I trust you’ve been enjoying our 12-Days-of-Christmas posts with all the excellent giveaways! Here’s day 10, followed by the next installment of the Sanditon Group Read.
You may have taken down your tree and moved on. But it’s still Christmas here at Austen Variations! We’re up to day ten, marked in the song by TEN LORDS A-LEAPING.
Jane Austen didn’t give us ten actual lords – leaping or otherwise – but she did give us a fine collection of leading men in her stories: Darcy, Bingley, Col. Fitzwilliam, Col. Brandon, Edward Ferrars, Edmund Bertram, Henry Tilney, Cpt. Wentworth, and Mr. Knightley Hmm. That’s only nine. I guess I could throw in a rogue amongst the gentlemen to complete the number. But instead, I will offer you a hero of my own: Captain Devereaux.
Captain Devereaux is a French ex-patriot, a man of noble birth (so he truly is a lord), who narrowly escaped the atrocities of the Revolution to make England his new home. He is now a loyal British subject defending his adopted country in the royal navy. Naturally, he is single and handsome too, which a young man ought to be if he possibly can. Intrigued so far? What if I told you he is Jane Austen’s one true love and the man on whom she bases her iconic character Captain Wentworth? That’s right. And Wentworth’s famous letter? Captain Devereaux wrote the original!
Want to get to know this dashing and totally swoon-worthy hero better? Here’s your chance, because today I’m giving away a free copy of his story – his and Jane Austen’s story, I should say! It’s The Persuasion of Miss Jane Austen (which was just named a favorite book of 2019 at From Pemberley to Milton!).
Just leave a comment below, headed with his name, DEVEREAUX (and yes, spelling counts!), about why you’d like to read more. The winner, chosen by random drawing, will receive a signed paperback of The Persuasion of Miss Jane Austen (US, ebook international). To see if you’ve won, check back right here or on our FB page on January 7th for the official announcement.
In the meantime, you can read more about the book, including an excerpt, here!
And our winner is BeckyC! Please contact me at shannon(at)shannonwinslow(dot)com to arrange to receive your gift!
Now let’s carry on with our Friday Group Read of Sanditon!
(If you’re just joining the Group Read today, review the Introduction here and Part One here and Part Two here to get caught up)
Chapter 7 & 8
I can’t help being impressed with how astute Charlotte Heywood is in sizing up the true characters of the people she’s meeting in Sanditon. She immediately sees what Miss Denham is like – her duplicitous behavior – how she is cold and reserved with most people, but then, when is suits her interests, she transforms herself to smiling and solicitous with Lady Denham. Charlotte at first is dazzled by Sir Edward Denham’s charms and attentions, for which Jane Austen is prepared to forgive her, writing:
I make no apologies for my heroine’s vanity. If there are young ladies in the world at her time of life, more dull of fancy and more careless of pleasing, I know them not, and never wish to know them.
But Charlotte soon tires of Sir Edward’s nonsense, how he rattles on and on of the glories of the sea and his tastes in poetry and novels. She judges him morally questionable and downright silly. His attentions to her, she realizes, are only a game to make Clara Brereton (his real object) jealous!
Charlotte finally escapes Sir Edward’s company for Lady Denham’s instead, which she doesn’t like much better, as it turns out.
Charlotte’s feelings were divided between amusement and indignation – but indignation had the larger and increasing share. She kept her countenance and she kept a civil silence. She could not carry forbearance farther; but… allowed her thoughts to form themselves into such a meditation as this. ‘She is thoroughly mean. I had not expected anything so bad… Poor Miss Brereton!’
Of course, the use of the word “mean” here is a little different than how it’s usually meant today. Rather than cruel, it’s probably better defined as small-minded, ignoble, bad-tempered, or even stingy. That certainly seems to fit what Jane Austen reveals to us through their conversation.
Once again, I’m amazed by how talkative these quirky characters are! – how easily they reveal their secrets to Charlotte by their unguarded words and behavior. Do you think they’re like this with everybody, or is Charlotte just someone that other people feel compelled to confide in?
