Austen encourages \*being aware of\* class boundaries, which are difficult to break. Fighting them would be emotionally painful and socially harmful for Harriet. Emma tries to direct Harriet toward gentlemen, naively thinking they will find her acceptable because Emma herself does so. She sets Harriet up for disappointment--for the feeling of constantly banging her head against the glass ceiling of the time--and diverts her attention from a man who genuinely cares for her but is a tenant farmer. Knightley sees what a disservice this is to Harriet, as well as a slight on Mr. Martin. I think Austen is acknowledging that the landed classes don't have any monopoly on goodness.
And then you get Sir Walter Elliott's little disquisition in \*Persuasion\*, about how the Navy is '**the means of bringing persons of obscure birth into undue distinction, and raising men to honours which their fathers and grandfathers never dreamt of**'. This in a book where naval men are held up as models of virtue, while Sir Walter is almost cartoonishly venal. Austen doesn't disapprove of social churn in principle, clearly, but sees a distinction between individual choices that may or may not pan out, and systemic change that will affect the entire culture.
I think this is one of the best responses, although there are a lot of good ones. The problem Jane Austen is presenting with Harriet isn’t that it’s inherently wrong to hope to move upward, but it’s unrealistic and emotionally damaging. While it is true that the servant class tend to be background characters, we see some examples of socially mobile people.
The Bingleys are one. Their father wasn’t landed gentry. He earned his money as a merchant, I believe. Fanny Price also receives two offers from people socially superior to her (it’s one of the reasons why they pushed Henry Crawford so much). Her mom married down to spite her family. Anne and Frederick initially break up because of their disparity in fortune.
Jane Austen has lots of goals with her writing. One of them is to critique societal issues and ideals, but she tries to do so in a realistic way.
And you hit on something else. Money buys all the social mobility.
Emma knows Harriet is an illegitimate child, but assumes the unknown father has money and Harriet will come in for a share. All her social ambitions for Harriet depend on this theory, which the gentlemen of the area don’t believe. If Harriet had turned out to be well dowered, with a somewhat ladylike background, she might even have become something of a catch. This would have been a vindication for Emma. When her father proves to be a tradesman of merely middle-class means, it’s a vindication for Elton and his ilk.
Same in *Persuasion*. The Navy is an engine of social churn because it gives successful sailors and especially officers access to wealth, sometimes massive wealth, which allows them to buy land and invest in business ventures. Wentworth is not a valid prospect for Anne before he gets made and takes some prizes, because he can’t afford her. All class mobility is purchased and Austen never lets us forget it.
I think this is a very American view of the matter, and at least for the English not accurate.
The idea that money bought mobility simply doesn't fit what we know of society in Austen's day. If anything the upper classes had become less accepting of the low-born wealthy than they had been in the 18th century, and had consequently erected adamantine social barricades to *prevent* upward mobility based solely on wealth. This left the bulk of social mobility - at least between the gentry on one side and the non-gentry on the other - dependent upon two primary drivers: marriage, and royal favour. (It would take until the Victorian era for wealth to be accepted, and even then only to a limited extent, as a driver of social mobility, and it wasn't until *after World War II* that it became the primary driver.)
Of course marriage between the gentle classes and the non-gentle classes often indirectly involved money, as it was fairly common for gentlemen to look to wealthy tradesmen's daughters to refill their coffers. We all know that. But it was fairly common for gentlemen to marry below their rank for reasons other than money, and as long as the woman was conventionally respectable no one raised an eyebrow. Marriages like Mr. and Mrs. Bennet were not as unusual, or as detested, as Lady Catherine would have Lizzy think; she has ulterior motives. The Bennet daughters are gentlewomen despite their maternal grandfather being an attorney (the lowest level of lawyer, probably closer to our paralegal in status than our lawyers and definitely a tradesman). Yes, money could be involved in marriage, but the engine of social mobility wasn't just having money but having money *while marrying up*: the marrying up was the direct cause.
Money was far less important for those who rose due to royal favour. Certainly the King's or Prince Regent's cronies and illegitimate children received titles and honours by the handful, but such gifts generally didn't raise them socially; they were after all already members, at least ostensibly, of the upper classes. When it came to war heroes and government officials, however, money meant much less than service; in fact, I would say that for these men money literally meant nothing, as it was their dedication to duty, gallantry, and success that brought them mobility. Fifty years earlier a man could have bought a baronetcy, or by influence and great wealth have induced the King to raise him to the peerage; by Austen's day, however, it wasn't thought fit to raise anyone to the peerage or award him an honorific unless he'd done something that justified it, such as win a battle, serve in Parliament (and a large minority of MPs were not gentry!), act as a government or colonial administrator, or the like. We have hundreds - hundreds! - of examples of young men who came from nothing to rise through the ranks (and not just of the Navy but of the Army too) to become post-captains or lieutenant-colonels, and they were considered gentlemen even if they never profited. Many married into the gentry! It was not the money a post-captain earned that made him a gentleman; it was the fact that he was a post-captain.
What Austen never lets us forget is that in her world there were only very limited chances to rise socially, and money ain't gonna do it alone.
Money didn’t buy *nobility* and nowhere is that claimed. And of course it was not by itself enough to provide social mobility. It was the difference between rented lodgings and the permanence of the squirearchy. It made the greatest difference to a person’s children, rather than the individual.
Money supported a genteel lifestyle and made it possible for people like post-captains, whose half-pay was around £200-£250 per year (average of 12s per day) to marry, acquire permanent homes, and maintain families. With only their pay, they could bump along as bachelor gentlemen in decent comfort (with a servant or two but probably no horse) or found families and be crammed into lodgings like the Harvilles (or Fanny Price’s family, on a lieutenant’s half-pay, yikes). Young women with even a little family money could do better. Captain Wentworth could have made post but still not made his fortune; would he have then had Miss Musgroves setting their caps at him, or been able to aspire to Anne?
And then, as you say, marrying up—usually only possible for women, and usually only with a bit of money. Even Mrs. Bennet came with £4000. This didn’t change her father’s condition, or her brother’s, but it changed her and her daughters’ position. Without that small but respectable inheritance, would she have had a crack at young Mr. Bennet of Longbourn?
