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Sunday, April 27, 2008

Sense, sensibility, seven novels and one life

Sunday, April 27, 2008 12:15 am by M. in ,    6 comments
A couple of alerts for today, April 27. A talk given in the Cotswolds:
Literature & Writing: Jane Austen and the Brontes: 'Sense' versus 'Sensibility'

With Angela Day

27 April 2008 at 2:30 p.m.

Farncombe Estate Centre
Broadway (Cotswolds)
Worcestershire

So much in common and yet so different: Jane Austen and the Bronte sisters. We look at Austen’s "Sense and Sensibility" and "Pride and Prejudice", Charlotte Bronte’s "Jane Eyre" and Emily Bronte’s "Wuthering Heights" and discuss this apparent paradox. Austen’s approach is through a rejection of excess of sentimentality – sense. The Bronte novels emphasise the power of the imagination – sensibility.
And crossing the pond, Edward Mendelson, author of The Things That Matter gives a talk in Port Washington, New York.
Edward Mendelson

Columbia University Professor and Author to give 2008 Ruth D. Bogen Memorial Lecture on Classic Literature

Sunday, April 27

The Friends of the Port Washington Public Library invites you to join them on Sunday, April 27 at 2 p.m. in the library's Lapham Room for the 2008 Ruth D. Bogen Memorial Lecture. Edward Mendelson, professor of English and Comparative Literature, and Columbia University's Lionel Trilling Professor in the Humanities, is the distinguished speaker.

Professor Mendelson's talk, "From Frankenstein to Mrs. Ramsay: Seven Novels and One Life," will focus on classic authors Mary Shelley, George Eliot, Virginia Woolf and the Bronte sisters. Dr. Mendelson's book. The Things That Matter: What Seven Classic Novels Have to Say about the Stages of Life, on which the talk is based, will be available for purchase and signing.

Ellen Zimmerman, a vice president of the Friends and chairwoman of the event, notes that the book has been called an illuminating exploration of how seven of the greatest novels of the 19th and 20th centuries - Frankenstein, Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre, Middlemarch, Mrs. Dalloway, To the Lighthouse and Between the Acts - portray the essential experiences of life. "We know this will be an intellectually simulating and enjoyable afternoon at the library!" she added. (Port Washington News)
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6 comments:

  1. Anonymous4/29/2008 03:43:00 pm

    I must take issue with Angela Day on her summary of Sense and Sensibility: Austen was arguing for a balanced combination of sense and sensibility; it is at least intended that Elinor combines both.

    I am in the middle of writing a book that argues that Austen wrote S&S to present the reader with problems analagous to Elinor's. Misread the book and you end up making 'mistakes' that mirror Marianne's and their mother's. Others have observed the same kind of techniques employed in Emma, but I think she was doing this throughout. I have posted a very rough early draft at In Search of Sense and sensibility; and some blog articles based on extracts from the draft.

    Realistically, only folks who are really, really interested in this are going to get involved at this stage. I am trying to find other ways into this story at Peace and Wisdom, including a blog commentary on Mansfield Park.

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  2. Anonymous4/29/2008 08:21:00 pm

    Sounds like you're working on something interesting there!

    What I've always concluded from S&S, too, is that by the end of the novel both sisters have learned that extremes are no good and to take a leaf of each other's book.

    If anyone's interested they should definitely head over to your blog and articles.

    All the best!

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  3. Anonymous5/03/2008 12:44:00 pm

    Thanks very much Christina for your kind comments and the link.

    I just want to clarify that you take on S&S is very much the modern orthodox position (also that the novel was flawed and really belongs with her Juvenilia). The contemporaneous reviews by anonymous critics took a quite different line that was less sympathetic to Marianne (and especially her early romantic philosophy). I agree with those early critics and I think there is no doubt that this was Austen's intention. Most people would agree with me on the latter point, but they would say so much the worse for Sense and Sensibility.

    The point I am trying to get across is that this is 'fighting talk'. Elinor has very little to learn from Marianne (by my view) but of course Marianne is depicted extremely sympathetically, much more sympathetically than Elinor (at least to begin with). This was a recurring theme is Austen's work to drive our sympathies away from where our judgement should be--judgement should not remain captive of sentiment. They have to work together. (The heartless 'prudence' of a Lucy Steele or vacuous decorum of a Lady Middleton are not at all admirable in Austen's world.)

    So you should be really scandalised by my opinions, and even more scandalised by my opinions on Mansfield Park, Fanny Price being one of my favourite heroines in fiction. (The link is to a blog on Mansfield Park that is being prepared for liftoff next week.)

    Thanks for the excellent blog!

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  4. Anonymous5/04/2008 05:33:00 pm

    I do think Elinor learns from Marianne - and not just a little.

    And you're right. I'm one of those people who don't really get Fanny Price. Not that I hate her - I just don't understand her behaviour nor find it very natural. But I think that's where Jane Austen's mastery shows.

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  5. Anonymous5/07/2008 10:09:00 am

    I have expanded on this, explaining the difference between the three views (Angela's, Christina's and mine) at The Janeites, the Brontës and Sense and Sensibility, explaining why my view is best (naturally :-)).

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  6. Anonymous5/07/2008 05:34:00 pm

    Thanks for the link - I have found your article very interesting. I don't have the time now to enter into an in-depth discussion on the matter, but in short, just like I find Charlotte Brontë's words on Austen just one more opinion, I tend to think that each reader's viewpoint is a valid one. What you get, what you draw from reading a book is what matters.

    Views can be more or less in accordance to your own, but I don't think there's wrong or right.

    ReplyDelete

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