Rating: 
Summary: Oh, what a wonderful story!
Review: Fanny Price, the heroine from this novel, is the biggest drawback to the story in my view. She is the sort of woman with whom I have never had much in common. She is insufferably sweet, eternally turning cheeks, and almost totally incapable of speaking her mind if she is in disagreement with others. In short...she is the ultimate in "goodness." It felt plastic to me.For whatever criticisms I have of Fanny Price, I cannot deny that the reader is forced, throughout the novel, to wish her well. I truly yearned with my full heart for Fanny to get the life and love and attention that she so heartily deserved. The story, though not as funny as Pride & Prejudice, is quite entertaining with little twists in the plot that one doesn't necessarily see coming and with an ending that really could've gone either way. I thoroughly enjoyed this one. I'll probably read it again, and I would definitely recommend it to any true Austen fan.
Rating: 
Summary: A really long walk
Review: Ok, I'll admit it right here. I skipped to the end of the book. But how could I help it? Between Edmund's confused love-life and Fanny's martyrdom, we were getting no where. It's like in one of those movies where you yell at the characters "Just TALK to each other!" Do you like the tv show Felicity? Then this is the book for you. Here you have two people who totally understand each other. They're soul mates. Yet they just can't seem to get together. The very characteristics that make them so right for each other are the walls that separate them. I have a feeling that Jane Austen was tired of being so nice and then getting the bad end of the bargain. Maybe writing this book was some kind of outlet for her. And she must have had LOTS of free time on her hands when she wrote this. So if you have lots of free time on your hands, and you're a die-hard Austen fan like me, go ahead. Take the challenge. See if you can make it all the way through Mansfield Park!
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Summary: Jane Austen's visit to Palo Alto.
Review: How wonderful to live in a small town in Asia! And how wonderful to belong to a small sect, and to spend much of my life performing two-thousand-year-old rituals! What has all of this to do with Mansfield Park? Very little. But it has a lot to do with the modern criticisms of Mansfield Park. People living in the First World, especially in the United States, often forget that there are societies and ways of thinking different from their own. They forget to the extent that they can no longer even imagine such a possibility. In the Western world today, moral absolutism is treated with suspicion, and as something dirty. Maybe rightly, maybe not. But there's no point in reading every novel as if the author shared your point of view, and then staring in bewilderment when you thus find contradictions in it. Fanny Price is morally perfect. She is modest, truthful, and certain of nothing but the difference between right and wrong. She is "a loathsome little priss". So how could Jane Austen have made her her heroine? And if she decided to create a revolting heroine, why didn't she express her opinion of her, as she frequently does in her novels? Did Jane Austen like prissy little Fanny? This is the question which is really bothering the critics. Well, maybe she did. Maybe Jane Austen herself believed in moral absolutes. There's nothing in her letters or novels to make me think that this is impossible. 'But how could an intelligent, sensitive woman think like that?' Why not? I've spent my life studying moral philosophy, and have not yet seen a logical proof for the impossibility of moral absolutes. It would be unusual for an intelligent, sensitive woman who grew up in Twentieth-Century America to believe in such things. Intelligent people in the United States today are taught to look at many sides of moral issues. But Jane Austen didn't grow up in the United States today. She grew up in a family outwardly very similar to the Bertrams, in a town much like theirs. It is not even clear that Jane Austen herself placed a high value on deep thought and fine moral distinctions. The fact that she enjoyed using them herself is neither here nor there. She may have liked and admired Fanny Price. I like and admire Fanny Price, too. (According to hearsay adduced by Claire Tomalin, so did Cassandra Austen. Tomalin also quotes some words of Jane Austen which point in the same direction, but I don't know the source.) I wouldn't like to have Fanny Price around, because I wouldn't want my every move supervised by the morals-police. But at a great distance, as a character in a novel, I like her. Because I can imagine a different world, where absolute goodness is absolutely good. I have no problem with Jane Austen's attitude toward Fanny Price. It's quite possible that Jane Austen could also imagine absolute good. It would be strange if an associate professor from Palo Alto thought in such terms. But Miss Austen wasn't an associate professor from Palo Alto. She was a clergyman's daughter from Hampshire. And she is allowed to think differently from the associate professor. Or from me. Like many of the critics, I'm not too fond of Mansfield Park. Without Miss Austen's habitual biting wit, her view of society is oppressive. And I can't make any sense of the business with the theatricals. Which annoys me. But I have no complaints against Fanny Price.
