Janeites, Austen Enthusiasts, and those who are new to the sport of analyzing Austen’s great works, welcome to a series devoted entirely to the writing Jane Austen produced when she was in her youth. The fragments, short stories, poems, and letters have been cobbled together over the years and in most circles are commonly referred to as Austen’s Juvenilia. Today, we focus our collective attention on the short story entitled Edgar and Emma. It is concise, to be sure, but it also serves to give the reader an accurate description of the life and longing that can accompany young love.
Edgar & Emma: A Synopsis
Austen opens this story in medias res—in the midst of things already initiated. Sir Godfrey and his wife, Lady Marlow, are debating a rather serious matter. Both are miserable because they abhor living in their current, cramped lodgings. Each claim they have suffered in silence for two years so to preserve the contentment and felicity of the other. After some discussion, it is determined that they should give up their current home, pack up their belongings, and take their daughters back to the country estate located in Marlhurst that they vacated two years prior. They have missed the place so much and are so tremendously overjoyed about their return to the town that they pay to have the bells rung in honor of their homecoming.
In chapter the second, the family’s arrival in the country brings much elation to those who had once been their most intimate friends. The Willmot family were amongst that number. Mr. and Mrs. Willmot were nice and agreeable people who had a large family. Their brood was so exceedingly sizable that they could only travel with nine of their children at a time, but once Sir Godfrey brought his own family back to the neighborhood, the Willmots set out immediately to call upon them. Emma, the youngest of Sir Godfrey and Lady Marlow’s daughters, watched eagerly from the window as the carriages arrived and the Willmots alighted. She searched for Edgar, the eldest son, and was dismayed when she realized he was not with the travel party. Dutifully, she joins the others in the parlor, but she cannot shake her feelings of despondency at being deprived of his company.
The story winds to a speedy conclusion as the young Emma is solely focused on hearing Mrs. Willmot speak of Edgar. When it seems that the Willmots will leave without uttering even a single syllable about their eldest son, Emma, quite audaciously, demands to hear about the Willmot children who have been left at home. Mrs. Willmot is taken aback by this request, but she obliges and conveys a summary of her children’s whereabouts. It seems Edgar is off at college and that’s why he’s not with them today. Emma holds it together until the Willmots take their leave, then she adjourns to her bedchambers where she proceeds to cry interminably.
Edgar & Emma: An Analysis
Some might choose to see Miss Emma as a stereotypical, weeping damsel. They might characterize her as being weak and silly for crying over Edgar and lamenting his absence. Furthermore, they might elect to seek out the way Austen periodically satirizes Society and her characters for the purpose of pointing out the pitfalls of being a young lady living in the late eighteenth, early nineteenth century. But let us view Miss Emma in a more practical light.
Upon learning that Edgar is away at college, it can be assumed that he, as the eldest son, is studying with the prospect of one day inheriting his father’s family’s ancient fortune. By today’s standards, one might think Emma is behaving hysterically by throwing herself on her pillow and covering it with tears. But…things today are not quite what they were when Austen penned this piece.
The life expectancy rate averaged around thirty-six years in the early 1800s, which is decidedly not a very long time to tread upon this earth. The commonplace dangers that riddled even the most mundane activities during the period could snuff out a life in a matter of seconds. For all Emma knew, Edgar could die of illness or from being thrown by a horse long before they should ever see one another again. That is to say nothing of him possibly making a match with someone else while he was away from home. It could very well be that he would not return to Marlhurst until after he had wed another.
But it seems more likely that Austen, at the young age in which she wrote this text, was not so concerned with Master Edgar’s health, wealth, or his marriage prospects. It is probable that she has her heroine, Miss Emma, heave sobs of discontent because Edgar is attending college, while she must remain at home. It is understood that education for young ladies was not valued at this time, a fact that Austen exceedingly lamented. So, rather than envisioning Miss Emma as a helpless, lovelorn teenager, might we agree that she was suffering from a jealous inclination? Did she cry over Edgar because she feared she might never see him again or did she sob because she would never be afforded the luxury to attend school as he was?
What do you think? Please feel free to drop your comments below and let us know how you interpreted this text.
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