Society and Neighbourhood in Jane Austens ‘Emma

Seminar paper from the year 2011 in the subject English - Literature, Works, grade: 1,7, University of Hildesheim (Institut fur englische Sprache und Literatur), course: Jane Austens Pride and Prejudice and the didactics of the classic novel, language: English, abstract: This term paper tries to work out the habits and social graces of the regency period by using the novel Emma. Emma by Jane Austen is a novel about a 21-year-old girl living in the small town of Highbury, Surrey, in England. The novel deals with the relationships between the neighbours, the class differences and, typical for Jane Austen novels, marriage and match- making. The characters in this novel may not be as highly-drawn as the ones in Pride and Prejudice are, but it delineates with great accuracy the manners and the habits of a middle class gentry (Gentlemans Magazine in September 1816: Lodge 1972: 46), and thus Emma is convenient to be a source for research for typical habits. In this paper, the aspects of family life, neighbourhood, manners and values in Emma (and thus representatively for the English Regency period) are to be portrayed.