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Posts Tagged ‘Jane Austen’

Pride and Prejudice: The Phrase

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on May 13, 2025| 5 Comments »

Art:  C.E. Brock, 1895.
Mr. Darcy says Elizabeth is “not handsome enough to tempt him” to dance.

Jane Austen is in the news again thanks to a tv series about that devoted sister who burned all her letters after her death. I like thinking about how deeply Jane remains embedded in our culture, despite our losing out on the burned details.

Much continues to be discovered — or at least brought to our attention — about the world she knew. Today’s article is from the Conversation and describes the origins of the words that title her best-known novel, Pride and Prejudice.

Margie Burns, lecturer of English at the University of Maryland, writes, “Most readers hear ‘pride and prejudice’ and immediately think of Jane Austen’s most famous novel. … Few people, however, know the history of the phrase ‘pride and prejudice,’ which I explore in my new book, Jane Austen, Abolitionist: The Loaded History of the Phrase ‘Pride and Prejudice.’ …

“The phrase, which has religious origins, appeared in hundreds of works before Austen was born. From Britain it traveled to America, and from religious tomes it expanded to secular works. It even became a hallmark of abolitionist writing. …

“The phrase ‘pride and prejudice’ first appeared more than 400 years ago, in religious writings by English Protestants. … If ministers wanted to reproach their parishioners or their opponents, they attributed criticism of their sermons to ‘pride and prejudice’ – as coming from people too arrogant and narrow-minded to entertain their words in good faith.

“While the usage began in the Church of England, other denominations, even radical ones, soon adopted it. … One early takeaway is that, amid fervent religious conflicts, various denominations similarly used ‘pride and prejudice’ as a criticism. … At the same time, the phrase could be invoked to support religious toleration and in pleas for inclusiveness.

“ ‘When all Pride and Prejudice, all Interests and Designs, being submitted to the Honor of God, and the Discharge of our Duty,’ an anonymous clergyman wrote in 1734, ‘the Holy Scriptures shall again triumph over the vain Traditions of Men; and Religion no longer take its Denomination from little Sects and Factions.’ …

“One fan was American founding father Thomas Paine. In his 47-page pamphlet ‘Common Sense,’ Paine argued that kings could not be trusted to protect democracy: ‘laying aside all national pride and prejudice in favor of modes and forms, the plain truth is, that it is wholly owing to the constitution of the people, and not to the constitution of the government that the crown is not as repressive in England as in Turkey.’ …

“My annotated list in Jane Austen, Abolitionist includes more than a dozen female writers using the phrase between 1758 and 1812, the year Austen finished revising Pride and Prejudice. …

“As the critique embodied in the phrase progressed beyond religious and partisan conflict, it became increasingly used in the context of ethics and social reform. … The leaders of transnational antislavery organizations used it at their conventions and in the books and periodicals they published. In 1843, 30 years after the publication of Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, British Quaker Thomas Clarkson wrote to the General Antislavery Convention, which was meeting in London.

“He exhorted the faithful to repudiate slavery ‘at once and forever’ if there were any among them ‘whose eyes may be so far blinded, or their consciences so far seared by interest or ignorance, pride or prejudice, as still to sanction or uphold this unjust and sinful system.’ …

“At the funeral for abolitionist John Brown, the minister prayed over his body, ‘Oh, God, cause the oppressed to go free; break any yoke, and prostrate the pride and prejudice that dare to lift themselves up.’

“Use of the phrase did not end with Emancipation or the end of the U.S. Civil War. In fact, it was one of Frederick Douglass’ favorite phrases. On Oct. 22, 1883, in his ‘Address at Lincoln Hall,’ Douglass excoriated the Supreme Court’s decision rendering the Civil Rights Act of 1875 unconstitutional.

“As was typical of Douglass, the speech ranged beyond racial inequities: ‘Color prejudice is not the only prejudice against which a Republic like ours should guard. The spirit of caste is malignant and dangerous everywhere. There is the prejudice of the rich against the poor, the pride and prejudice of the idle dandy against the hard-handed workingman.’ ”

More examples at the Conversation, here. No firewall.

