Northanger Abbey and Jane Austen's Conception of the Value of Fiction
1957; Johns Hopkins University Press; Volume: 24; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.2307/2871826
ISSN1080-6547
Autores Tópico(s)Literature Analysis and Criticism
ResumoAlthough the explicit passages on the value of novels in Northanger Abbey have been frequently commented on, opinion differs concerning how seriously one is to take them. For the most part critics doubt that Jane Austen meant her readers to accept seriously her assertion that the novel is the literary form in which the greatest powers of the mind are displayed, in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour are conveyed to the world in the best chosen language. 1 Disregarding her words for the moment, one might attempt to analyze Northanger Abbey to ascertain what Jane Austen was attempting in the work in which the words appear, and to discover whether the intention in Northanger Abbey is similar to that in her other completed novels. Northanger Abbey appears to be the best place to begin such an analysis, not only because the passages on novels occur in it, but because it repre-
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