REVIEW: "Northanger Abbey"

SYNOPSIS:

“The story's heroine is Catherine Morland, an innocent seventeen-year-old woman from a country parsonage. While spending a few weeks in Bath with a family friend, Catherine meets and falls in love with Henry Tilney, who invites her to visit his family estate, Northanger Abbey. Once there, Catherine, a great reader of Gothic thrillers, lets the shadowy atmosphere of the old mansion fill her mind with terrible suspicions. What is the mystery surrounding the death of Henry's mother? Is the family concealing a terrible secret within the elegant rooms of the Abbey? Can she trust Henry, or is he part of an evil conspiracy? Catherine finds dreadful portents in the most prosaic events, until Henry persuades her to see the peril in confusing life with art”.

Credits to Goodreads.com

REVIEW:

As the huge Jane Austen fan that I am, I have been wanting to re-read her novels for a while, and I decided to start with Northanger  Abbey, one of Austen’s very firsts novels. In this book, Austen introduces the reader to Catherine Morgan, a young lady who is invited to spend a few weeks at Bath with her family´s friends. There she will have the opportunity to attend balls, buy new dresses and meet suitors.

Furthermore, Catherine becomes a heroine like those in the fictional gothic novels of the XVIII century and she sees her world turns upside down when the limits between the fantastic and reality become blurry. Northanger Abbey is not my favorite Jane Austen novel, but still I quite enjoy it. I love the witty way Austen expresses herself to describe the typical characteristics of the society, such as marriage of convenience.

Pros

It is indeed, a really light, easy-reading novel. Also, the clever writing of Austen and the satiric way she uses to address the injustices lived by women during that period are simply marvellous.

Cons

As it is a parody of the gothic novels, the personality of the characters result extremely exaggerated, although this is quite typical in Austen´s works. However, I find Catherine extremely innocent and virginal, while Isabella and John Thorne are obviously fortune hunters, even if Catherine doesn´t suspect anything.

All in all, the novel is really funny, as Catherine lives in her own fantasy world and doesn´t really appreciate the personality of those who surround her. . In addition, the author deals with the loss of innocence of the main character as she discovers that some people are deceiving. Northanger Abbey is not only the typical Austen novel, it is actually a story full of gothic characteristics and the author again is sarcastic about women´s role in a society that mistreated them