Mansfield Park, ch. 33: Persuasion (Doesn't Always Work)

Credit to Leanna McWilliams for her portrait of a
very tired, very done Fanny.

This is one of my favorite chapters in a Jane Austen book. I’ve been looking forward to dissecting this chapter for the last 33 weeks. Here is where Austen lays out the case for and against Fanny and Henry’s union. Unfortunately, this can be a frustrating read for some of us modern readers, since we’re used to dialogue exchanges and we put a lot of value (for good reason) on “show, don’t tell.” But we have to look at what Austen is trying to show us just by the telling.

For one thing? This is the second-least romantic proposal (especially with this being Henry’s second run at one) in an Austen novel.* It’s just a debate that ends in a stalemate. That right there doesn’t bode well for Hanny’s fate as a couple.

Henry’s argument is that he wants Fanny, ergo he deserves her. Okay, okay, there’s a little more going on, but when one’s “vanity” is mentioned before every other consideration, every other trait of a professed lover … well, that’s what we call a red flag. Going deeper, we find that “[Henry] considered [Fanny] as one … whose modesty had prevented her from understanding his attentions, and who was still overpowered by the suddenness of addresses so wholly unexpected.” From his perspective, his conclusions make sense. Fanny is young (Henry is in his mid-twenties), exceptionally modest, and was clearly taken aback by his proposal. He also has no clue of her “pre-engaged heart,” which Fanny has hidden from everybody. This part of his argument has some merit.

Fanny’s rejoinder that “she did not love him, could not love him, was sure she never should love him,” is more sound. Their union is impossible because “their dispositions were so totally dissimilar, as to make mutual affection incompatible, and that they were unfitted for each other by nature, education, and habit.” All true. Where she fails is in her presentation. Because she feels she “must be courteous,” “compassionate;” “[s]he must have a sense of being honoured … and she must have a strong feeling of gratitude” due to Henry’s sincerity, honor, and ability to secure promotions for beloved older brothers. In other words, she is so preoccupied with (say it with me) what she owes to Henry that “[h]er diffidence, gratitude, and softness” works against her. So “when constrained at last to admit that she did know her own present feelings” (i.e., no means no), she demonstrates the very gentleness, sweetness, and subservience that attracted Henry to her in the first place. Mistaking her soft demeanor for hesitation and naiveté, he has “so much delight in the idea of obliging her to love him in a very short time, that her not loving him now was scarcely regretted.” (Note his assumption that it’d only take “a very short time” for Fanny to change her mind. Not a long-term planner, our Henry).

We are left with the tidbit that even if Fanny wasn’t already in love, Henry “never could have engaged [her affections].” At first glance, this appears to contradict the assertion that Fanny could have fallen for Henry despite his past dalliance with Maria. But it’s not. Fanny is too angry at Henry’s “selfish and ungenerous” persistence after her consistent barrage of no, please, just no. There is “a gross want of feeling and humanity where his own pleasure was concerned,” she reflects, and once someone has displayed a pattern of putting their desires before yours (and play careless mind games), it’s hard to think of them as a romantic partner.

Credit to Joanna Barnum

And I think it bears repeating: if your arrogance leads you to believe that all that’s standing between you and domestic felicity is a spirited debate with your would-be wife who keeps saying no thanks, you might want to re-think your approach to relationships.

Speaking of approaches that need work, Sir Thomas demonstrates again his skills and limitations as a parent. After fawning over Henry’s declaration that he won’t give up his pursuit of Fanny (despite how miserable it makes her), Sir Thomas tells her that he won’t pressure her anymore: “You cannot suppose me capable of trying to persuade you to marry against your inclinations. Your happiness and advantage are all that I have in view … ” By assuring her that she is “on safe ground,” he attempts to give her some peace of mind. But by allowing Henry to continue to woo/pester her, he is robbing her of that peace. Despite Sir Thomas’s intentions, Mansfield Park is no longer Fanny’s safe space. (Was it ever? We’ll save that for future chapters.)

Though Sir Thomas shoots himself in the foot here, Fanny’s reflections on him are not entirely fair. Though she concedes that her uncle’s ignorance of the truth goes a long way in explaining his behavior, she herself is clueless about Sir Thomas’s offer to intervene in Maria’s unhappy engagement. Sir Thomas, deficient in “romantic delicacy” though he may be, is not just the strict father Fanny assumes. For example, he urges Mrs. Norris to demonstrate “the strictest forbearance and silence toward his niece” (mark the use of that pronoun—Fanny is much more Sir Thomas’s niece than she ever was to Mrs. Norris, who has been “trying to depress” Fanny for years). In fact, Sir Thomas is slowly getting wise to his sister-in-law’s m.o.

And then we get Lady Bertram’s response to the whole debacle. When she correctly assumes that the ball was a turning point for Henry’s courtship of Fanny, she reveals just how shallow she really is. “[Y]ou must be aware, Fanny, that it is every young woman’s duty to accept such a very unexceptionable offer as this,” she instructs her speechless niece. Yikes! With a mother like that, is it no wonder that Maria and Julia turned out the way they did? And check out that bit about the puppy-gifting being “more than [she] did for Maria”—doesn’t it sound like she’s playing favorites? Though to be fair, Maria has shown no interest in seeing her family since she got married. If Lady Bertram feels a little resentful, can we really blame her? She misses her kids. Though you have to wonder what exactly she misses about them.

God. What a messed-up family.

Chapter the next: Ed returns at last to catch up on all the latest, Henry puts on an act, and Fanny can’t even anymore.

*Mr. Collins’s absurd and awkward proposal to Elizabeth Bennet in Pride & Prejudice still takes the cake.