Mansfield Park

by Jane Austen, Kathryn Sutherland (Introduction), Kathryn Sutherland (Noted by), Tony Tanner (Introduction), Coralie Bickford-Smith (Illustrator)

Overview

Part of Penguin's beautiful hardback Clothbound Classics series, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith, these delectable and collectible editions are bound in high-quality colourful, tactile cloth with foil stamped into the design. Taken from the poverty of her parents' home in Portsmouth, Fanny Price is brought up with her rich cousins at Mansfield Park, acutely aware of her humble rank and with her cousin Edmund as her sole ally. During her uncle's absence in Antigua, the Crawford's arrive in the neighbourhood bringing with them the glamour of London life and a reckless taste for flirtation. Mansfield Park is considered Jane Austen's first mature work and, with its quiet heroine and subtle examination of social position and moral integrity, one of her most profound.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780141197708
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	04/24/2012
Series:	Penguin Clothbound Classics
Pages:	560
Sales rank:	103,632
Product dimensions:	5.30(w) x 7.90(h) x 1.30(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction set among the gentry have earned her a place as one of the most widely read and most beloved writers in English literature. She was born in Steventon rectory on 16th December 1775. Her family later moved to Bath and then to Chawton in Hampshire. She wrote from a young age and Pride and Prejudice was begun when she was twenty-two years old. It was initially rejected by the publisher she submitted it to and eventually published in 1813 after much revision. All four of her novels - Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814) and Emma (1815) published in her lifetime were published anonymously. Jane Austen died on 18th July 1817. Northanger Abbey and Persuasion (both 1817) were published posthumously.

Date of Birth:

December 16, 1775

Date of Death:

July 18, 1817

Place of Birth:

Village of Steventon in Hampshire, England

Place of Death:

Winchester, Hampshire, England

Education:

Taught at home by her father

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Chapter I
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Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Introduction
Jane Austen: A Brief Chronology
A Note on the Text

Mansfield Park

Appendix A: The Theatricals at Mansfield Park

1. August von Kotzebue, from Lovers’ Vows
2. Austen family correspondence, from The Austen Papers
3. Erasmus Darwin, from A Plan for the Conduct of Female Education in Boarding Schools
4. Thomas Gisborne, from “On Amusements in General”

Appendix B: Religion

1. Jane Austen’s prayers, from The Works of Jane Austen
2. Hannah More, Strictures on the Modern System of Female Education
3. William Wilberforce, from A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians
4. Dr. John Gregory, from “Religion”

Appendix C: Ideals of Femininity

1. Henry Austen, from “Biographical Notice” of Jane Austen
2. Thomas Gisborne, from “On the Importance of the Female Character”
3. Dr. John Gregory, from “Conduct and Behaviour”
4. Hannah More, from “The Benefits of Restraint”

Appendix D: “The Improvement of the Estate”

1. William Cowper, from The Garden
2. Humphry Repton, from Observations on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening

Appendix E: The West Indian Connection

1. A Permanent and Effectual Remedy Suggested for the Evils Under Which the British West Indies Now Labour
2. Joseph Lowe, from An Inquiry into the State of the British West Indies
3. Excerpt from Frank Austen’s notebook 1808, from Jane Austen’s Sailor Brothers
4. Thomas Clarkson, from The History of the Rise, Progress, and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave-Trade
5. Hannah More, “The Sorrows of Yamba or the Negro Woman’s Lamentation”

Appendix F: Women’s Education

1. Thomas Gisborne, from “On Female Education”
2. Thomas Gisborne, from “On Parental Duties”
3. Hannah More, from “Comparison of the Mode of Female Education in the Last Age With That of the Present Age”
4. Maria Edgeworth and Richard Lovell Edgeworth, from “Prudence and Economy”
5. Mary Wollstonecraft, from “Introduction” to A Vindication of the Rights of Woman

Appendix G: Contemporary Reception of Mansfield Park

1. Richard Whateley, from Quarterly Review, January 1821
2. Excerpt from “Opinions of Mansfield Park: collected and transcribed by Jane Austen”
3. Excerpt from “Opinions of Emma: collected and transcribed by Jane Austen”

Appendix H: Jane Austen’s Letters and Mansfield Park

1. Letter from JA to Cassandra Austen. January 1813
2. Letter from JA to Francis Austen. July 1813
3. Letter from JA to Francis Austen. September 1813

Works Cited and Recommended Reading

What People are Saying About This

Russel-Mitford

"I would almost cut of one of my hands if it would enable me to writer like Jane Austin with the other."

