Wealth and the masculinity of the heroine in Emma
The heroines of Jane Austen’s four earlier novels are all young, accomplished women of good background and breeding, but without much money. From this general outline, each one is individualized. Catherine Morland is from a fairly wealthy family, but an unfortunately large one. For this reason, she cannot expect much of a dowry when she marries. Fanny Price lives with her wealthy relatives, but her immediate family embarrasses her with its poverty. With such this precedent, Emma Woodhouse, in Austen’s novel Emma, is a surprising heroine. Emma has many of the good qualities of other Austen heroines, including beauty and intelligence, but is also the only child of and heiress to a wealthy father. Austen delights in writing novels that reverse the situations of earlier novels, and Emma is no exception. Her earlier novels are focused on the heroine’s search for a husband. Austen asks the question: what happens to a heroine typical of the earlier novels, when she is given wealth and security? The answer is that Emma becomes a foil to these other heroines in situation and character, something which manifests itself most surprisingly in a masculinity of character and the relationships that Emma shares with others.
The title of the novel is the first indication to the reader of the ways in which Emma and her story are unlike the heroines and stories of Austen’s earlier novels. She is the only heroine in any of Austen’s completed novels whose name is the title. Austen’s other novels are titled either after an abstract quality or estate important to the novel. Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, and Persuasion are all titles that reflect the ideological struggles of the book, and the qualities that different people can possess and that affect their interactions with other people. Northanger Abbey and Mansfield Park are both estates central to the novel. It is interesting to note the importance of what these titles represent in the marriages of the heroines. In the first three novels mentioned, the titular abstract qualities divide the heroine from marriage to a worthy man, until they can overcome those qualities. In the last two novels mentioned, the estates in the titles are those belonging to the families that the heroine will marry into, although both men involved are second sons and will not inherit. Emma, in contrast, is a title that implies the self-sufficiency of the novel's heroine. It is a novel in which her marriage happens, but her romance with Mr. Knightley and consequent marriage are of less importance than the changes that she goes through as a person and her interactions with others. The title implies something that Emma states clearly early in the novel, when she says,
"And I am not only, not going to be married, at present, but have very little intention of ever marrying at all. [...] I have none of the usual inducements of women to marry. Were I to fall in love, indeed, it would be a different thing! but I have never been in love; it is not my way, or my nature; and I do not think I ever shall. [...] Fortune I do not want; employment I do not want; consequence I do not want." (84)
Emma’s wealth means that marriage is not only not necessary, but perhaps even unappealing. She is granted a great deal of personal freedom and independence, by her economic security, that other Austen heroines do not have. Instead, of course, she searches for the husbands of others. The title also implies her preoccupation with herself, for “The real evils indeed of Emma’s situation were the power of having rather too much her own way, and a disposition to think a little too well of herself” (5). This is another luxury many of Austen’s other heroines cannot afford. They must be able to observe and think of other people, or they will not find a husband. Emma may not be an astute observer of human character, but in the end, it cannot hurt her. For her, trying to understand others is a game that she enjoys. For the other heroines of Austen, it is essential to their lives and their happiness.
Emma is described at the beginning of the story in very thorough, and surprisingly masculine, detail. There is little depth given to her at the beginning of the novel, but she is given a very good outline: “Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in this world with very little to distress or vex her” (5). The adjectives used to describe Emma here are surprising. Although many Austen female characters are described as “handsome” or “clever,” the two qualities are seldom united so coherently, as a part of a statement of character, or so forcefully. Individually, the qualities are masculine. Emma is first described as handsome, rather than beautiful, pretty, or lovely. She is clever, rather than witty, elegant, or intelligent. Finally, she is rich, an adjective never before applied to an Austen heroine. The individual masculinity of each word, coupled with other words of similar power, creates an image of masculinity in Emma. Her sexuality and gender are never doubted, of course, but her presence and power in the story are very like that of a man. Many of Austen’s heroines, like Fanny Price and Elinor and Marianne Dashwood, have had youths troubled by the financial situations of their family, whereas Emma has never had cause to worry. She is an heiress, and has lived her life in the carefree way normally exhibited by the young male heirs of Austen. She is rather erratic in her pursuits: “She played and sang;– and drew in almost every style; but steadiness has always been wanting; and in nothing had she approached the degree of excellence which she would have been glad to command, and ought not to have failed of” (44). Her ways of spending her time are like those of the male heirs, who choose an equally erratic course of self-improvement and sporting. Her diversions are appropriate to a woman of her status, but she has no need to develop them to use to impress a future husband. She is able to idle away her time in a way that prevents her from being as accomplished as society would expect a woman of her stature to be.
