Northanger Abbey: The Authentic Novel by Jane Austen

This was one of my covid readings and I'm glad I still have Jane Austen novels to entertain me through these times.

“The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid”

The Northanger Abbey reads a little differently from her other novels as it is a satire of the gothic stories of that time.
The book follows the story of Catherine, an innocent and mostly unremarkable woman, with almost none of the desired attributes of that time, and her coming of age episodes as she enters society in Bath. Later, we see her struggling to make sense of reality with her productive imagination, full of knowledge of her beloved gothic thrillers.

I don't have any knowledge of the gothic novels of the time to be able to comment on that specific sides of the satire. However, as her other works, this book brilliantly discusses the absurdity of society and of the gender roles on that society.

“The advantages of natural folly in a beautiful girl have been already set forth by the capital pen of a sister author; and to her treatment of the subject I will only add, in justice to men, that though to the larger and more trifling part of the sex, imbecility in females is a great enhancement of their personal charms, there is a portion of them too reasonable and too well informed themselves to desire anything more in woman than ignorance.”“But Catherine did not know her own advantages - did not know that a good-looking girl, with an affectionate heart and a very ignorant mind, cannot fail of attracting a clever young man, unless circumstances are particularly untoward.”

Henry Tilney is the wittiest of Austen heros and I loved all his interactions with Catherine. It was a pleasure to read his dialogues.

“And such is your definition of matrimony and dancing. Taken in that light, certainly their resemblance is not striking; but I think I could place them in such a view. You will allow that in both man has the advantage of choice, woman only the power of refusal; that in both it is an engagement between man and woman, formed for the advantage of each; and that when once entered into, they belong exclusively to each other till the moment of its dissolution; that it is their duty each to endeavor to give the other no cause for wishing that he or she had bestowed themselves elsewhere, and their best interest to keep their own imaginations from wandering towards the perfections of their neighbors, or fancying that they should have been better off with any one else.”

It was a lovely reading.

P.S - Jane Austen novels always have the best opening and closing lines.