Elizabeth Bowen

"The technique of the novel is beyond praise, and has been praised. The master of the art she choose, or that choose her, is complete: How she achieved it no one will ever know."

From the Publisher

"McCaddon is the ideal choice to present this classic...a nineteenth-century 'tell all' just as impossible to resist as the tabloids in the check-out line." —-AudioFile

Reading Group Guide

1. Though it was very successful, Jane Austen deemed Pride and Prejudice, her second novel, 'rather too light.' As Carol Shields mentions in her Introduction, Austen hoped to address more serious issues in her next novel, Mansfield Park. Many readers and critics think Mansfield Park is Austen's most serious and most profound novel. How does it differ from Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice? How are her treatments of class, gender, relationships, and most especially, faith, more nuanced and more mature?

2. Describe the social positions of the three Ward sisters Lady Bertram, Mrs. Norris, and Mrs. Price. How did they arrive at such different circumstances and how have their circumstances presumably affected their personalities? How do the sisters treat each other and how much of this is the result of their respective status?

3. As soon as Sir Thomas decides to accept responsibility for one of Mrs. Price's children, Fanny is put into an unusual position. Sir Bertram says, although she is to live with them, 'she is not a Miss Bertram . . . their rank, fortune, rights and expectations will always be different.' Describe the family's feelings for Fanny as the novel develops. How does the treatment of Fanny by Mrs. Norris and the Bertram sisters distinguish her from the rest of the children? How does Fanny feel about the Bertrams and how do her feelings change, especially for Sir Bertram and Edmund? Before her marriage, what changes take place that allow for her acceptance in the family?

4. Fanny Price inspires strong reactions in readers; she is cast by some as a dreary killjoy, and by others as an endearing, admirable heroine. Is this dichotomy Austen'sintention? Discuss the ways in which Fanny embodies both sides of this polarized debate. What is your opinion of her in relation to other well-known female protagonists of the day?

5. Mansfield Park was divided into three volumes, published separately. Why do you think Austen chose this structure, and how does it affect your reading of the book? Think about other writing that employs this structure to inform your response.

6. From the moment the idea is suggested, Edmund is against the staging of a play. Why is the play seen as inappropriate by both Edmund and Fanny? Why, once it is decided upon, does Edmund accept a part in the play, even though he would appear a hypocrite? How much of this license was taken because of the absence of Sir Thomas and how much was simply the influence of Tom? What is the significance of their choice of plays, Lover's Vows?

7. Describe the similarities and differences between the courtship of Edmund and Mary and that of Fanny and Henry. What are the stumbling blocks in these two courtships that cause them to fail? To what extent were the trials of these courtships responsible for Edmund's change of heart toward Fanny?

Editorial Reviews

"Never did any novelist make more use of an impeccable sense of human values."
—Virginia Woolf

From the Publisher

Gr 9 Up-Jane Austen paints some witty and perceptive studies of character.

School Library Journal

Never did any novelist make more use of an impeccable sense of human values.”

Virginia Woolf

An excellent edition. Sturrock's introduction provides a nuanced view of Mansfield Park as well as judicious treatment of the critical debates the novel has prompted in recent years. Her annotations are genuinely helpful, and the appendices thought-provoking. With a sharp eye for the most relevant passages, Sturrock has assembled late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century writings on issues such as slavery, female education, and private theatricals. These writings create fascinating vantage points from which to view Austen's novel, and they make clear how profound a response it was to contemporary cultural concerns.

Deborah Kaplan George Mason University

Unlike Jane Austen's earlier novels, Mansfield Park is embedded within a specific historical moment, and the Introduction to this Broadview edition splendidly brings out the novel's engagement with a range of contemporary controversies, from female education to the slave trade and the proper use of wealth. The appendices, too, offer readers a generous range of material, expertly selected and introduced. They extend our insight into what Sturrock shows is Austen's most discomforting—as well as engrossing—text.

John Wiltshire LaTrobe University

Fanny Price, one of a dozen children born into a family that can ill afford so many, is sent at the age of 10 to live with her wealthy relatives. In typical Jane Austen form, immutable laws of propriety frame acts both vicious and virtuous, enabling Fanny to find her place in the world. Wanda McCaddon is the ideal choice to present this classic. Her impeccable elocution fits Austen's persnickety style. McCaddon gives a soft, sweet cadence to Fanny's thoughts and words while conveying all the author's derision toward the story's shallow characters. Both story and performance deliver a nineteenth-century “tell-all” just as impossible to resist as the tabloids in the checkout line. R.L.L. © AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine

FEBRUARY 2009 - AudioFile