Emma Post

Unfortunately last week we didn’t have to blog, but now I am very ready to catch up on blogs about Emma. For the past few weeks it has been all about Emma and her silliness. Our focus for the past two weeks has been volume the third, so we are wrapping things up. Volume the third is primarily the conclusion and final events that happen to Emma and her collogues. Some very important events occur, such as the ball and Harriet’s experience with the gypsies, but the most important interaction that highlights Jane Austen’s ideas about society would be the relationship between Mrs. Elton and Emma. This volume is when the reader truly begins to see Mrs. Elton as Emma’s foil instead of Jane. An example would be at the ball; Mrs. Elton is a more mature(ish) Emma who knows how to use her wealth to get what she wants. I am not saying that Emma doesn’t do that, but Mrs. Elton is more out in open about it, where as Emma does it discretely, but Emma also knows how to control herself in a manner that is polite and she seems genuinely nicer and caring towards her friends of a lower class. This is where the book is completely pulled together.

In preparation of our seminar on Emma, I would like to talk about how Jane Austen completely flip flops the gender roles within the novel. Throughout the entire novel the men other than Mr. Knightly (obviously) are very feminine, Mr. Elton to be an example; he engages in some of the most womanly actions, even his personality screams out girly. Elton is very involved with finding status through marriage, as seen when he proposes to Emma, he also engages in some of the most deceitful/disrespectful acts that women would do, such as gossip and he even rejects a dance with Harriet which is extremely rude. Enough about Elton, Austen also uses women as the more masculine and dominant figures throughout the novel as well, all of the women have some sort of influence, especially Emma and Mrs. Elton. By creating these strong female characters, Austen is trying to comment on the way that society works within that time period, both of those characters are activist of their time, and completely contradict with the roles expected of that time. Although with some of the other characters are used to confirm the stereotypical woman, such as Harriet and Jane, they are the weak characters who lives get taken over by the socialites of Highbury. This is how Austen makes commentary on the social structure and the feminine versus the masculine roles of the men and women throughout the novel.

This part of my blog I would like to discuss our Tea party, because I didn’t get to finish writing my response in class. The tea part was definitely a unique experience, I was lady Deburgh and I had quite a high title which gave some freedom to do what I wanted to do. It was really fun to experience what it would have been like in that time period. It was definitely very different from today, but I felt very constricted and limited in my actions.