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Catherine Morland
Catherine Morland is the heroine of Jane Austen's 1817 novel ''Northanger Abbey''. A modest, kind-hearted ingénue, she is led by her reading of Gothic literature to misinterpret much of the social world she encounters. Character Catherine is barely out of the schoolroom when she enters the social whirl of Bath society, and the novel centres around her attempts, often laughable, to learn about life and social realities. Many of her problems stem from her excessive tendency to take people at their own evaluations; However, while socially naive, Catherine also has an underlying sense of reality to support her; and her honesty and strength eventually see her successfully through her troubles. Her confrontation at the Abbey itself with the novel's main father figure, General Tilney, brings matters to a head. Unable to see through his manipulations over her postulated inheritance, or to recognise him beneath his fine words as a domestic tyrant, Catherine turns to Gothic fantasy to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jane Austen
Jane Austen (; 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist known primarily for her six major novels, which interpret, critique, and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots often explore the dependence of women on marriage in the pursuit of favourable social standing and economic security. Her works critique the novels of sensibility of the second half of the 18th century and are part of the transition to 19th-century literary realism. Her use of biting irony, along with her realism and social commentary, have earned her acclaim among critics, scholars and readers alike. With the publication of ''Sense and Sensibility'' (1811), '' Pride and Prejudice'' (1813), ''Mansfield Park'' (1814), and '' Emma'' (1816), she achieved modest success but only little fame in her lifetime since the books were published anonymously. She wrote two other novels—''Northanger Abbey'' and '' Persuasion'', both published posthumou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Northanger Abbey
''Northanger Abbey'' () is a coming-of-age Coming of age is a young person's transition from being a child to being an adult. The specific age at which this transition takes place varies between societies, as does the nature of the change. It can be a simple legal convention or can ... novel and a satire of Gothic novels written by Jane Austen. Austen was also influenced by Charlotte Lennox's ''The Female Quixote'' (1752). ''Northanger Abbey'' was completed in 1803, the first of Austen's novels completed in full, but was published posthumously in 1817 with ''Persuasion (novel), Persuasion''. The story concerns Catherine Morland, the naïve young protagonist, and her journey to a better understanding of herself and of the world around her. How Catherine views the world has been distorted by her fondness for Gothic novels and an active imagination. Plot summary Seventeen-year-old Catherine Morland is one of ten children of a country clergyman. Although a tomboy in he ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ingénue
The ''ingénue'' (, , ) is a stock character in literature, film and a role type in the theater, generally a girl or a young woman, who is endearingly innocent. ''Ingénue'' may also refer to a new young actress or one typecast in such roles. The term comes from the feminine form of the French adjective meaning "ingenuous" or innocent, virtuous and candid. The term may also imply a lack of sophistication and cunning. Typically, the ''ingénue'' is beautiful, kind, gentle, sweet, virginal and often naïve; additionally, she is often in mental, emotional, or even physical danger—usually a target of the cad—whom she may have mistaken for the hero. The ''ingénue'' usually lives with her father, husband, or a father figure. The vamp (femme fatale) is often a foil for the ''ingénue'' (or the damsel in distress). The ''ingénue'' is often accompanied by a romantic side plot. This romance is usually considered pure and harmless to both participants. In many cases, the male p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gothic Literature
Gothic fiction, sometimes called Gothic horror in the 20th century, is a loose literary aesthetic of fear and haunting. The name is a reference to Gothic architecture of the European Middle Ages, which was characteristic of the settings of early Gothic novels. The first work to call itself Gothic was Horace Walpole's 1764 novel ''The Castle of Otranto'', later subtitled "A Gothic Story". Subsequent 18th century contributors included Clara Reeve, Ann Radcliffe, William Thomas Beckford, and Matthew Lewis. The Gothic influence continued into the early 19th century, works by the Romantic poets, and novelists such as Mary Shelley, Charles Maturin, Walter Scott and E. T. A. Hoffmann frequently drew upon gothic motifs in their works. The early Victorian period continued the use of gothic, in novels by Charles Dickens and the Brontë sisters, as well as works by the American writers Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne. Later prominent works were ''Dracula'' by Bram Stoker, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sheila Kaye-Smith