In her friendship with Harriet Smith, Emma sometimes appears more to be a lover or an admirer rather than a friend. Her qualities and situation create a parallel between herself and the male heirs of Austen, and make her a foil to the struggling heroines of preceding novels. It is her friendship with Harriet, however, that creates a parallel between the romances of Austen’s earlier novels and Emma. In many ways, Harriet Smith is like the heroines of Austen’s earlier novels. She is unaffected, like Catherine Morland, and inexplicably good-natured and elegant, like Fanny Price. Her description is marked by femininity in a way that Emma’s is not:
"She was a very pretty girl, and her beauty happened to be a sort which Emma particularly admired. [...] Emma was as much pleased with her manner as her person, and quite determined to continue the acquaintance. She was not struck by anything remarkably clever in Miss Smith’s conversation, but she found her altogether very engaging– not inconveniently shy, not unwilling to talk– and yet so far rom pushing, shewing so proper and becoming a deference, seeming so artlessly impressed." (23)
Harriet is not “handsome,” like Emma, but “very pretty.” She is not “remarkably clever,” but “very engaging” and “artlessly impressed,” qualities to be treasured in a heroine being courted by a lover. Emma is pleased by how incredibly thorough Harriet’s femininity is, in her balance of introversion and extroversion, and general sense of good manners. Although she is poor and her family questionable, she seems to have good breeding and natural elegance. However, Emma is also struck by Harriet’s beauty, and actually “admired” it in a way not unlike that of a suitor. When she decides to become better friends with Harriet, it is because “Those soft blue eyes and all those natural graces should not be wasted on the inferior society of Highbury and its connections” (23). Emma’s belief in Harriet’s superiority is not lightly invested in Harriet’s beauty, and because of her esteem of that beauty, she believes that Harriet must be marked for a greater place in society than she perhaps actually merits. Harriet is a good and caring person, but her intelligence and refinement are not enough to allow her to marry into society much higher than that she was born into. If Emma were a man, perhaps she would marry Harriet, but no man in the novel of the higher class expresses romantic interest in her.
Emma’s relationship with Harriet bears a strong resemblance to some of the common marriages in Austen’s earlier novels. Emma is seduced by Harriet’s good looks and good humor. One of the characters often used in Austen novels is the intelligent and sensible man who marries a silly woman because his pleasure in her good nature and beauty makes him believe that he loves her. Mr. Bennet of Pride and Prejudice and Mr. Palmer of Sense and Sensibility are two examples of this kind of character. Emma is a related character, although obviously she is a woman and her relationship with Harriet Smith will never be more than friendship. She defends a marriage of the kind that these men pursue, telling Mr. Knightley that Harriet’s beauty and kindness make her “exactly what every man delights in– what at once bewitches his senses and satisfies his judgment” (64). She does not foresee the unfortunate consequence that Mr. Bennet and Mr. Palmer experience, of not having an intellectual and emotional companion and equal once beauty has faded away and good nature has worn thin. Mr. Knightley protests against Emma, saying that “Men of sense, whatever you may chuse to say, do not want silly wives” (64). Their disagreement on this subject is one of the first strange elements of the relationship between Emma and Mr. Knightley. It is perhaps Emma’s masculinity, and the way that she interacts with Mr. Knightley in that masculinity, that make this relationship so strange. Their relationship never seems charged with the same sexuality and attraction that exists between many Austen’s earlier couples, like Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy, or Marianne and Willoughby or Colonel Brandon. It is instead, more like the semi-incestuous relationship between Fanny Price and Edmund Bertram in Mansfield Park. The two characters seem more like brother and sister than husband and wife. Emma’s argument for the traditionally male role held by some of the characters in Austen’s earlier books, and Knightley’s dispute of it, reverses their gender associations. Their relationship is a bizarre one, but it is presumably based on love, even if it is one that the reader can’t entirely understand. If the masculinity is the cause of the strangeness in the relationship, what makes it strange also sanctions it. She and Mr. Knightley are so wealthy that they can act as they wish and how they wish, with some license as to societal restrictions.
