The Flawed Character of Emma Woodhouse in Jane Austen's Emma

The character Sarah Daniels in Percival Everett’s short story “Wrong Lead” has clouded her mind with her obsession with horses instead of focusing on her marriage with her husband Clark which is falling apart. “she spends all of her time with that damn horse” (Everett 90) says Sarah’s husband to Jake. It's clear

“All the roads you took came back to me. So I’m following the path that leads to you.”

In a novel overflowing with misconstrued romance, “Emma” by Jane Austen succeeds in misleading the readers, as well as the actual characters on the matter of who is really in love with whom. Although it is teeming with romantic dialogue, the characters have a tendency to misunderstand confessions of love, as well as comments made in passing concerning the secret feelings of others. Through forms of narration and dialogue, Jane Austen forces the reader to interpret these subtexts and draw conclusions concerning the actual romantic intensions of her complex characters, while also deceiving readers on an adventure of romantic deception.

Robert: you do not need to do that, I can move by myself, but since you are extremely bored, I will let you push me and enjoy your way until we reach the shop. But before you do that let me tell you something. You need to move slowly and carefully so that you do not hit people on the way.

“I believe I can find it on my own. The footsteps are not hard to miss.”

Emma, is the story of the education and growth process of Emma. Throughout majority of the novel, Emma involves herself in bad situations in which she misconstrues facts and blinds herself from the truth, at the expense of others. After Emma has discovered that she has been terribly wrong about Mr. Elton, and she was mistaken to encourage Harriet's affection of him, Emma says, "It was foolish, it was wrong to take so active a part in bringing two people together, it was adventuring too far, assuming too much, making light of what ought to be serious- a trick of what ought to be simple!." Emma

“It is time for Jekyll’s guests to leave; should I summon ‘is carriage for you?”

“Sweet gods, let’s get out of here.” Maxen grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the carriage.

In the novel Emma, the author, Jane Austen, uses many different techniques to characterize Miss Bates as a woman with no intellect, but a very kind heart. Miss Bates in a humorous character who is loved and loving.

Emma considers Harriet to be rather senseless, she uses gossip to help Harriet get to know the men's background before proceeding into matchmaking. In several occasions Harriet becomes the subject to most arguments between Emma and Mr. Knightley, due to the issues of Emma meddling in her friends business. As Spacks states: "She has become so involved to her immediate social role, in her fantasy of being perceived as powerful, witty, and attractive, that she has lost awareness of others' feelings" (408). In one scene Emma witness Churchill and Harriet acting loving towards one another, her immediate thought is to praise herself: "Could a linguist, could a grammarian, could even a mathematician have seen what she did, have witnessed their appearance together, and heard their history of it, without feeling that circumstances had been at work to make them peculiarly interesting to each other?-- How much more must an imaginist, herself, be on fire with speculation and foresight!-- especially with such a ground-work of anticipation as her mind had already made."

Though at first glance, Emma appears to be a generic romantic novel about virtue and ladyhood, Austen actually challenges what the meaning of “ladyhood” is to the reader. We view Emma’s follies, trials, and triumphs through the eyes of the omnipotent narrator who first describes Emma as a stereotypical, wealthy young lady who is “handsome, clever…with…a happy disposition” (1). Through the use of irony, Austen employs a series of situations in which Emma, a “lady” of high standing within her community, challenges conventional thinking of what it means to be a young woman in the early nineteenth century, particularly her ideas concerning marriage and

“But they did miss me. Quite loudly in fact; the retainers had the castle guard practically turn the place upside down. I seem you recall you getting quite the reprimand for smuggling me out.”

Near the town of Highbury, a village located in the eighteenth century English countryside, sits the estate of Hartfield where Emma Woodhouse resides with her health conscious father who finds fault with all of life's necessities. When Emma's governess and close comrade, Miss Taylor, marries Mr. Weston, an affluent neighbor, and moves to his nearby estate, sociable Emma is forced to find herself a new companion. Harriet Smith, a naive teen who lives at Mrs. Goddard's boarding school, though of a lower class due to her illegitimacy, seems desperately in need of Emma's management and counsel. Sure that she was the cause of the perfect match between Miss Taylor and Mr. Weston, Emma is determined to find

“They haven’t told you yet, have they?” he mutterred in a low voice. We were standing next to the horse stables whilst waiting for my grandmother, cousin, and brother to finish putting the last horse in the field. The sun had seeped down right before our eyes, but we were too deep in conversation to notice. Jacob, my cousin,was different. Yet had ignored this fact to have a good vacation.

Jane Austen’s Emma follows the life of an overindulged, upper class young woman who, after enduring a crisis brought on by her own pride, is transformed from callow and vain, to a state of mental and emotional maturity. On first reading, the audience may perceive Emma’s actions as a repression of feelings, but upon closer inspection one can see that she is not suppressing her emotions but simply does not have the level of self-awareness that would allow her to clarify the difference between right and wrong. It is important to bring to light the connections between self and society, which Austen has embedded into narrative, as they raise the question of who is to blame for Emma’s harmful conduct. She struggles with shedding her arrogance, and the fear she has of facing her feelings causes her to misunderstand those around her, wreaking havoc in the lives of others. Her immaturity is not confined to contextual milieu – Austen’s examination of character and society has universality in its comment on our sense of self and culture, and is as relevant today as it was in the 19th century.