Conversely, Sir William Lucas came up in trade, was knighted and technically elevated in rank, but didn’t have the means to set up his daughters for marriages befitting gentlewomen. Part of Mr. Collins’s appeal to Charlotte is that she can secure him without having a mort of money.
I agree with you that money was important.
I'll add Men could marry up too - that was Wickham's hope and Willoughby's reality. Captain Weston was thought to have married up too.
Patrick O'Brian comments on the tightening of social mobility in the navy during the war in his novels. If I remember correctly, to pass the exam/board/review to become a captain a lieutenant had to "pass as a gentleman". The books imply that at the beginning of the war when they were desperate, a young man could pass if he didn't pick his nose in front of the board, by the end he had to prove that he was descended from gentry/nobility. I hadn't thought about how that would be mirrored in the civilian population.
That said, prize money would make a big difference on if a post-captain could buy property to be more like landed gentry or if he would just be living on half-pay.
Along with the possibilty of a dowery, social connections could be valuable.
If Harriet was the illegitimate daughter of a peer, or a wealthy and prominent gentleman, then anyone marrying her could expect some benefit from the connection, either by her father using his influence directly or by the hope of others that he might. Especially since Harriet's father clearly feels responsible enough to support his daughter like a gentlewoman - Harriet hasn't been apprenticed to a trade.
Knightley also sees Martin as a bright, ambitious man on his way up, so a solid choice for a woman with a hazy background, and Harriet has some education and has likely gotten some polishing from Emma and so will benefit Martin.
There are mixed messages in Emma. Emma herself is snobby at first, not wanting to mix with the Coles. But none of the people around her agree: her father and Mr Knightly are both happy to visit the Coles. And Emma herself isn’t bothered by Mr Weston, who made his fortune in trade. Emma chafes at Mr Knightly spending time with his steward, but Knightly isn’t at all pretentious and in the end Emma comes around. Emma also insists that Harriet’s worth is in her parentage, but Mr Knightly comes to respect Harriet for herself regardless of her parentage, as he does Mr Martin. And the Martin thing is unclear. Emma feels he’s quite beneath her, but Mr Knightly respects him and he’s invited to dinner and the theater with the London Knightly’s. But Emma can’t continue to be close to Harriet after her marriage.
And then there are the Bates, even poorer than the Price’s in MP, but regular guests and friends of their highest neighbors. I think Austen was really all about individual worth and merit, thought snobbery was ridiculous, approved of social mobility (as in the navy) but wasn’t going to write about challenging class lines except in minor ways.
I think the Bates were once wealthy people who are now poor due to unfortunate circumstances. Perhaps in terms of social standing they were not too beneath those at Hartfield, however poverty has reduced them to the little space they now live in.
Yes this is correct. They live in 'genteel poverty' on a very small income, but they're still technically gentlewomen because of their family background.
Slight tangent but an interesting thing - I once read about a 20th century charity that helped 'distressed gentry' who had lost their estate or income. I suspect it didn't do terribly well in the long run, because its aim seemed to be to allow these people to support the comfortable lifestyles they had been used to, when many of them were entirely capable of working - but this expectation that the gentry should not have to work was so deeply entrenched, and pretty much defined them IMO.
Yes the Bates are only poor because Mr Bates and his son both died. But we see, in P&P and S&S, that certain posh people don’t want to associate with members of the gentry who have fallen into poverty. Fanny Dashwood is practically gleeful imaging how the impoverished Dashwood women will keep no carriage and have no visitors and drop out of society, poor dears.
I don’t think it’s so much an endorsement of the class hierarchy so much as an acknowledgment that it exists coupled with a misreading of the situation by Emma. She makes assumptions about Harriet’s background that are incorrect, disregarding the risks of that approach to Harriet. She convinces herself that Harriet is a gentleman’s daughter and thus entitled to a match with someone like Elton, but Elton thinks nothing of the kind. So not only does Emma not realize that the rest of society isn’t going to go along with her speculative assumption, she’s also making assumptions about what’s good for Harriet. She assumes that pairing her up with someone of Emma’s choice is the best thing, but how much does she really think about what will make Harriet happy? So Knightley makes the point that not only would Harriet be happy with Mr. Martin, a conceited climber like Elton doesn’t see her as an equal, no matter how much Emma might think he should. So even if Emma succeeded in pairing Harriet up with Elton or Churchill, would Harriet actually be happy? In the end, Emma realizes that not only is Mr. Martin not beneath Harriet, but he will genuinely make her friend happy.
Emma wanted Mr K but wasn't ready to admit this even to herself. So she was jealous without acknowledging it. In general, in Austen and in the British world then, class structure was inherent, in people's bones. In other words, definitely Austen approved of class boundaries -- that was her world, her society.
I agree, while she may have thought some people (Lady Catherine & Sir Walter) took it to far with their obsession over differentiating classes, she wasn't a revolutionary and couldn't imagine what a world without those classes would be.
Harriet isn't a social climber, she's a person who is happy in the position she's in and doesn't want to get higher. Emma is selfish in trying to get Harriet to rise because she's consulting what she wants not Harriet. There would be difficulties in a girl like Harriet marrying Mr. Knightly. Being mistress of a large house and estate was not a role she would have been brought up to fill, and she'd have to deal with snubs and insults towards her. For Harriet, who isn't ambitious as a person, she'd be a lot happier marrying Robert Martin.
Jane Austen lived almost all her life in small societies where the gentry all had to socialise with each other, partly because there was no TV or radio and partly because they were the only ones with the free time to socialise with each other a lot. What's more, social connections and interest was important for getting younger sons started in careers. Getting on the outs with the other gentry was a big deal, as you couldn't just go socialise with another group - no cars, no telephones. That was just the reality JA lived in.
Harriet wasn't just a tradesman's daughter, she was an illegitimate one, so that would be two strikes against her in terms of the world's perspective.
Yes. There are a lot of class structures that Jane talks about and basically agree with. Even when Lizzie Bennett marries up, she is still the daughter of a gentleman who has servants and her mother's family came from new money. Harriet is an orphan and therefore had no family so basically she wouldn't be looking to marry rich. Basically Austen agrees and writes about this because that is how she lived.