In contrast, Emma’s relationship with Harriet is more like the traditional relationships of Austen’s novels. Harriet need not make a bad wife, or eventually become a silly person. Mr. Knightley says, “Her character depends on those she is with; but in good hands she will turn out a valuable woman” (58). There is a good chance of her improvement. In Austen’s novels, a good match is generally considered to be one where the two partners are roughly equal, but can learn from each other. In some cases, one partner is significantly more superior to the other. If the other partner’s disposition is open to learning, however, this does not pose a problem. For example, in Northanger Abbey, the marriage between Catherine Morland and Henry Tilney is a happy one because his character is superior to hers, and from him, she can learn much about improving her mind and elegance. Often, Henry Tilney seems arrogant in his corrections of Catherine, but it is a necessary arrogance, one that corrects Catherine. Similarly, Emma decides that in her friendship with Harriet Smith,
She would notice her; she would improve her; she would detach her from her bad acquaintance, and introduce her into good society; she would form her opinions and her manners. It would be an interesting, and certainly a very kind undertaking; highly becoming her own situation in life, her leisure, and powers." (24)
A young male heir’s choosing a wife to spend the rest of his life with, and possibly improve, would be one “highly becoming” his “own situation in life,” his “leisure, and powers.” What would be, with a woman like Harriet Smith, romance and marriage for him, is friendship for Emma. The relationship differs by degrees of passion. Like Henry Tilney, Emma is condescending to another character, securely believing in her superiority and ability to improve others simply through acquaintance. She does, however, have some influence over Harriet Smith. Even Mr. Knightley confesses that “you [Emma] have improved her. You have cured her of her school-girl’s giggle” (58). Emma, then, fulfills the same function for Harriet that a husband would fulfill in Austen’s other novels. The difference is, of course, that there is no romance, but an interest motivated by the masculinity of Emma’s situation and the ways in which that situation has shaped her character.
Emma is allowed some indolence in her life because of her wealth. She can afford not to dedicate herself to her studies and to play at match-making, rather than focus on what might be called a serious pursuit. This indolence is characteristic of male heirs in Austen’s novels, ad it is one of the ways in which Emma’s wealth makes her a more masculine character and presence in the novel. Austen makes her a character for whom wealth makes all the difference; she has the same sorts of good qualities as other Austen heroines, but a greater wealth gives her a freedom and independence that these heroines lack. Austen is not advocating Emma as an ideal heroine, embracing masculine freedom over feminine repression, although she certainly doesn’t think badly of young women having wealth. Instead, Austen’s work is a challenge to herself and an intellectual puzzle. She writes novels that deliberately go against what she has written before, asking herself questions to provoke these changes. What happens when a heroine with the intelligence and beauty of a character like Elizabeth Bennet or Marianne Dashwood is given wealth and security? What does society consider masculine or feminine? How does wealth and this kind of gender manipulation affect marriage? In Emma, the effects of the author’s manipulations are radical, and distinctly change the way that the heroine functions within the novel.
WORKS CITED
Austen, Jane. Emma. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982.
The title of the novel is the first indication to the reader of the ways in which Emma and her story are unlike the heroines and stories of Austen’s earlier novels. She is the only heroine in any of Austen’s completed novels whose name is the title. Austen’s other novels are titled either after an abstract quality or estate important to the novel. Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, and Persuasion are all titles that reflect the ideological struggles of the book, and the qualities that different people can possess and that affect their interactions with other people. Northanger Abbey and Mansfield Park are both estates central to the novel. It is interesting to note the importance of what these titles represent in the marriages of the heroines. In the first three novels mentioned, the titular abstract qualities divide the heroine from marriage to a worthy man, until they can overcome those qualities. In the last two novels mentioned, the estates in the titles are those belonging to the families that the heroine will marry into, although both men involved are second sons and will not inherit. Emma, in contrast, is a title that implies the self-sufficiency of the novel's heroine. It is a novel in which her marriage happens, but her romance with Mr. Knightley and consequent marriage are of less importance than the changes that she goes through as a person and her interactions with others. The title implies something that Emma states clearly early in the novel, when she says,
"And I am not only, not going to be married, at present, but have very little intention of ever marrying at all. [...] I have none of the usual inducements of women to marry. Were I to fall in love, indeed, it would be a different thing! but I have never been in love; it is not my way, or my nature; and I do not think I ever shall. [...] Fortune I do not want; employment I do not want; consequence I do not want." (84)
Emma’s wealth means that marriage is not only not necessary, but perhaps even unappealing. She is granted a great deal of personal freedom and independence, by her economic security, that other Austen heroines do not have. Instead, of course, she searches for the husbands of others. The title also implies her preoccupation with herself, for “The real evils indeed of Emma’s situation were the power of having rather too much her own way, and a disposition to think a little too well of herself” (5). This is another luxury many of Austen’s other heroines cannot afford. They must be able to observe and think of other people, or they will not find a husband. Emma may not be an astute observer of human character, but in the end, it cannot hurt her. For her, trying to understand others is a game that she enjoys. For the other heroines of Austen, it is essential to their lives and their happiness.