Rating:
Summary: Mansfield Park
Review: "The nonsense and folly of people's stepping out of their rank and trying to appear above themselves, makes me think it right to give you a hint Fanny, now that you are going into company without any of us." Fanny's Aunt Norris said this and it resembles how Fanny was treated when she first moved from her low-classed home, to her uncle's high classed home. Because of this, Fanny was mistreated and looked down upon by most for a great deal of the book, until a few finally saw what a wonderful person she was, and the views of her family members slowly began to change. The story takes place in England during the Victorian age. Fanny is a ten-year-old girl that goes to live with her uncle, and aunt, and cousins. Fanny spends the whole story trying to live up to the standards that have been produced for her at her new home at Mansfield Park. Because she went from a lower classed home to a higher classed home, she had to learn the ways of a high classed young lady, which entitled her becoming educated, learning to be a proper lady, and learning proper manners and class. Fanny spends the novel seeking happiness and love, which she had been missing throughout her life. Austen does a wonderful job of making it a point that a person that was not born in a low classed family could experience as much, if not more happiness as one that was born into a high classed family. Fanny had two female cousins, Julia and Maria, who were both somewhat cruel to her when they were younger. They looked down on Fanny, as if she did not deserve to live in the house as them. They did not feel that Fanny would ever have the chance to experience the love and happiness that they were to experience because she was of a lower social class. However in the end, Fanny found the most happiness of all, and Maria had done something that was unacceptable of such a high classed young woman, and was never to have respect of dignity again. Austen wrote this novel beautifully in a way that many could enjoy it, however there are some objections. There are times in the novel when Austen goes into great detail, which you might find unnecessary at first, however she does this for a reason. The information that is given to you is always important, because an author doesn't write anything for no reason, there is always a purpose. These details are crucial in making everything fit together in the end, which Austen does very well. Also, the characters get very confusing at times, and paying attention to the details will make it a lot easier to understand. To overcome these difficulties, just keep in mind that if you skim past the details, the best part of the book will have been lost. The names of the characters get confusing at times, so to keep from the confusion, write down all the characters and their full names and who they are married to. This will give you a good reference to look at. Austen does a wonderful job of making Fanny make somewhat of a difference in everyone's life. Fanny proved to everyone that happiness could be found without doing what was socially expected of people. She followed her heart instead of doing what was expected of her, which brought her great happiness. She proved to people that happiness is about love, not what you have or whom you are married to. She became so happy because she grew up in both and upper and lower classed homes, so she knows what both are like. She was taught to enjoy what she had because it may be gone someday.
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Summary: Not My favorite but Still Glad I read it!
Review: This is my least favorite of Jane Austen's novels. I am glad that I read it of course and I would be tempted to pick it up someday again and see if I think differently of it. It's strange because you never fully connect or actually like the heroine. It's the only book I've ever read where I was hoping the main male character ended up with the heroine's competition! Likeable book, unlikeable heroine would be my way of summing it up.
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Summary: A Strange Book - Perhaps Austen in Drag?