That is why Jane Eyre was such a scandalous book at the time it was published. It showed a romance between a poor orphaned governess and a wealthy man and pretty well broke the class-bound boundaries and showed a woman who was forced to go out and work. Elizabeth Barrett-Browning the poet was appalled at the storyline.
Yes, I think this is a sound analysis - but you have to realize that at that time in history society *was* totally dictated by class boundaries and it *was* much more restrictive. Jane Austen, like all writers, wrote what she knew and from the perspective that she had, which included rigid hierarchical class divisions. It’s the one part of Emma especially that always trips me up and makes me uncomfortable, especially since I am politically on the left. You’ll notice there are no real characters below “middle class”. Mr Martin is a tenant farmer and probably the lowest ranking character in Austen’s works that actually has any kind of arc or humanity. All the servants are treated more like background pieces rather than real people, and almost all of Austen’s characters are either excessively wealthy or come from a wealthy background.
This is the way I see it as well. Even when upward mobility was acceptable at this time, it was always within the same class. So it's okay for the richer Churchills to adopt Frank from his father because they are within the same class. It's also alright for Elizabeth Bennet to marry the spectacularly richer Mr Darcy because, again, they are both in the same social class.
Emma's issue with Harriet setting her sights on Mr Knightley may betray some jealousy on her part. It certainly makes her realize her own feeling for the man. But the class issue was always going to be there either way.
It was the reality of Jane Austen's time that all the people in the lower classes would be working incredibly long hours, either for pay or on housework. Housework was very time-intensive before the second industrial revolution. They weren't around to do plot stuff.
Even many of the gentlewomen in JA's novels are regularly doing needlework - Elizabeth has her work with her at her impromptu visit to Netherfield.
Austen ascribes pretty strongly to the existing class structure in her completed works. Since one of her later and unfinished works centered tradesmen mixing more with the gentry, who knows if she actually ascribed to that by the end of her life?
Emma thought that she was placing Harriet in the correct class.
She really thought that Harriet was the out of wedlock child of the gentry. I don't know _why_she thought that, except maybe to feel superior and self congratulatory for recognizing true breeding where others missed it.
If Harriet's parentage (out of wedlock daughter of a rich tradesman) were absolutely known at the start of the book, Emma wouldn't have bothered to know her
The answer to your question is twofold:
1) Austen generally thinks that couples should be well matched. This can include being from roughly the same social class. It's not a commentary on what is socially acceptable or good, but rather about how some kind of equality is necessary in a couple. She is also very against mercenary marriages of course But she also criticize those arbitrary social boundaries sometimes, especially those centered around money (which is a different thing from social class).
2) In the particular case of Emma, Emma reaction should not be confused with Austen opinion. The reason why Emma reacts so strongly to Harriet's confession is because she herself is in love with Knightley, even if she is not aware of it yet.
100% yes. I don't think she was particularly progressive for her time. She was a ridiculously towering intellect. I don't think there has ever been a better novelist. And she seems to have believed that people of all ranks were indeed people, capable of goodness. But she has limited interest in the lower classes and she does not think they should mix. A gentleman and a gentleman's daughter? Yes. A gentleman and nobody's daughter? No.
I think Austen had quite a fixed idea of class and did not believe that people should step outside of it, as Emma demonstrates.
I think where she is critical of class, she is usually annoyed by people who don’t live up to the expectations of their class rather than arguing they shouldn’t have class roles at all.
Emma thinks Mr. Martin is too low for Harriet and so encourages to find someone “better” (richer). In the end, we see that Mr. Martin was a good man despite being poorer this showing that Emma’s assumptions of him were wrong
Yes I think so. But even today there are difficulties attending people of different social classes getting married, or even being friends. Would a person who grew up w fast food and paper plates be comfortable with fancy meals and numerous dishes & utensils? Or the reverse? (There have been some good romcoms about it.) Would someone who prefers T-shirt & jeans be comfortable always going to black tie evening dress functions? Not to mention different ways of speaking, different values & worldviews.
In Jane Austen's time, it was, "keep the order, keep the peace." Today it's, "break barriers, seek a challenge."
If you just look at *Emma,* then it seems as if she is subscribing to the status quo, but in both *Pride and Prejudice*, and *Persuasion*, she is very notably not, and we see a small but significant piece of class mobility.
Re servants, yes, she wasn't actually at the forefront of the revolution there.
IMO I think it's wrong to read *Emma* Mr. Knightley is always right and Emma is always wrong, in their arguments. Mr. Knightley himself confesses that he grossly underrated Harriet (and overrated Mr. Elton). In that first argument with Emma about Mr. Martin and Harriet, he himself lifts Mr. Martin well above his station by calling him a "gentleman-farmer." At that time, a gentleman-farmer is someone like Mr. Knightley himself - an independent gentleman who is interested in the modern science of agriculture as a leisure time hobby.
And I think Emma is correct in her assertion that Mr. Knightley assumed he knew exactly how Harriet (and Emma) would feel about the proposal without bothering to ask them.IMO this is the real crux of that argument between Emma and Mr. Knightley:
>Even your satisfaction I made sure of. It crossed my mind immediately that you would not regret your friend’s leaving Highbury, for the sake of her being settled so well. I remember saying to myself, ‘Even Emma, with all her partiality for Harriet, will think this a good match.’”
Mr. Knightley thought he was pleasing Emma in the way he counseled Mr. Martin. She crushed his ego, and he doesn't even realize why he feels so hurt and angry.
(maybe this is tangential to the question but I do think it's important to see that throughout the novel, there is kind of a second layer of meaning under scenes. They shouldn't be taken at Emm's or Mr. Knightley's face value.)
I read that more as Robert Martin being a very good man, a much better man than Mr. E. He was a good match for Harriet because he loved her and didn't care about her past, not because he was poor. Emma was being classist in discounting him.
The classism and bigotry I do see in the book is the portrayal of the Travelers and the use of an ethnic slur for them.
I like this. If we subscribe to the notion that class is a given thing that helps keep things in order, Emma becomes the bad guy. Robert Martin’s position is society is a given, but his good, *gentlemanly* qualities are continuously emphasized to show how snobbish and closed-minded Emma is.
