Posted by Michelle K. on September 11, 1997 at 16:18:41:
In reply to Re: Question for the Crawfordites posted by Caroline on September 10, 1997 at 22:18:55
] ] I'm wondering (guess it is the survey researcher in me, always looking for the dependent variables)... if a reader likes the Crawfords, or finds them not immoral, or blameless or innocent, or whatever, does it follow that the same reader finds Fanny a wimp, or a milquetoast or a drag, or insipid?
]
] ________
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] Or the opposite? Fanny-supporters are the ones that cannot justify Henry Crawford under any conditions?
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Yes. I'll buy that. I personally cannot understand how someone can say they like Fanny and then wish to hook her up with Henry, who is IMO (and in her opinion, too, as JA writes) the last person on earth she would want to marry. I think that anyone who really likes the character of Fanny as written would be rooting all along for Edmund to drop his delusions of Mary and see what's good for him, rather than wishing to fix Fanny up with someone (Henry) who'll probably just get tired of her eventually (or find some way to rationalize his infidelities while still professing to love her).
In order to fix up Fanny with Henry, some serious alteration needs to be done to Fanny's character as Austen portrays it.
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