Northanger Abbey, chapter 9: A Thorpe In My Side

We are on Day 2 of knowing John Thorpe. 

DAY 2, people.

This is the third chapter in a row in which he has a big focus. He might just be unstoppable. He certainly seems that ways when he barges in to collect Catherine, holding her to the incredibly vague promise she gave of going on a day trip. She literally looks to Mrs. Allen to help her politely turn him down, but Mrs. Allen continues to be clueless. Figuring that “there could be no impropriety in her going with Mr. Thorpe, as Isabella was going at the same time with James,” Cat decides to just go with it (even though this conflicts with her desire to see Miss Tilney again, which she hoped to do before John Thorpe busted in).

The four of them are going to Claverton Down, a village just outside of Bath. Isabella playfully (?) teases Cat for being a slowpoke, insisting “I have a thousand things to say to you; but make haste and get in, for I long to be off.” She proceeds to not utter a word of consequence to Cat for the whole day. Cat is stuck with Thorpe and his incessant chatter about how awesome his gig is, how good he is at driving it, how the normally wild horse is completely under his control. Etc. We get a clue that Thorpe is interested in Cat when he asks about Mr. Allen’s fortune and whether Cat is his goddaughter. Then, in a wild turn, he insists that Mr. Allen is an alcoholic based on his own drinking habits and those of her own brother.

WHAT.

Thorpe’s constant bragging about opposing ideas (the safety of the gig he’s driving, the alcoholic habits of random people) gives Cat whiplash: “she knew not how to reconcile two such very different accounts of the same thing.” He’s more obsessed with horses and gigs and races than she is with Udolpho, judging by how much more he talks about his interests than she does. She begins “to distrust his powers of giving universal pleasure” despite his connection to Isabelle and to her brother.

Through this interaction—Thorpe’s overwhelming personality and Cat’s nonplussed reaction—we learn about the foundation of Cat’s pragmatic, simplistic approach to people. Her family life is straightforward and realistic. Her parents have no time for sarcasm or pomposity: “they were not in the habit therefore of telling lies to increase their importance, or of asserting at one moment what they would contradict the next.” I find this incredibly telling, not just as a charming insight into Cat’s (and James’s) upbringing, but also as an indirect explanation for John Thorpe’s bewildering behavior. In many ways, Cat is the kind of person that someone like John is likely used to bullying around. When John outlandishly claims that James’s gig is on the verge of breaking down, Cat is visibly and vocally upset. It really seems like John says whatever he thinks sounds dramatic to get a bit of a rise from her—because when in the next breath he insists that James has nothing to worry about, Cat is silenced. He’s playing her like a fiddle. 

Apparently the day goes by so quickly that not only do the readers never get to hear about it, but Isabella never finds the time to tell Cat one of the alleged “thousand things” on her mind. When they arrive at the Allens’, Isabella shows that she’s her brother’s sister as she “protest[s], over and over again, that no two hours and a half had ever gone off so swiftly before” Two and a half? HOURS?? The ride back and forth with John felt like a whole week to me!

The Jane Austen Irony Fairy drops in for a visit as Cat learns she missed out on meeting the Tilney siblings. She pries Mrs. Allen for details but that woman’s head is full of cotton (and linen. And satin. And lace). Thanks, Mrs. Allen.

And what did we learn today? “Could [Catherine] have foreseen such a circumstance, nothing should have persuaded her to go out with the others.” On the other hand, Cat doesn’t like John Thorpe anymore, and it’s only been 42 hours since she met him. Progress!

The Shapard Shelf: Shapard has a detailed annotation on John Thorpe’s use of an antisemitic slur. Jewish people living in England at this time were not actively persecuted, but nonetheless were barred from actively participating in Christian England in other ways. He cites Shylock from The Merchant of Venice as a fictional character that reinforced the perception of Jewish people as greedy and money-obsessed (ladyknightthebrave explains it so well). However, an evolving tolerance for Jewish people picked up among the upper classes, as many began to recognize the toll that centuries of prejudice had taken. “Thorpe’s crude talk of Jews would mark his lack of gentility and refinement,” Shapard concludes. I’ll add that it’s also a mark of bigotry in anyone, and should not be tolerated in any century.