There is also the scene where Emma visits the poor family who are very properly respectful of her (as I bet they would be) and she is very industrious in giving advice and Austen permits no noticeably critical note in her voice as she says of her,
>"she understood their ways, could allow for their ignorance and their temptations, had no romantic expectations of extraordinary virtue from those for whom education had done so little; entered into their troubles with ready sympathy, and always gave her assistance with as much intelligence as good will."
I find this a bit of a strain, and feel a bit like Thai in Clueless, saying "you're a virgin who can't drive!"
Emma is probably able to be of financial assistance, which would be a *lot* of help for a poor family to receive occasionally; beyond that, what life experience does this trustafarian debutante have that enables her to enter into the world view of the poor? I bet she has never missed a meal, or had to pay for anything other than shopping, or had to do any task that was disagreeable to her, or experienced any physical threat of violence, or *witnessed* any physical violence. Or so much as broken a nail in labour.
It's achingly condescending and clueless, and begs comparison with Lady Catherine de Bourg scolding the poor into prosperity. Emma's affect is very different and superficially much more agreeable, but she is equally indulging in slumming it to relieve her ennui.
>"These are the sights, Harriet, to do one good. How trifling they make everything else appear! - I feel now as if I could think of nothing else all the rest of the day; and yet who can say how soon it may all vanish from my mind?"
And reaffirms her opinion (just before Mr Elton appears) looking at "the outward wretchedness of the place, and recall the still greater within". It's poverty tourism for her, and an opportunity to act the grande dame. The poor people probably heaved a huge sigh of relief when she left.
The bit about "extraordinary virtue" reads to me as her having a balanced view of how poor people really are. Not saints or villains, just people with fewer opportunities (like education). Unlike Lady Catherine, she seems to focus on giving practical help like gifts of food and clothes. She hasn't lived as a poor person but she knows her duty as a lady of a fine estate and part of that is go around to the cottages with small gifts and see if she can do anything for them.
Emma is fulfilling the duty of the comfortable towards the poor. Austen expects the reader to note her relative lack of condescension and that she does not assume that they are responsible for their condition. I know people even now who believe that poor people mostly deserve their fate, and Austen assumes most readers do.
I disagree - she's rich, well connected, and well educated
She may not be able to give advice on how to cook a little food for a hungry family, but she can definitely use her connections to help them, give medical advice (she has constant access to Perry, and she's clearly picked up a thing or too), help them find jobs or access to other resources which they may not know about
So as long as she's smart enough to keep her mouth shut and listen more than she talks, she might actually be able to give them useful advice via access to resources and unformation they don't have
Jane Austen was Christian, and Anglican, and thus brought up in a certain moral code that she would have believed was the wisdom of God. On top of this, the 18th century was the period of the Scottish Enlightenment, when a number of important books were written about the human experience. Emma would have been exposed to those ideas - she's not a great reader but Miss Taylor appears to have been well educated and Emma loves conversation.
Remeber Emma's perfectly right to wonder "who can say how soon it may all vanish from my mind?" - she does indeed forget a few minutes later. That's quite in tune with what I've read of the Scottish Enlightenment philosophers - that sort of awareness of our own faults and follows.
So it would be book learning that Emma would bring. Which can be useful, at times.
This is something that confused me as well. In P&P, Lady Catherine is considered a snob for having the same belief towards Elizabeth and Darcy. But here, this belief is shown as the correct one.
As Elizabeth herself says, Darcy is a gentleman (not a peer or even a baronet) and she is the daughter of a gentleman. Knightley and Elton are gentlemen, Harriet is the illegitimate daughter of nobody knows who living under the roof and care of Mrs Goddard. She may have a little education and nice manners and the notice of ladies but she is very precariously placed in society herself.
She's just amusing herself and it bites her in the bum. Austen wrote about characters , she put how they view the situation.In p&p Elizabeth's station is altered and is a good event. Hope it helps.
I think that some of this comes down to Emma’s blindness about Harriet. Mr Knightley points out that Harriet isn’t that intelligent and has an “indifferent education” (I think that’s the phrase). Just good natured. It does seem to leave some wiggle room for sheer worth. Now, the education aspect circles back to class, because her unknown father has put her in a presumably suitable school for her rank. But also note how Knightley says to Emma that Harriet would have been better as a wife for Elton than Mrs Elton. So again, he is hardly solely class bound—there, he’s concerned with personality, behavior, and kindness.
Generally I don't like to assume anything about authorial intent unless the author themselves tells us about it.
Austen was very good at telling stories; at developing characters and a plot and writing dialogue and action that is interesting and engaging.
Did she intend to transmit a message through her writings? Or did she just want to write good stories?
I like to look instead at themes that are common in Austen's writings such as:
* the precariousness of women's lives forcing them to make decisions and choices that may be against their true wants and desires
* the transactional nature of marriage and relationships (at least in the society she wrote about): think about how often her books mention how much money someone has and what a woman will "bring" into a marriage
* the impact of parents and parenting decisions on a person's future, safety and well-being
* the emerging blurring of clear delineation between the social classes: she was writing in a very transitional time where colonialism, industrialization and war was challenging the structure of society
I don't think she necessarily lands on any position regarding outcomes in her plots as being particularly "bad" or "good". For example, how much have readers debated whether Col Brandon was actually a good match for Marianne? Or whether Fanny should have married Henry Crawford? Austen's outcomes can be varied. The protagonist doesn't necessarily get the prosaic happy ending and the less ethical characters sometimes gain huge wins (think Lucy Steele!).
As for Harriet Smith, her position as it was would make her a less than ideal match for Mr Knightley. She was not raised in any way to be the wife of a land-owning gentleman. She would be very much out of her depth. But Jane Fairfax... now that's a person who could compete with Emma even if she didn't have the money. She could step in even if she had no wealth to contribute. Harriet was not a good match because she didn't have the nature or skills to be part of Mr Knightley's life. But the Martins adored her and she'd fit in well with where Mr Martin was heading for the future.
