​In Mansfield Park we began to see Austen exploring some changes affecting the rigid social behaviours of the Regency Period.  Mary and Henry Crawford from London move into the small social world of the Bertrams and Fanny Price their niece, bringing with them more individualistic social and personal behaviours. Both are wealthy and reject the social expectations of this country group. Mary falls in love with Edmund Bertram but rejects him when he won’t give up becoming a local minister. Henry tries to seduce both Maria Bertram, an engaged lady, and also Fanny Price, an innocent eighteen-year old who is really in love with her cousin Edmund. Both the Crawford siblings eventually fail in the complex courting games they play with the Bertram family and fail to marry the people they most love. Even so, the Crawfords are the most lively of the characters and presage the more relaxed conventions that the Regency period will embrace. Meanwhile, Fanny and her cousin Edmund, both represent a world that will rapidly vanish.

We watched half of the BBC TV version of the book and enjoyed the lavish costumes, grand houses and interiors.   July - 'Mansfield Park'  (continued)

​Meg Dillon

Our introductory session looked at both Georgian/Regency society 1780 – 1820, and Jane Austen’s life.

Austen grew up within a changing social group  of the County Gentry, a group of old rural squires but now, also rich newcomers renting or buying country properties, but with few understandings of how this county squirarchy had behaved for generations. Of the dozen or so local families that the Austen family visited, only two of the old gentry remained. This gave her a rich tapestry from which to satirically draw many of her characters: the frivolous and the worthy.

We watched Lucy Worsley’s excellent UTube video* in which she visited the many houses and towns the Austen family lived in after they shifted away from their original home in Steventon, where her father had been a rector in the local church for many years. She traced the changes of fortune that Jane Austen experienced in her life as an author.

​Meg Dillon

​*The Untold Story of Jane Austen: Behind Closed Doors, narrated by Lucy Worsley, UTube.  [50 minutes]  A general introduction to Austen’s life.

Extension:  Also recommended Death of Jane Austen, narrated by Lucy Worsley, UTube.