Q:Role and function of Isabella Thorpe.
'Northanger Abbey' is a parody of gothic novels and while it relates many unreal elements to thicken the satire, it also presents real life examples contradicting the popular gothic elements. One of the examples is the character Isabella Thorpe, a lesson in the form of a seemingly harmless beauty.
Austin has presented Isabella's way of conversation with a certain prominence that other characters do not have. Her frequent declarations of affection are flowery and sweet. Sweet enough to remind the readers of Eve's apple. We felt that her speeches are overly exaggerated and compared with those of Eleanor and Henry feel over the top. Her constant compliments towards Catherine and her brother delude them, make them think of Isabella as someone who is warm and welcoming while her rapid chatter leaves behind clues of her true intentions, inexperienced Catherine is not able to keep up and often ends up being manipulated by Isabella instead. Like when she makes Catherine greedy enough to go on an inappropriate open-carriage ride, or when she disapproved of the gentlemen looking at her and then insists on following them in such a way that Catherine thinks she is merely wanting to show her the hat she fancies. Furthermore, Isabella finds out that Catherine did not mean to get John's hopes up she says things like, 'what one means one day.... one may not mean it the next.' and, 'a little harmless flirtation or so will occur and one is often drawn on to give more encouragement than one wishes to stand by.' What she really means to do is probably make Catherine guilty enough that when eventually her affair with Captain Thorpe is revealed and her speech applies to her, Catherine would not be able to point her out due to her self-consciousness of her hypocrisy but unfortunately for her Catherine is oblivious to such hints and her plans fail miserably.
When we first see Isabella Thorpe we do not suppose her to be a bad person rather she seems like a loving person towards Catherine but it is important to notice that as we are following Catherine's experiences we are all also adapting to her mindset, through her eyes her only acquaintance will of course be a welcome one and due to her desperation for company and lack of experience she sees not the materialistic nature of Isabella. She sees not how Isabella misguides her and takes advantage of her innocence by feeding her brain with gothic novels and using her to get closer to James, all because she thinks the Morlands are rich and Catherine is the Allen's heir. Furthermore Catherine does not realise that Isabella showers Miss Andrews with compliments one moment and backbites her the next and the thought that Isabella is capable of doing the same to her does not cross her mind. Despite of all her talk of putting her friends first she is often seen to leave Cathrine alone in favour of a man's company. Austin depicts a picture of materialistic and fake people through the presentation of Isabella and warns her readers to be wary of the signs of a false friend.
Putting aside Isabella's behaviour her situation also deserves to be noted. She is the eldest of three daughters, her mother is a widow with not much money to dispense and furthermore she is around twenty-one years of age which during Austin's time is an age at which a women is usually married. Although her behaviour towards Catherine and James was unfair especially when she thought she could break her engagement with James and have one with Captain Tilney because of her greed for a larger income, we see her situation where her family depends on her to help them enter high society and her marrying a rich man would make way for her sisters to marry someone with high status as well resulting in a comfortable living. Thus the readers understand the social pressure she is under and sympathise with her.
Austin does not depict what exactly happens to Isabella but her relationship with the Morlands being broken and her reputation probably tarnished due to her affair with Captain Tilney and a broken engagement the readers can assume that her story does not end well. Austin, therefore, warns her readers against being materialistic and greedy and warns against manipulating and using people who are nothing but kind like Catherine. She also warn her readers to be wary of people like Isabella. Isabella is an example of the fact that villains do not have to be creepy men with sinister smiles, they could come to you in the form of a friend. This proves that real life is not black and white like the gothic novels present it to be and that people have both good and bad in them. Austin also subtly condemns society's rules and unfairness that lead to young women to make a fool of themselves in desperation to fit in, to change with the tide and to keep up with statuses.
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English Literature 9695
Non-FictionThis is a compilation of all the essays and notes I wrote while I was in ALevels. It must be noted that not all of of these are A* material (though none goes lower than a grade B) so they aren't meant to be copy pasted for your school assignments. U...