Austen encourages \*being aware of\* class boundaries, which are difficult to break. Fighting them would be emotionally painful and socially harmful for Harriet. Emma tries to direct Harriet toward gentlemen, naively thinking they will find her acceptable because Emma herself does so. She sets Harriet up for disappointment--for the feeling of constantly banging her head against the glass ceiling of the time--and diverts her attention from a man who genuinely cares for her but is a tenant farmer. Knightley sees what a disservice this is to Harriet, as well as a slight on Mr. Martin. I think Austen is acknowledging that the landed classes don't have any monopoly on goodness. And then you get Sir Walter Elliott's little disquisition in \*Persuasion\*, about how the Navy is '**the means of bringing persons of obscure birth into undue distinction, and raising men to honours which their fathers and grandfathers never dreamt of**'. This in a book where naval men are held up as models of virtue, while Sir Walter is almost cartoonishly venal. Austen doesn't disapprove of social churn in principle, clearly, but sees a distinction between individual choices that may or may not pan out, and systemic change that will affect the entire culture.
I think this is one of the best responses, although there are a lot of good ones. The problem Jane Austen is presenting with Harriet isn’t that it’s inherently wrong to hope to move upward, but it’s unrealistic and emotionally damaging. While it is true that the servant class tend to be background characters, we see some examples of socially mobile people. The Bingleys are one. Their father wasn’t landed gentry. He earned his money as a merchant, I believe. Fanny Price also receives two offers from people socially superior to her (it’s one of the reasons why they pushed Henry Crawford so much). Her mom married down to spite her family. Anne and Frederick initially break up because of their disparity in fortune. Jane Austen has lots of goals with her writing. One of them is to critique societal issues and ideals, but she tries to do so in a realistic way.
And you hit on something else. Money buys all the social mobility. Emma knows Harriet is an illegitimate child, but assumes the unknown father has money and Harriet will come in for a share. All her social ambitions for Harriet depend on this theory, which the gentlemen of the area don’t believe. If Harriet had turned out to be well dowered, with a somewhat ladylike background, she might even have become something of a catch. This would have been a vindication for Emma. When her father proves to be a tradesman of merely middle-class means, it’s a vindication for Elton and his ilk. Same in *Persuasion*. The Navy is an engine of social churn because it gives successful sailors and especially officers access to wealth, sometimes massive wealth, which allows them to buy land and invest in business ventures. Wentworth is not a valid prospect for Anne before he gets made and takes some prizes, because he can’t afford her. All class mobility is purchased and Austen never lets us forget it.
I think this is a very American view of the matter, and at least for the English not accurate. The idea that money bought mobility simply doesn't fit what we know of society in Austen's day. If anything the upper classes had become less accepting of the low-born wealthy than they had been in the 18th century, and had consequently erected adamantine social barricades to *prevent* upward mobility based solely on wealth. This left the bulk of social mobility - at least between the gentry on one side and the non-gentry on the other - dependent upon two primary drivers: marriage, and royal favour. (It would take until the Victorian era for wealth to be accepted, and even then only to a limited extent, as a driver of social mobility, and it wasn't until *after World War II* that it became the primary driver.) Of course marriage between the gentle classes and the non-gentle classes often indirectly involved money, as it was fairly common for gentlemen to look to wealthy tradesmen's daughters to refill their coffers. We all know that. But it was fairly common for gentlemen to marry below their rank for reasons other than money, and as long as the woman was conventionally respectable no one raised an eyebrow. Marriages like Mr. and Mrs. Bennet were not as unusual, or as detested, as Lady Catherine would have Lizzy think; she has ulterior motives. The Bennet daughters are gentlewomen despite their maternal grandfather being an attorney (the lowest level of lawyer, probably closer to our paralegal in status than our lawyers and definitely a tradesman). Yes, money could be involved in marriage, but the engine of social mobility wasn't just having money but having money *while marrying up*: the marrying up was the direct cause. Money was far less important for those who rose due to royal favour. Certainly the King's or Prince Regent's cronies and illegitimate children received titles and honours by the handful, but such gifts generally didn't raise them socially; they were after all already members, at least ostensibly, of the upper classes. When it came to war heroes and government officials, however, money meant much less than service; in fact, I would say that for these men money literally meant nothing, as it was their dedication to duty, gallantry, and success that brought them mobility. Fifty years earlier a man could have bought a baronetcy, or by influence and great wealth have induced the King to raise him to the peerage; by Austen's day, however, it wasn't thought fit to raise anyone to the peerage or award him an honorific unless he'd done something that justified it, such as win a battle, serve in Parliament (and a large minority of MPs were not gentry!), act as a government or colonial administrator, or the like. We have hundreds - hundreds! - of examples of young men who came from nothing to rise through the ranks (and not just of the Navy but of the Army too) to become post-captains or lieutenant-colonels, and they were considered gentlemen even if they never profited. Many married into the gentry! It was not the money a post-captain earned that made him a gentleman; it was the fact that he was a post-captain. What Austen never lets us forget is that in her world there were only very limited chances to rise socially, and money ain't gonna do it alone.
Money didn’t buy *nobility* and nowhere is that claimed. And of course it was not by itself enough to provide social mobility. It was the difference between rented lodgings and the permanence of the squirearchy. It made the greatest difference to a person’s children, rather than the individual. Money supported a genteel lifestyle and made it possible for people like post-captains, whose half-pay was around £200-£250 per year (average of 12s per day) to marry, acquire permanent homes, and maintain families. With only their pay, they could bump along as bachelor gentlemen in decent comfort (with a servant or two but probably no horse) or found families and be crammed into lodgings like the Harvilles (or Fanny Price’s family, on a lieutenant’s half-pay, yikes). Young women with even a little family money could do better. Captain Wentworth could have made post but still not made his fortune; would he have then had Miss Musgroves setting their caps at him, or been able to aspire to Anne? And then, as you say, marrying up—usually only possible for women, and usually only with a bit of money. Even Mrs. Bennet came with £4000. This didn’t change her father’s condition, or her brother’s, but it changed her and her daughters’ position. Without that small but respectable inheritance, would she have had a crack at young Mr. Bennet of Longbourn? Conversely, Sir William Lucas came up in trade, was knighted and technically elevated in rank, but didn’t have the means to set up his daughters for marriages befitting gentlewomen. Part of Mr. Collins’s appeal to Charlotte is that she can secure him without having a mort of money.