Emma is described at the beginning of the story in very thorough, and surprisingly masculine, detail. There is little depth given to her at the beginning of the novel, but she is given a very good outline: “Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in this world with very little to distress or vex her” (5). The adjectives used to describe Emma here are surprising. Although many Austen female characters are described as “handsome” or “clever,” the two qualities are seldom united so coherently, as a part of a statement of character, or so forcefully. Individually, the qualities are masculine. Emma is first described as handsome, rather than beautiful, pretty, or lovely. She is clever, rather than witty, elegant, or intelligent. Finally, she is rich, an adjective never before applied to an Austen heroine. The individual masculinity of each word, coupled with other words of similar power, creates an image of masculinity in Emma. Her sexuality and gender are never doubted, of course, but her presence and power in the story are very like that of a man. Many of Austen’s heroines, like Fanny Price and Elinor and Marianne Dashwood, have had youths troubled by the financial situations of their family, whereas Emma has never had cause to worry. She is an heiress, and has lived her life in the carefree way normally exhibited by the young male heirs of Austen. She is rather erratic in her pursuits: “She played and sang;– and drew in almost every style; but steadiness has always been wanting; and in nothing had she approached the degree of excellence which she would have been glad to command, and ought not to have failed of” (44). Her ways of spending her time are like those of the male heirs, who choose an equally erratic course of self-improvement and sporting. Her diversions are appropriate to a woman of her status, but she has no need to develop them to use to impress a future husband. She is able to idle away her time in a way that prevents her from being as accomplished as society would expect a woman of her stature to be.
In her friendship with Harriet Smith, Emma sometimes appears more to be a lover or an admirer rather than a friend. Her qualities and situation create a parallel between herself and the male heirs of Austen, and make her a foil to the struggling heroines of preceding novels. It is her friendship with Harriet, however, that creates a parallel between the romances of Austen’s earlier novels and Emma. In many ways, Harriet Smith is like the heroines of Austen’s earlier novels. She is unaffected, like Catherine Morland, and inexplicably good-natured and elegant, like Fanny Price. Her description is marked by femininity in a way that Emma’s is not:
"She was a very pretty girl, and her beauty happened to be a sort which Emma particularly admired. [...] Emma was as much pleased with her manner as her person, and quite determined to continue the acquaintance. She was not struck by anything remarkably clever in Miss Smith’s conversation, but she found her altogether very engaging– not inconveniently shy, not unwilling to talk– and yet so far rom pushing, shewing so proper and becoming a deference, seeming so artlessly impressed." (23)
Harriet is not “handsome,” like Emma, but “very pretty.” She is not “remarkably clever,” but “very engaging” and “artlessly impressed,” qualities to be treasured in a heroine being courted by a lover. Emma is pleased by how incredibly thorough Harriet’s femininity is, in her balance of introversion and extroversion, and general sense of good manners. Although she is poor and her family questionable, she seems to have good breeding and natural elegance. However, Emma is also struck by Harriet’s beauty, and actually “admired” it in a way not unlike that of a suitor. When she decides to become better friends with Harriet, it is because “Those soft blue eyes and all those natural graces should not be wasted on the inferior society of Highbury and its connections” (23). Emma’s belief in Harriet’s superiority is not lightly invested in Harriet’s beauty, and because of her esteem of that beauty, she believes that Harriet must be marked for a greater place in society than she perhaps actually merits. Harriet is a good and caring person, but her intelligence and refinement are not enough to allow her to marry into society much higher than that she was born into. If Emma were a man, perhaps she would marry Harriet, but no man in the novel of the higher class expresses romantic interest in her.
