The Role Of Family In Northanger Abbey And Persuasion, By Jane Austen

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In Pride and Prejudice, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion, family, specifically the father, plays a significant role on the heroines, Elizabeth Bennet, Catherine Morland and Anne Elliot. The father held the most power in his daughter’s life because he has control over important life decisions such as her marriage proposals and relationships. Throughout all three novels, Jane Austen utilizes fathers, who have influential power over the heroines, to guide the heroines’ development and decisions. Elizabeth mirrored her father’s personality developing her prejudices on other people and Sir Elliot’s isolation of Anne lowered her confidence on her self-worth, whereas the absentee father of Catherine flourished her naivety and admiration of General …show more content…
Morland is an absent character causing Catherine’s lack of maturity and her consideration of General Tilney as her fatherly figure. During the novel’s entirety, Austen never described any conversation between Catherine and her father. Mr. Morland is only mentioned by his presence next to Mrs. Morland. When Catherine was leaving for Bath, her mother gave her advice while her dad “gave her only ten guineas” (Austen 9). He “simply [had] no time” to be around Catherine because he worked as a clergyman (Odel 37). Catherine’s father may believe he is supporting Catherine by giving her money, however, money cannot prepare her for the new life experiences she will encounter. Because of her absentee father, Catherine lacks the proper life skills to navigate Bath and Northanger Abbey. One of her biggest flaws is trusting people too easily. When she first meets General Tilney, she is in awed of his appearance and power creating the feelings of admiration towards him. She believes “he could not impose anything improper for her” by trusting him in his decisions (Austen 113). The father and daughter bonding Catherine missed with her father is reestablished with General Tilney. She wanted this same connection with her father and stepped into the father-daughter relationship hoping for not only a mentor, but a father she can look up to. She automatically trusted General Tilney before knowing who he was. Additionally, her lack of life experience she has is shown through her “charmingly enthusiastic enthrallment to the power of the imagination” (Glock 35). For example, she believed General Tilney was a murderer and the old receipts she found created a manuscript. She connected her fears and curiosity to the themes of her gothic novels and is constantly struggling to separate unreal from reality. Because Mr. Morland was absent during her life, he was not able to teach her any advice to minimize her innocence. Consequently,

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