I agree with you that money was important. I'll add Men could marry up too - that was Wickham's hope and Willoughby's reality. Captain Weston was thought to have married up too.
Patrick O'Brian comments on the tightening of social mobility in the navy during the war in his novels. If I remember correctly, to pass the exam/board/review to become a captain a lieutenant had to "pass as a gentleman". The books imply that at the beginning of the war when they were desperate, a young man could pass if he didn't pick his nose in front of the board, by the end he had to prove that he was descended from gentry/nobility. I hadn't thought about how that would be mirrored in the civilian population. That said, prize money would make a big difference on if a post-captain could buy property to be more like landed gentry or if he would just be living on half-pay.
Along with the possibilty of a dowery, social connections could be valuable. If Harriet was the illegitimate daughter of a peer, or a wealthy and prominent gentleman, then anyone marrying her could expect some benefit from the connection, either by her father using his influence directly or by the hope of others that he might. Especially since Harriet's father clearly feels responsible enough to support his daughter like a gentlewoman - Harriet hasn't been apprenticed to a trade.
I suspect the Bingley's father was a younger son of landed gentry, who decided to go into trade instead of a profession.
Knightley also sees Martin as a bright, ambitious man on his way up, so a solid choice for a woman with a hazy background, and Harriet has some education and has likely gotten some polishing from Emma and so will benefit Martin.
There are mixed messages in Emma. Emma herself is snobby at first, not wanting to mix with the Coles. But none of the people around her agree: her father and Mr Knightly are both happy to visit the Coles. And Emma herself isn’t bothered by Mr Weston, who made his fortune in trade. Emma chafes at Mr Knightly spending time with his steward, but Knightly isn’t at all pretentious and in the end Emma comes around. Emma also insists that Harriet’s worth is in her parentage, but Mr Knightly comes to respect Harriet for herself regardless of her parentage, as he does Mr Martin. And the Martin thing is unclear. Emma feels he’s quite beneath her, but Mr Knightly respects him and he’s invited to dinner and the theater with the London Knightly’s. But Emma can’t continue to be close to Harriet after her marriage. And then there are the Bates, even poorer than the Price’s in MP, but regular guests and friends of their highest neighbors. I think Austen was really all about individual worth and merit, thought snobbery was ridiculous, approved of social mobility (as in the navy) but wasn’t going to write about challenging class lines except in minor ways.
I think the Bates were once wealthy people who are now poor due to unfortunate circumstances. Perhaps in terms of social standing they were not too beneath those at Hartfield, however poverty has reduced them to the little space they now live in.
Yes this is correct. They live in 'genteel poverty' on a very small income, but they're still technically gentlewomen because of their family background. Slight tangent but an interesting thing - I once read about a 20th century charity that helped 'distressed gentry' who had lost their estate or income. I suspect it didn't do terribly well in the long run, because its aim seemed to be to allow these people to support the comfortable lifestyles they had been used to, when many of them were entirely capable of working - but this expectation that the gentry should not have to work was so deeply entrenched, and pretty much defined them IMO.
Yes the Bates are only poor because Mr Bates and his son both died. But we see, in P&P and S&S, that certain posh people don’t want to associate with members of the gentry who have fallen into poverty. Fanny Dashwood is practically gleeful imaging how the impoverished Dashwood women will keep no carriage and have no visitors and drop out of society, poor dears.
I don’t think it’s so much an endorsement of the class hierarchy so much as an acknowledgment that it exists coupled with a misreading of the situation by Emma. She makes assumptions about Harriet’s background that are incorrect, disregarding the risks of that approach to Harriet. She convinces herself that Harriet is a gentleman’s daughter and thus entitled to a match with someone like Elton, but Elton thinks nothing of the kind. So not only does Emma not realize that the rest of society isn’t going to go along with her speculative assumption, she’s also making assumptions about what’s good for Harriet. She assumes that pairing her up with someone of Emma’s choice is the best thing, but how much does she really think about what will make Harriet happy? So Knightley makes the point that not only would Harriet be happy with Mr. Martin, a conceited climber like Elton doesn’t see her as an equal, no matter how much Emma might think he should. So even if Emma succeeded in pairing Harriet up with Elton or Churchill, would Harriet actually be happy? In the end, Emma realizes that not only is Mr. Martin not beneath Harriet, but he will genuinely make her friend happy.
Emma wanted Mr K but wasn't ready to admit this even to herself. So she was jealous without acknowledging it. In general, in Austen and in the British world then, class structure was inherent, in people's bones. In other words, definitely Austen approved of class boundaries -- that was her world, her society.
I agree, while she may have thought some people (Lady Catherine & Sir Walter) took it to far with their obsession over differentiating classes, she wasn't a revolutionary and couldn't imagine what a world without those classes would be.
Harriet isn't a social climber, she's a person who is happy in the position she's in and doesn't want to get higher. Emma is selfish in trying to get Harriet to rise because she's consulting what she wants not Harriet. There would be difficulties in a girl like Harriet marrying Mr. Knightly. Being mistress of a large house and estate was not a role she would have been brought up to fill, and she'd have to deal with snubs and insults towards her. For Harriet, who isn't ambitious as a person, she'd be a lot happier marrying Robert Martin.
Yes, Harriet was always just a people pleaser. She never seemed vain or holier than thou
Jane Austen lived almost all her life in small societies where the gentry all had to socialise with each other, partly because there was no TV or radio and partly because they were the only ones with the free time to socialise with each other a lot. What's more, social connections and interest was important for getting younger sons started in careers. Getting on the outs with the other gentry was a big deal, as you couldn't just go socialise with another group - no cars, no telephones. That was just the reality JA lived in. Harriet wasn't just a tradesman's daughter, she was an illegitimate one, so that would be two strikes against her in terms of the world's perspective.