Chapter 9
Now Charlotte, as she is returning to Trafalgar House, notices a lady walking nimbly behind her, walking so briskly that she soon overtakes her. Who is it? Charlotte and I are both amazed to discover it is Mr. Parker’s sister Miss Diana Parker – the same sister self-described in her letter as being so deathly ill as to make travel quite impossible! Nevertheless, here she is at Sanditon after all, having nearly sprinted from the hotel to inform her brother of her arrival with the other two “hopeless invalids” – sister Susan and brother Arthur. It seems they’ve come, not for their own health, but acting on a snap decision to engage lodgings for others. Diana’s explanation in part:
“Miss Heywood, I astonish you. I see by your looks, that you are not used to such quick measures… But my dear Miss Heywood, we are sent into this world to be as extensively useful as possible, and where some degree of strength of mind is given, it is not a feeble body which will excuse us… It is the bounded duty of the capable to let no opportunity of being useful escape them… I am convinced that the body is the better, for the refreshment the mind receives in doing its duty. While I have been travelling, with this object in view, I have been perfectly well.”
Do you think this is Jane Austen’s way of trying to convince herself that, if she sets her mind to it, if only she keeps busy doing useful things, that her strong mind will be able to prevail over the weakness of her body? Or is this a comment on a certain kind of personality – one who, consciously or unconsciously, garners attention and sympathy through illness when it suits, and at other times, admiration for rising above that handicap?
Please share your thoughts in the comments below. Once again, to save confusion, head your comment with “SANDITON” and leave a separate comment (headed “DEVEREAUX”) if you want to enter the giveaway.
Your assignment is to finish the Sanditon fragment, chapters 10 – 12, for next Friday! This last section, I discovered, starts by giving Charlotte’s thorough opinion of why the Parker invalids behave as they do (thereby answering my previous question). Then there is a snafu over some new arrivals to Sanditon. So the cast is fully assembled and the stage seems set for the play to begin. It’s a pity Austen didn’t have the time and the strength to go on with it.
20 comments
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Since I don’t see a place for a subject line, I’ll write it here: DEVEREAUX. 🙂
I’m totally intrigued. Jane Austen herself with a love interest in the Royal Navy. I am going to add this book to my Amazon wish list. Thanks for the opportunity to win this book.
Sanditon
It seems extraordinary to me how ill Diana and Susan and Arthur say that they are and how well they seem in fact. I love the bit of Arthur drinking cocoa which he claims is thin only for it to emerge as a strong brew and the picture of Arthur munching hot buttered toast only for it to emerge the toast is lavishly spread. I can hear Arthur licking his lips with pleasure and enjoying. Jane Austen is enjoying herself too and it is sad given how ill Jane Austen was herself.
Author
Yes, Avril, the contrast is striking – Jane, actually dying but perhaps trying to convince herself otherwise, and the Parker siblings claiming to be on death’s door but looking far from it!
DEVEREAUX. What a lovely story, I loved it when you uploaded it here
Author
Thanks, Sophia!
DEVEREAUX
Thanks for the giveaway!
I have enjoyed how in this section of Sanditon, along with chapter 6, we are allowed to become better acquainted with Charlotte and her thoughts on the various other characters instead of just hearing Mr. Parker’s perception of them. She seems very perceptive, but I also think that it is easy to be so as an outsider.
I often find myself returning the differences in Jane Austen’s writing style from her other novels. This could be attributed to how the text might have only been a first draft, as someone discussed in the first week, but part of me also wonders whether some things might have been intentional. Austen is just so much more direct and candid, especially with her commentaries on contemporary medicine and the pride of the gentry (mostly directed at Lady Denham). And then there was the end of chapter 8. I found it odd that she would have directly set up the audience to view Sir Edward Denham as an intentional villain. I can’t help thinking that this was just a plan for his eventual character and that if this were a project she chose to pursue, she would have dealt with his character with a little more of her usual sense of tact and refinement.
Lastly, I was also very surprised by the arrival of Miss Diana Parker and feel inclined to like her character. She seems to be a woman who is frank and can get the job done which sets up an interesting contrast to the state of her medical fragility. I am eager to learn more about her and her siblings in the next section!
Author
Thanks for your comments, Amanda! Yes, to me this fragment feels quite different than Austen’s finished books (although we get plenty of examples of her classic ironic wit). So I wonder if this is an example of what her first drafts always looked like before she polished them up to a high gloss. Or was she not able to write as well as usual because she was so sick? Anyway, I have no doubt Sanditon would have ended up as another excellent novel if she had been well enough to finish it.
