Posted by Anna on June 09, 1997 at 01:02:36:
One of the things that made me uneasy about MP the first time I read it was the 'wallowing' in Fanny's plight. In the play episode we have what seems to me to be one of the most florid examples; 'everyone else' has a part in the play; 'everyone else' is happy, busy, popular and of consequence. 'Only Fanny' is lonely, disregarded, unwanted (etc, etc).
On a reread, I suspect the narrator is taking the mickey a bit; Fanny's exagerated wallowing in her own misery is probably meant as a spoof on a convention of the day - the lonely, friendless and abandoned heroine. True, Fanny is unhappy, but she's in no real danger; to me her plight is extremely exagerated in a most unaustenish way - that's what makes me think it's a spoof.
What think you?
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