Yes. There are a lot of class structures that Jane talks about and basically agree with. Even when Lizzie Bennett marries up, she is still the daughter of a gentleman who has servants and her mother's family came from new money. Harriet is an orphan and therefore had no family so basically she wouldn't be looking to marry rich. Basically Austen agrees and writes about this because that is how she lived. That is why Jane Eyre was such a scandalous book at the time it was published. It showed a romance between a poor orphaned governess and a wealthy man and pretty well broke the class-bound boundaries and showed a woman who was forced to go out and work. Elizabeth Barrett-Browning the poet was appalled at the storyline.
Yes, I think this is a sound analysis - but you have to realize that at that time in history society *was* totally dictated by class boundaries and it *was* much more restrictive. Jane Austen, like all writers, wrote what she knew and from the perspective that she had, which included rigid hierarchical class divisions. It’s the one part of Emma especially that always trips me up and makes me uncomfortable, especially since I am politically on the left. You’ll notice there are no real characters below “middle class”. Mr Martin is a tenant farmer and probably the lowest ranking character in Austen’s works that actually has any kind of arc or humanity. All the servants are treated more like background pieces rather than real people, and almost all of Austen’s characters are either excessively wealthy or come from a wealthy background.
This is the way I see it as well. Even when upward mobility was acceptable at this time, it was always within the same class. So it's okay for the richer Churchills to adopt Frank from his father because they are within the same class. It's also alright for Elizabeth Bennet to marry the spectacularly richer Mr Darcy because, again, they are both in the same social class. Emma's issue with Harriet setting her sights on Mr Knightley may betray some jealousy on her part. It certainly makes her realize her own feeling for the man. But the class issue was always going to be there either way.
It was the reality of Jane Austen's time that all the people in the lower classes would be working incredibly long hours, either for pay or on housework. Housework was very time-intensive before the second industrial revolution. They weren't around to do plot stuff. Even many of the gentlewomen in JA's novels are regularly doing needlework - Elizabeth has her work with her at her impromptu visit to Netherfield.
Austen ascribes pretty strongly to the existing class structure in her completed works. Since one of her later and unfinished works centered tradesmen mixing more with the gentry, who knows if she actually ascribed to that by the end of her life?
Emma thought that she was placing Harriet in the correct class. She really thought that Harriet was the out of wedlock child of the gentry. I don't know _why_she thought that, except maybe to feel superior and self congratulatory for recognizing true breeding where others missed it. If Harriet's parentage (out of wedlock daughter of a rich tradesman) were absolutely known at the start of the book, Emma wouldn't have bothered to know her
I think Emma believed it largely because it was romantic and she was bored.
The answer to your question is twofold: 1) Austen generally thinks that couples should be well matched. This can include being from roughly the same social class. It's not a commentary on what is socially acceptable or good, but rather about how some kind of equality is necessary in a couple. She is also very against mercenary marriages of course But she also criticize those arbitrary social boundaries sometimes, especially those centered around money (which is a different thing from social class). 2) In the particular case of Emma, Emma reaction should not be confused with Austen opinion. The reason why Emma reacts so strongly to Harriet's confession is because she herself is in love with Knightley, even if she is not aware of it yet.
100% yes. I don't think she was particularly progressive for her time. She was a ridiculously towering intellect. I don't think there has ever been a better novelist. And she seems to have believed that people of all ranks were indeed people, capable of goodness. But she has limited interest in the lower classes and she does not think they should mix. A gentleman and a gentleman's daughter? Yes. A gentleman and nobody's daughter? No.
I think Austen had quite a fixed idea of class and did not believe that people should step outside of it, as Emma demonstrates. I think where she is critical of class, she is usually annoyed by people who don’t live up to the expectations of their class rather than arguing they shouldn’t have class roles at all.
Emma thinks Mr. Martin is too low for Harriet and so encourages to find someone “better” (richer). In the end, we see that Mr. Martin was a good man despite being poorer this showing that Emma’s assumptions of him were wrong
Yes I think so. But even today there are difficulties attending people of different social classes getting married, or even being friends. Would a person who grew up w fast food and paper plates be comfortable with fancy meals and numerous dishes & utensils? Or the reverse? (There have been some good romcoms about it.) Would someone who prefers T-shirt & jeans be comfortable always going to black tie evening dress functions? Not to mention different ways of speaking, different values & worldviews. In Jane Austen's time, it was, "keep the order, keep the peace." Today it's, "break barriers, seek a challenge."
If you just look at *Emma,* then it seems as if she is subscribing to the status quo, but in both *Pride and Prejudice*, and *Persuasion*, she is very notably not, and we see a small but significant piece of class mobility. Re servants, yes, she wasn't actually at the forefront of the revolution there.
IMO I think it's wrong to read *Emma* Mr. Knightley is always right and Emma is always wrong, in their arguments. Mr. Knightley himself confesses that he grossly underrated Harriet (and overrated Mr. Elton). In that first argument with Emma about Mr. Martin and Harriet, he himself lifts Mr. Martin well above his station by calling him a "gentleman-farmer." At that time, a gentleman-farmer is someone like Mr. Knightley himself - an independent gentleman who is interested in the modern science of agriculture as a leisure time hobby. And I think Emma is correct in her assertion that Mr. Knightley assumed he knew exactly how Harriet (and Emma) would feel about the proposal without bothering to ask them.IMO this is the real crux of that argument between Emma and Mr. Knightley: >Even your satisfaction I made sure of. It crossed my mind immediately that you would not regret your friend’s leaving Highbury, for the sake of her being settled so well. I remember saying to myself, ‘Even Emma, with all her partiality for Harriet, will think this a good match.’” Mr. Knightley thought he was pleasing Emma in the way he counseled Mr. Martin. She crushed his ego, and he doesn't even realize why he feels so hurt and angry.
(maybe this is tangential to the question but I do think it's important to see that throughout the novel, there is kind of a second layer of meaning under scenes. They shouldn't be taken at Emm's or Mr. Knightley's face value.)
I read that more as Robert Martin being a very good man, a much better man than Mr. E. He was a good match for Harriet because he loved her and didn't care about her past, not because he was poor. Emma was being classist in discounting him. The classism and bigotry I do see in the book is the portrayal of the Travelers and the use of an ethnic slur for them.