Sheila Kaye-Smith (4 February 1887 – 14 January 1956) was an English writer, known for her many novels set in the borderlands of Sussex and Kent in the English regional tradition. Her 1923 book ''The End of the House of Alard'' became a best-seller, and gave her prominence; it was followed by other successes, and her books enjoyed worldwide sales. Interest in her novel '' Joanna Godden'' (1921) was revived after it was adapted as a film titled ''The Loves of Joanna Godden'' (1947), which had a different conclusion. In the 1980s, this novel and ''Susan Spray'' were reissued by Virago press. Life The daughter of a physician and his wife, Sheila Kaye-Smith was born in St Leonards-on-Sea, near Hastings, in Sussex. She lived most of her life in that county, apart from a period in London in her youth. She was a distant relative of writer M. M. Kaye (''The Far Pavilions''). In 1924 Kaye-Smith married Theodore Penrose Fry, an Anglican clergyman. The following year she published a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Father Figure
A father figure is usually an older man, normally one with power, authority, or strength, with whom one can identify on a deeply psychological level and who generates emotions generally felt towards one's father. Despite the literal term "father figure", the role of a father figure is not limited to the biological parent of a person (especially a child), but may be played by uncles, grandfathers, elder brothers, family friends, or others. The similar term mother figure refers to an older woman. Several studies have suggested that positive father figures and mother figures (whether biological or not) are generally associated with healthy child development, both in boys and in girls. Definition The ''International Dictionary of Psychology'' defines "father figure" as "A man to whom a person looks up and whom he treats like a father." The ''APA Concise Dictionary of Psychology'' offers a more extensive definition: "a substitute for a person's biological father, who performs typical ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ann Radcliffe
Ann Radcliffe (née Ward; 9 July 1764 – 7 February 1823) was an English novelist and a pioneer of Gothic fiction. Her technique of explaining apparently supernatural elements in her novels has been credited with gaining respectability for Gothic fiction in the 1790s.The British LibrarRetrieved 12 November 2016./ref> Radcliffe was the most popular writer of her day and almost universally admired; contemporary critics called her the mighty enchantress and the Shakespeare of romance-writers, and her popularity continued through the 19th century. Interest has revived in the early 21st century, with the publication of three biographies.Chawton House LibraryRuth Facer, "Ann Radcliffe (1764–1823)" retrieved 1 December 2012. Biography Early life Radcliffe was born Ann Ward in Holborn, London on 9 July 1764. She was the only child to William Ward (1737-1798) and Ann Oates (1726-1800), and her mother was 36 years old when she gave birth. Her father worked as a haberdasher in Lond ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Female Quixote
''The Female Quixote; or, The Adventures of Arabella'' is a novel written by Charlotte Lennox imitating and parodying the ideas of Miguel de Cervantes' ''Don Quixote''. Published in 1752, two years after she wrote her first novel, ''The Life of Harriot Stuart'', it was her best-known and most-celebrated work. It was approved by both Henry Fielding and Samuel Richardson, applauded by Samuel Johnson, and used as a model by Jane Austen for ''Northanger Abbey''. It has been called a burlesque, "satirical harlequinade", and a depiction of the real power of females. While some dismissed Arabella as a coquette who simply used romance as a tool, Scott Paul Gordon said that she "exercises immense power without any consciousness of doing so". Norma Clarke has ranked it with ''Clarissa'', '' Tom Jones'' and ''Roderick Random'' as one of the "defining texts in the development of the novel in the eighteenth century". Plot Arabella, the heroine of the novel, was brought up by her widowed fa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry Tilney
Henry Tilney is the leading man in Jane Austen's 1817 novel ''Northanger Abbey''. The younger son of a local landowner, Tilney is comfortably placed as a beneficed clergyman on his father's estate. Character Tilney, with his teasing yet kind-hearted mentorship of Catherine, has been considered the nicest of Austen's heroes. At the same time, with his knowledge of muslin and of Gothic novels, he is the least masculine of heroes. Overshadowed by his military father and elder brother, he is a strangely passive figure, falling for Catherine only after she falls for him, and with his father as the driving force behind her coming to the Abbey. Nevertheless, he does not lack moral courage, as he shows with his marriage at the book's close. Origins Frank Swinnerton considered that, as a teasing mentor, knowledgeable on female matters, Tilney might represent a disguised version of the author herself. Later critics, more cautiously, have seen him as representing in part the author's "voic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Footnotes
A note is a string of text placed at the bottom of a page in a book or document or at the end of a chapter, volume, or the whole text. The note can provide an author's comments on the main text or citations of a reference work in support of the text. Footnotes are notes at the foot of the page while endnotes are collected under a separate heading at the end of a chapter, volume, or entire work. Unlike footnotes, endnotes have the advantage of not affecting the layout of the main text, but may cause inconvenience to readers who have to move back and forth between the main text and the endnotes. In some editions of the Bible, notes are placed in a narrow column in the middle of each page between two columns of biblical text. Numbering and symbols In English, a footnote or endnote is normally flagged by a superscripted number immediately following that portion of the text the note references, each such footnote being numbered sequentially. Occasionally, a number between brack ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