Sanditon.
I was also impressed by all the character development here.
Sir Edward is being set up as a comic villain. He admires the villains of contemporary romances, is inspired by them and wants to be like them. He even picks up bad morality from good writing. His “great object in life was to be seductive.” And yet he’s so silly and confused that he’s not at all frightening. Charlotte dismisses him and Clara sees through him. But he is funny! I think Austen is giving us more of her famous satire here. Contemporary novels were criticized or praised according to the morality in them, and people worried that the villains provided a bad example (or that less-than perfect heroes or heroines might provide a bad example) for readers to follow. So here we have the reader who aspires to follow those bad examples, probably as a caricature.
Lady Denham also reveals her character as “mean”—selfish, small-minded, sordid, and making those around her mean as well, Charlotte thinks. She has no idea of any big picture, and can state the most outrageous contradictions without any consciousness of anything being wrong. So she says the Denhams have no money, but wants them to rent a house rather than stay with her. She claims that they are “very good young people” and that she “takes them by the hand,” yet she won’t invite them to her house for fear that her housemaids will have no work and she’ll have to pay them more!
And of course we see Mr. Parker’s sisters and brother much more clearly, as bored hypochondriacs. I love Charlotte’s summation of Diana, “unaccountable officiousness!” and “activity run mad!” And the scene at the end where everyone is saying it is “impossible” that the two big groups she is trying to accommodate could just be one small group, although obviously they have to be the same, is very funny.
And, yes, we learn more about Charlotte herself–a great observer, and a very level-headed, sensible person who can see people’s follies (like she sees Arthur with his cocoa and toast), but is also tolerant of them.
This book is in many ways different from her earlier ones. In Persuasion, she started to show the changes going in on society–those with merit, like Captain Wentworth and the Crofts, could rise from humble beginnings and even take over wealthy family’s homes and marry into their families, while those families, like the Elliots, might be losing their status and possessions due to extravagance and pride.
Now in Sanditon she’s going even farther, looking at new trends of financial speculation, promotion, and “watering places” rising to tempt the middle classes with money to spend. It would have been lovely to see where she went with that! But she continues her satirical look at her society and the people in it. In Emma she already satirized hypochondriacs, but the Parker hypochondriacs are different than Mr. Woodhouse. Diana, at least, instead of being afraid of any exertion like Mr. W., glories in it. Perhaps Jane Austen, lying on two chairs shoved together (so that her mother could have the sofa), wishes she had Diana’s energy and that her illness really was imaginary.
Author
Excellent insights, as usual, Brenda – Sir Edward as the “comic villain” and Lady Denham’s small-mindedness and contradictions. Masterful character development, as you say, and a shame that JA wasn’t able to finish what she had begun. Thanks for sharing!
DEVEREAUX. Absolutely I want to get to know him! My absolute favorite part of any of Austen’s books is Captain Wentworth’s letter. So wonderfully romantic…
I’m not entering into the draw, as I’ve already got TPOMJA both as an ebook and audiobook and as I’m in the UK, not being eligible for the signed paperback. Just wanted to say how much I love this particular one of Shannon’s books, especially because of the Persuasion theme. I think it vies with The Ladies of Rosings Park as my favourite Shannon Winslow book. (Don’t tell the Ladies though, but I think the dashing French naval officer just edges into first place!)
Author
Haha! I’ll never tell, Anji!
When I get to the UK, I hope I get to meet you and sign a pb copy of one or the other for you!
DEVEREAUX
This sounds like a really interesting story so thank you for the chance to win a copy and read more about him and Jane Austen.
Have a Happy, Healthy New Year!
I loved that story. And the audible version is superb.
Author
Thanks, Debbie!
DEVEREAUX
Thank you for the giveaway
DEVEREAUX
I would love the opportunity to have a peek inside Jane’s real life. Thank you for your generosity.
DEVEREAUX
Thank you for the chance to win. Captain Wentworth is one of my favourite heroes and I would gladly be the recipient of his love letter.
I read and loved that book! Congratulations to the winner. I had 2 cataract surgeries over the holidays so just saved these posts to read later. I have read Sanditon plus one author’s variation of that same book.