Emma’s relationship with Harriet bears a strong resemblance to some of the common marriages in Austen’s earlier novels. Emma is seduced by Harriet’s good looks and good humor. One of the characters often used in Austen novels is the intelligent and sensible man who marries a silly woman because his pleasure in her good nature and beauty makes him believe that he loves her. Mr. Bennet of Pride and Prejudice and Mr. Palmer of Sense and Sensibility are two examples of this kind of character. Emma is a related character, although obviously she is a woman and her relationship with Harriet Smith will never be more than friendship. She defends a marriage of the kind that these men pursue, telling Mr. Knightley that Harriet’s beauty and kindness make her “exactly what every man delights in– what at once bewitches his senses and satisfies his judgment” (64). She does not foresee the unfortunate consequence that Mr. Bennet and Mr. Palmer experience, of not having an intellectual and emotional companion and equal once beauty has faded away and good nature has worn thin. Mr. Knightley protests against Emma, saying that “Men of sense, whatever you may chuse to say, do not want silly wives” (64). Their disagreement on this subject is one of the first strange elements of the relationship between Emma and Mr. Knightley. It is perhaps Emma’s masculinity, and the way that she interacts with Mr. Knightley in that masculinity, that make this relationship so strange. Their relationship never seems charged with the same sexuality and attraction that exists between many Austen’s earlier couples, like Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy, or Marianne and Willoughby or Colonel Brandon. It is instead, more like the semi-incestuous relationship between Fanny Price and Edmund Bertram in Mansfield Park. The two characters seem more like brother and sister than husband and wife. Emma’s argument for the traditionally male role held by some of the characters in Austen’s earlier books, and Knightley’s dispute of it, reverses their gender associations. Their relationship is a bizarre one, but it is presumably based on love, even if it is one that the reader can’t entirely understand. If the masculinity is the cause of the strangeness in the relationship, what makes it strange also sanctions it. She and Mr. Knightley are so wealthy that they can act as they wish and how they wish, with some license as to societal restrictions.
In contrast, Emma’s relationship with Harriet is more like the traditional relationships of Austen’s novels. Harriet need not make a bad wife, or eventually become a silly person. Mr. Knightley says, “Her character depends on those she is with; but in good hands she will turn out a valuable woman” (58). There is a good chance of her improvement. In Austen’s novels, a good match is generally considered to be one where the two partners are roughly equal, but can learn from each other. In some cases, one partner is significantly more superior to the other. If the other partner’s disposition is open to learning, however, this does not pose a problem. For example, in Northanger Abbey, the marriage between Catherine Morland and Henry Tilney is a happy one because his character is superior to hers, and from him, she can learn much about improving her mind and elegance. Often, Henry Tilney seems arrogant in his corrections of Catherine, but it is a necessary arrogance, one that corrects Catherine. Similarly, Emma decides that in her friendship with Harriet Smith,
She would notice her; she would improve her; she would detach her from her bad acquaintance, and introduce her into good society; she would form her opinions and her manners. It would be an interesting, and certainly a very kind undertaking; highly becoming her own situation in life, her leisure, and powers." (24)
A young male heir’s choosing a wife to spend the rest of his life with, and possibly improve, would be one “highly becoming” his “own situation in life,” his “leisure, and powers.” What would be, with a woman like Harriet Smith, romance and marriage for him, is friendship for Emma. The relationship differs by degrees of passion. Like Henry Tilney, Emma is condescending to another character, securely believing in her superiority and ability to improve others simply through acquaintance. She does, however, have some influence over Harriet Smith. Even Mr. Knightley confesses that “you [Emma] have improved her. You have cured her of her school-girl’s giggle” (58). Emma, then, fulfills the same function for Harriet that a husband would fulfill in Austen’s other novels. The difference is, of course, that there is no romance, but an interest motivated by the masculinity of Emma’s situation and the ways in which that situation has shaped her character.
Emma is allowed some indolence in her life because of her wealth. She can afford not to dedicate herself to her studies and to play at match-making, rather than focus on what might be called a serious pursuit. This indolence is characteristic of male heirs in Austen’s novels, ad it is one of the ways in which Emma’s wealth makes her a more masculine character and presence in the novel. Austen makes her a character for whom wealth makes all the difference; she has the same sorts of good qualities as other Austen heroines, but a greater wealth gives her a freedom and independence that these heroines lack. Austen is not advocating Emma as an ideal heroine, embracing masculine freedom over feminine repression, although she certainly doesn’t think badly of young women having wealth. Instead, Austen’s work is a challenge to herself and an intellectual puzzle. She writes novels that deliberately go against what she has written before, asking herself questions to provoke these changes. What happens when a heroine with the intelligence and beauty of a character like Elizabeth Bennet or Marianne Dashwood is given wealth and security? What does society consider masculine or feminine? How does wealth and this kind of gender manipulation affect marriage? In Emma, the effects of the author’s manipulations are radical, and distinctly change the way that the heroine functions within the novel.
WORKS CITED
Austen, Jane. Emma. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982.
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