hollis’s appears three lines later,) Burns’ (Burns’s.) “‘And how has Susan born the journey?’” (borne the journey.) “‘Susan has born it wonderfully’” (borne it,) Mrs Griffiths’ (Griffiths’s,) “the first trenches of an acquaintance” (tranches?) the Miss Parkers (Misses Parker,) “that he only eat enough” (ate enough,) Mrs Charles Dupuis’ (Dupuis’s,) “the two Miss Beauforts” (the two Misses Beaufort,) “the Mullins’s” (a plural – Mullinses. Then again the inverted comma can be taken to denote the absence of the ‘e’,) “the tallest of the two” (if there were two the comparative is ‘taller’ not ‘tallest’,” mantlepiece (mantelpiece.) In the Notes; “There are a very great number of minor alterations” (I know this is idiomatic but strictly ‘There is a very great number’.)