Review: Like all devoted lovers of Jane Austen, I have long pondered why she chose to write this, of all books, at time she was experiencing the intoxicating success of Pride and Prejudice. The protagonist is a loathesome little priss. Austen herself says so in her letters. Fanny Price is neurotic and oversensitive where Austen's other heroines are brash and healthy. Even Austen's own family found the ending as odd and disappointing as do subsequent generations of readers. So there's a puzzle to be solved here. The answer may lie in the fact that this book was written when, after a lifetime of obscurity, Austen found herself, briefly, a huge success. As is so often the case with writers, the success of her earlier book may have given her the courage to decided write about something that REALLY mattered to her--and what that was was her own very complex feelings about the intensely sexual appeal of a morally unworthy person. This topic, the charm of the scoundrel, is one that flirts through all her other books, usually in a side plot. However, the constraints of Austen's day made it impossible for her to write the story of a woman who falls for a scoundrel with a sympathetic viewpoint character. So what I think Austen may have decided to do was to write this story using Edmund--a male--as the sympathetic character who experiences the devastating sexual love of someone unworthy. Then, through a strange slight of hand, she gives us a decoy protagonist--Fanny Price, who if she is anything, is really the judgemental, punishing Joy Defeating inner voice--the inner voice that probably kept Jane from indulging her own very obvious interest in scoundrels in real life! In defense of this theory, consider these points: 1. Jane herself loved family theatricals. Fanny's horror of them and of the flirting that took place is the sort of thing she made fun of in others. Jane also loved her cousin, Eliza, a married woman of the scoundrelly type, who flirted outrageously with Jane's brother Henry when Jane was young--very much like Mary Crawford. The fact is, and this bleeds through the book continuously, Austen doesn't at all like Fanny Price! To make it more complex, Fanny's relationship with Henry Crawford is an echo of the Edmund-Mary theme, but Austen makes Henry so appealing that few readers have forgiven Austen for not letting Fanny liven up a little and marry him! No. Austen is trying to make a case for resisting temptation, but in this book she most egregiously fails. 2. Austen is famous for never showing us a scene or dialogue which she hadn't personally observed in real life, hence the off-stage proposals in her other books. Does this not make it all the more curious that the final scene between Edmund and Mary Crawford in which he suffers his final disillusionment and realizes the depths of her moral decay comes to us with some very convincing dialogue? Is it possible that Jane lived out just such a scene herself? That she too was forced by her inner knowlege of what was right to turn away from a sexually appealing scoundrel of her own? 3. Fanny gets Edmund in the end, but it is a joyless ending for most readers because it is so clear that he is in love with Mary. Can it be that Austen here was suggesting the grim fate that awaits those who do turn away from temptations--a lifetime of listening to that dull, upstanding, morally correct but oh so joyless voice of reason? We'll never know. Cassandra Austen burnt several years' worth of her sister's letters--letters written in the years before she prematurely donned her spinster's cap and gave up all thoughts of finding love herself. Her secrets whatever they were, were kept within the family. But one has to wonder about what was really going on inside the curious teenaged girl who loved Samual Richardson's rape saga and wrote the sexually explicit oddity that comes to us as Lady Susan. Perhaps in Mansfield Park we get a dim echo of the trauma that turned the joyous outrageous rebel who penned Pride and Prejudice in her late teens into the staid, sad woman when she was dying wrote Persuasion--a novel about a recaptured young love. So with that in mind, why not go and have another look at Mansfield Park!
Rating: 
Summary: Dark and Appealing
Review: As Jane Austen's most controversial novel, Mansfield Park continues to occupy an inveterate place in literature for its dark charm, its slow yet steady rhythm, its dry yet sharp and ironic humor, and of course fabulous charaterization built on extensive description all within a country challenged by progress. Readers become acquainted with Fanny Price, a victorian era Cinderella so it appeared--plucked from her family in destitude to be allowed to blossom at her wealthy uncle's house, Mansfield Park. Of course being passive, steadfast, timid...certainlly lacking the very fierce which makes Emma and Marrianne among other Austen heroine memorable. Yet withstanding the seductive charm of fortune and of consequence, Fanny Price resists the wooing of a stranger Mr. CRawford who puzzles everyone with his light gallantry and dark desires. A soulmate since childhood, Fanny's cousin Edmund yields in to Miss Crawford, who is all but a nonessential part of Mr. Crawford's scheme of stolen pleasure. Henry Crawford, certainlly one of the darknest characters ever portrayed, more so then Willoughbe (excuse the sp.) is too caught up in the sensual delights of his incessant conquests (including Fanny's 2 pretty cousins) that even though he ackowledges the good influence Fanny's purity has on his heart, he is too deeply sunken in his web of "play" to rise and face truth of love. Yes, Henry Crawford did love Fanny with his heart, at least the pure part of it, unlike Edmund who loves Fanny only out of brotherly affection. But Fanny, whose steady character makes her an unlikely candidate to Crawford's actual reformation, refuses Crawford's sincerity and thus almost pushes him back into his bottomless hold of scheme. The storm thus takes place in the heart of London's upper society, casting its shadow on the peaceful Mansfield Park community and shattering everything Sir Thomas has persevered in building up--with fortune, and with consequence...a mention of slave trade as well. Mary Crawford is a complex player, tainted by a society blindly wooing money and status, that even Edmund is not able to save the good side of her. Apart from Henry's scheme, Edmund is forced to refocus and, voila, there is Fanny (no matter how distasteful cousin-courtship is to many). The movie adaptation of this tale certainlly emphasizes the fighting nature of Fanny which is rarely detected on pages. Yet what IS acknowledged and admired in the quiet little herione, is the perseverance so rare in a world on the verge of revolution.
