Separate and together
Posted by gkb on June 25, 1998 at 11:15:57:
In response to Edmund, Mary, and Fanny, written by Tamee on June 24, 1998 at 14:32:56
]
] I agree that Mary is Edmund's first love or at least, a great infatuation, but I couldn't help but find it curious just how much time the three characters were together, and how Edmund's love for Mary seemed to grow with her appreciation of Fanny, and many crucial moments happen around Fanny
It's odd, but I tend to focus on the times when Edmund and Fanny were separated--He went to hear the harp every day for at least a month while Fanny never heard it until late in November. She was left for an hour alone while he and Mary walked on the see by themselves the very avenue Fanny had been hoping to see for weeks--the one that was to be cut down. And Fanny is stuck at Portsmouth for weeks with Edmund failing to write to her. I do beleive you are right in saying that Edmund gives Mary virtues she has not, and that some of those virtues are ones he has instilled in Fanny--but I am not convinced that they are Fanny's own personality traits that he loves so much as he loves his own ideals--the ideals by which he formed Fanny he would now try to RE-form Mary--but he fails. Had Mary been an unformed young girl, and he had prevailed upon her to accept his ideals--then who can say?
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