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Jane Austen’s Views Updated

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on July 14, 2021| 6 Comments »

Photo: Glasshouse Vintage/Getty.
Although Jane Austen’s family had ties to an Antigua property that used slaves, new research hints that the 19th century novelist may have held abolitionist views like her favorite brother.

Just when you think there’s nothing new to be learned about the life of a famous author, someone decides to try a different kind of search. In today’s article, a scholar who already knew quite a bit about Jane Austen’s brother Henry searched for “the Rev H.T. Austen,” the name he used after her death.

Scottie Andrew writes at CNN, “Austen’s personal values — namely, whether she supported slavery — have been debated by literary enthusiasts and experts who read her work like a cipher. A new discovery adds a new wrinkle to the Pride and Prejudice author’s personal lore: Her dear brother Henry was sent as a delegate to the World Anti-Slavery Convention in 1840.

“While it’s common knowledge among ‘Janeites’ — the nickname for Austen’s proudest and most passionate readers — that the author’s brothers privately held abolitionist views, Henry is the first of her six brothers to ‘have participated publicly in anti-slavery activism,’ said Devoney Looser, a preeminent Austen scholar and professor at Arizona State University, who uncovered the record of Henry’s attendance.

“It’s further evidence, she said, that Austen herself might have believed in the abolition of slavery. Looser shared her findings in the Times Literary Supplement, a UK literary review. However, the discovery does not apply to the entire Austen family’s views, Looser says. Austen’s father had ties to a family that ran an Antiguan sugar plantation, and Austen herself never publicly expressed abolitionist views, as far as researchers know. …

‘We’ve wanted to slot her family, and her, as one or the other,’ Looser told CNN of the debate over the Austen family’s attitudes toward and participation in slavery. ‘The uncomfortable truth that my research confirms is that, over the course of 80 years, her family was both.’ …

“Just 161 of her letters exist today, Looser said, but one of them mentions her love of the work of Thomas Clarkson, an abolitionist author. …

“Based on her findings, which Looser said she uncovered in digitized newspapers and church records, Henry was selected as one of two delegates from his town. Looser said it indicates that ‘he would have been a known supporter of, and even a local leader, in favor of abolition.’ The point of the convention, attended by 500 leaders in abolition, was to create a platform for anti-slavery measures around the world and support formerly enslaved Black people who’d been recently freed in the British colonies, Looser said.

“As a delegate, Henry would have debated anti-slavery policies with his peers, most of whom were White men (a handful of Black men served as delegates, and the eight women present weren’t allowed to sit with the men, Looser said). His broader history of activism remains unknown, as none of his letters seem to have survived, but Looser said he was a pastor known for being an ‘excellent public speaker.’

“Henry’s attendance is the first example of public support for abolition among the family, Looser said, and contrasts with his father’s ties to slavery. The Rev. George Austen was close to a man whose family ran a sugar plantation in Antigua and was named a co-trustee for the man’s fortune, Looser said. While her research does not support claims that the senior Austen was directly involved in managing the plantation, he did have a hand in managing the wealth of a man who owed his fortune to enslaved people.

“Though Austen’s work is central to the Western literary canon, for much of the 20th century, experts believed her novels were devoid of politics and nods to controversial subject matter like race and slavery, said Nicole Wright, an associate professor of English at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and an expert in themes of social justice in British literature from Austen’s era. But Austen’s novels aren’t just about fancy balls and complicated courtships.

“More recent scholarship suggests that her novels made subtle references to the evils of slavery. Take the ‘silence’ that inspired many an academic work: A moment in Mansfield Park when heroine Fanny Price questions her uncle about the slave trade and is met with ‘dead silence.’ For many years, that moment was viewed by some critics as complicity. Some Austen scholars today think it might have been a criticism of English society’s discomfort in discussing slavery, Wright said.” More at CNN, here.

You might also be interested in an April New York Times article that reports, “As part of the discussion over racism that followed the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis last year, museums have asserted solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement and begun to rethink and recast how they portray history. Among them is a museum dedicated to the writer Jane Austen in the English village of Chawton.”

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