Rating: 
Summary: Austen at her worst
Review: Mansfield Park is by far the worst book by Jane Austen. I am an avid Austen fan, and have enjoyed all of her books, except this one. I had two main complaints with this book. One, Fanny Price is the most annoying heroine. She is far too complacent. She accepts the bad treatment she recieves from her cousins and aunts with no complaints. It's as if she feels it is all she deserves! Also annoying is the fact that she is so delicate and ill all of the time. To have such a colourless creature as the central character of a book is a mistake. Second, the ending was horrible. It's as if Austen suddenly realized the book was way too long, and she had a deadline to meet. After torturing the reader for so long, she sums up Edmund and Fanny's relationship in just one chapter! If only she had edited the majority of the book, and nailed the ending better.
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Summary: A different side to Austen nonetheless entertaining
Review: After reading all of her other works beforehand, 'Mansfield Park' struck me, like many readers, as almost told by a different person from the Austen we know. It is darker, much more humourless (the scenes of comedy are much less evenly spread, and even then they are tainted despairingly sarcastic rather than her usual warm irony), and with a very different heroine. It would appear a quieter, if more intelligent version of Harriet Smith from 'Emma' has taken centre stage here--that is, meek little Fanny Price. Don't despair. It's brilliant as always. To begin with, this time Austen's novel contains much more 'action'--what I mean by that is her prose actually describes her characters doing things, even with a touch of ! dramatic climax! to them, something she'd never done before. (Apart from a few scenes of Lydia's wedding in "Pride and Prejudice", Austen's novels usually just contain large blocks of dialogue between characters with the occasioanl longer expositional block detailing the passage of time.) The arrival of Sir Thomas, for example, at the end of volume one, is, surprisingly, thrillingly done with no small amount of adrenaline shocked into the reader, knowing what exploits he will catch his children in the middle of. The humour is a sad loss, but then in this novel Austen deals with more 'racy' topics than her usual, which she probably felt deserved even more severe treatment than she would normally dispense to her characters through her razor-sharp tools of irony. The moral quotent, therefore, is much higher than normal--then again Austen never featured a married woman's affair before, did she? The last thing other readers complain about is the lack of any attractive characters in the novel, save Fanny's older brother, William Price (I'd agree there--he was delicious!). Many people dislike and even detest little fanny, after the 'spirited' and 'lively' exploits of Elizabeth Bennet and her kin. Notice how often the word 'lively' is linked to the poisonous Miss Crawford in this novel, and I think you'll see she was trying to make no small point about how dangerous an over-'spirited' girl could get! I don't understand this hate of Fanny. Is it just because she's a disappointment from Eliza? Because she's morally invincible? Because she turns down the dashing hero (Henry Crawford) to marry boring but steadfast old Edmund? I can't find sufficient evidence to hate her in ANY of the above. She's a pleasant, intelligent, charmingly emotional little girl--certainly a pleasant change from that spoiled brat Emma Woodhouse. My concluding statement is this: MP is a very enjoyable novel, if somewhat different from Austen's other works. Even if you come away wishing Fanny Price would drop dead on her pious little head, you should still read it. It's moral lessons are important, it's characters are vital additions to Austen's repetoire, and it reveals a very important shift in Austen's attitude in later life. Read it, please.
Rating:
Summary: One of Jane Austen's best
Review: Mansfield Park is a complex book with situations that cause one to sit back and think about what has been presented to her/him. I found the first half to be a bit slow and was wondering where the charatcter development and plot line would all lead. However, I was rewarded as I read the second half and saw how the character development and siutations of the first half led to each character's fate. This book is definitely not for everyone, since it is darker, more serious (and subversive) compared to Austen's other works. especially if you are uncomfortable with subversive situations.
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