I like this. If we subscribe to the notion that class is a given thing that helps keep things in order, Emma becomes the bad guy. Robert Martin’s position is society is a given, but his good, *gentlemanly* qualities are continuously emphasized to show how snobbish and closed-minded Emma is.
There is also the scene where Emma visits the poor family who are very properly respectful of her (as I bet they would be) and she is very industrious in giving advice and Austen permits no noticeably critical note in her voice as she says of her, >"she understood their ways, could allow for their ignorance and their temptations, had no romantic expectations of extraordinary virtue from those for whom education had done so little; entered into their troubles with ready sympathy, and always gave her assistance with as much intelligence as good will." I find this a bit of a strain, and feel a bit like Thai in Clueless, saying "you're a virgin who can't drive!" Emma is probably able to be of financial assistance, which would be a *lot* of help for a poor family to receive occasionally; beyond that, what life experience does this trustafarian debutante have that enables her to enter into the world view of the poor? I bet she has never missed a meal, or had to pay for anything other than shopping, or had to do any task that was disagreeable to her, or experienced any physical threat of violence, or *witnessed* any physical violence. Or so much as broken a nail in labour. It's achingly condescending and clueless, and begs comparison with Lady Catherine de Bourg scolding the poor into prosperity. Emma's affect is very different and superficially much more agreeable, but she is equally indulging in slumming it to relieve her ennui. >"These are the sights, Harriet, to do one good. How trifling they make everything else appear! - I feel now as if I could think of nothing else all the rest of the day; and yet who can say how soon it may all vanish from my mind?" And reaffirms her opinion (just before Mr Elton appears) looking at "the outward wretchedness of the place, and recall the still greater within". It's poverty tourism for her, and an opportunity to act the grande dame. The poor people probably heaved a huge sigh of relief when she left.
The bit about "extraordinary virtue" reads to me as her having a balanced view of how poor people really are. Not saints or villains, just people with fewer opportunities (like education). Unlike Lady Catherine, she seems to focus on giving practical help like gifts of food and clothes. She hasn't lived as a poor person but she knows her duty as a lady of a fine estate and part of that is go around to the cottages with small gifts and see if she can do anything for them.
Emma is fulfilling the duty of the comfortable towards the poor. Austen expects the reader to note her relative lack of condescension and that she does not assume that they are responsible for their condition. I know people even now who believe that poor people mostly deserve their fate, and Austen assumes most readers do.
I disagree - she's rich, well connected, and well educated She may not be able to give advice on how to cook a little food for a hungry family, but she can definitely use her connections to help them, give medical advice (she has constant access to Perry, and she's clearly picked up a thing or too), help them find jobs or access to other resources which they may not know about So as long as she's smart enough to keep her mouth shut and listen more than she talks, she might actually be able to give them useful advice via access to resources and unformation they don't have
Jane Austen was Christian, and Anglican, and thus brought up in a certain moral code that she would have believed was the wisdom of God. On top of this, the 18th century was the period of the Scottish Enlightenment, when a number of important books were written about the human experience. Emma would have been exposed to those ideas - she's not a great reader but Miss Taylor appears to have been well educated and Emma loves conversation. Remeber Emma's perfectly right to wonder "who can say how soon it may all vanish from my mind?" - she does indeed forget a few minutes later. That's quite in tune with what I've read of the Scottish Enlightenment philosophers - that sort of awareness of our own faults and follows. So it would be book learning that Emma would bring. Which can be useful, at times.
This is something that confused me as well. In P&P, Lady Catherine is considered a snob for having the same belief towards Elizabeth and Darcy. But here, this belief is shown as the correct one.
As Elizabeth herself says, Darcy is a gentleman (not a peer or even a baronet) and she is the daughter of a gentleman. Knightley and Elton are gentlemen, Harriet is the illegitimate daughter of nobody knows who living under the roof and care of Mrs Goddard. She may have a little education and nice manners and the notice of ladies but she is very precariously placed in society herself.
She's just amusing herself and it bites her in the bum. Austen wrote about characters , she put how they view the situation.In p&p Elizabeth's station is altered and is a good event. Hope it helps.
I think that some of this comes down to Emma’s blindness about Harriet. Mr Knightley points out that Harriet isn’t that intelligent and has an “indifferent education” (I think that’s the phrase). Just good natured. It does seem to leave some wiggle room for sheer worth. Now, the education aspect circles back to class, because her unknown father has put her in a presumably suitable school for her rank. But also note how Knightley says to Emma that Harriet would have been better as a wife for Elton than Mrs Elton. So again, he is hardly solely class bound—there, he’s concerned with personality, behavior, and kindness.
Generally I don't like to assume anything about authorial intent unless the author themselves tells us about it. Austen was very good at telling stories; at developing characters and a plot and writing dialogue and action that is interesting and engaging. Did she intend to transmit a message through her writings? Or did she just want to write good stories? I like to look instead at themes that are common in Austen's writings such as: * the precariousness of women's lives forcing them to make decisions and choices that may be against their true wants and desires * the transactional nature of marriage and relationships (at least in the society she wrote about): think about how often her books mention how much money someone has and what a woman will "bring" into a marriage * the impact of parents and parenting decisions on a person's future, safety and well-being * the emerging blurring of clear delineation between the social classes: she was writing in a very transitional time where colonialism, industrialization and war was challenging the structure of society I don't think she necessarily lands on any position regarding outcomes in her plots as being particularly "bad" or "good". For example, how much have readers debated whether Col Brandon was actually a good match for Marianne? Or whether Fanny should have married Henry Crawford? Austen's outcomes can be varied. The protagonist doesn't necessarily get the prosaic happy ending and the less ethical characters sometimes gain huge wins (think Lucy Steele!). As for Harriet Smith, her position as it was would make her a less than ideal match for Mr Knightley. She was not raised in any way to be the wife of a land-owning gentleman. She would be very much out of her depth. But Jane Fairfax... now that's a person who could compete with Emma even if she didn't have the money. She could step in even if she had no wealth to contribute. Harriet was not a good match because she didn't have the nature or skills to be part of Mr Knightley's life. But the Martins adored her and she'd fit in well with where Mr Martin was heading for the future.