Chapter Summaries

Jane Austen and Reflective Selfhood is now available in ebook and hardback form. You can buy the book or an individual chapter at https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-12160-9

1. Introduction: Selfhood and the Novel

The Introduction sets out the philosophical and cultural background to eighteenth-century understandings of selfhood. It identifies Austen’s engagement with these ideas through her exploration of the key components of selfhood recognised by Locke and Hume and the connection between selfhood and moral responsibility identified by Adam Smith. It considers the presentation of consciousness in the novel and suggests that the insistent critical focus on Austen’s use of free indirect discourse is too limiting. It argues that Austen’s narrative technique raises questions about the interaction between writer, reader and text which resonate with the contemporary discourse on both selfhood and reading practice and suggests that Austen’s focus on reflective selfhood offers new ways of reading her work.

Keywords: Selfhood; The Novel; Reading Practice; Narrative Technique

2. Memory: Continuity, Coherence and Self-Construction

This chapter shows that Austen’s exploration of memory is grounded in the philosophy of Locke and Hume and reflects the relationship between memory, reason and a coherent sense of self. It examines Austen’s focus on memory and coherence in Sense and Sensibility and Persuasion, and on the manipulation of memory in Pride and Prejudice and Mansfield Park, exploring the capacity of the individual to shape her own view of the past and the impact of that on the present. It shows that in each novel, Austen investigates a different approach to memory and uncovers the impact of those approaches on both judgement and a coherent sense of self, reflecting the central place of memory in the philosophy of selfhood.

Keywords: Memory; Selfhood; Judgement

3. Imagination and the Creative Self: The Reader and the Writer

This chapter examines Austen’s focus on imagination and its connections with selfhood and judgement in Northanger Abbey and Emma. It shows how she investigates the paradoxical nature of imagination in Enlightenment philosophy, revising the contemporary view of imagination and reason as oppositional forces. It argues that she calls attention to the limitations of a perspective which rejects imagination and challenges her readers as well as her characters to see the value of creative power and the potential for different readings which it makes possible. By portraying imagination and reason as complementary rather than antithetical approaches, Austen engages with both the duality of imagination in the philosophy of selfhood and the contemporary debate about reading, creativity and judgement.

Keywords: Imagination; Reason; Judgement; Reading Practice

4. Proofs, Probabilities and Ambiguities

This chapter examines Austen’s engagement with selfhood philosophy through her preoccupation with probability, which it identifies throughout her work in both content and style. It shows that the opposition between what is most and least likely inflects Austen’s representation of the tension between the expectations of society and the real experience of the individual within that society. It argues that Austen’s concern with probability also directly informs her narrative style because she uses a range of narrative techniques which repeatedly destabilize the narrative and subvert reader expectation. This frames our responses to her work, inviting us to consider our own interactions with character and text and challenging us to think beyond what is probable in our own reading experience.

Keywords: Probability; Judgement; Narrative Technique; Reader Engagement

5. Sympathy: Self and Society

This chapter explores Austen’s engagement throughout her writing with Adam Smith’s thinking on the relationship between self and society and its implications for moral judgement. It shows, first, her investigation of the impact on judgement when sympathy fails to operate as it should; and second, the need to regulate sympathy and move beyond both personal bias and what is valued by society in order to ground judgement in principle and integrity. It argues that Austen not only demonstrates Smith’s connection between situation and sympathy, and between sympathy and moral sense, but that she also challenges her readers to reflect on the central role of situation in their own sympathetic and moral responses to her characters and raises questions about the basis on which we judge them.

Keywords: Selfhood; Sympathy; Situation; Judgement; Reader Engagement

6. The Reflecting Self: Self-examination and Moral Judgement

This chapter investigates the complex relationship between feeling, reflection and judgement in Austen’s writing and its resonance with Adam Smith’s view that critical distance is a central component in moral judgement. It argues that Austen, like Smith, recognises the intricate balance between feeling and reason which informs judgement, and that she explores that balance in her representation of key characters responding to moral challenges throughout her work. At the same time, she utilizes different narrative techniques to render reflection in her characters, representing the dual perspectives of the divided self within the single consciousness of the reflecting self. The chapter suggests the critical focus on free indirect discourse is limiting. It shows that Austen renders consciousness in a variety of ways to demonstrate the dynamic between Smith’s agent and judge and, in doing so, effectively frames the perspective of not just the character, but also the reader.

Keywords: Feeling; Reflection; Judgement; Narrative Technique

7. Reflection, Reading Practice and Self-formation

This chapter argues that Austen’s work from the Juvenilia to ‘Sanditon’ accentuates the practice of reading as it applies to the interpretation of both text and character: it shows that she consistently explores the connection between reading practice, selfhood and judgement drawn directly from Smith’s philosophy on the development of moral sense and the continuing process of self-formation. The chapter explores how Austen presents reading as both a reflective and constitutive act, emphasising the interplay between sympathetic imagination, lived experience and objective judgement. It shows that, by applying Smith’s theory of critical distance to the practice of reading both text and character, Austen’s work challenges contemporary thinking on the cultural and personal value of novel-reading and on the significance of gender in reading practice.

Keywords: Reading Practice; Critical Distance; Judgement; Self-formation

8. Conclusion: The Effect of a Second Perusal

The Conclusion pulls together the key arguments of the book: that Austen’s work responds to questions about individual identity and moral judgement which were raised first in the philosophy of selfhood; and that her exploration of the building blocks of selfhood – memory, imagination, probability, sympathy and self-examination – combines with a narrative style which specifically calls attention to the reading and rereading of both character and text, and which revises contemporary notions of reading practice. It shows that Austen’s characters come to know themselves through knowing others, through learning to read, intelligently and critically, the world around them and their own place in it. It invites the reader to consider the significance of Austen’s narrative style in provoking critical reading as she challenges us to consider our own responses her texts, and to reflect for ourselves on the questions raised by our readings of her work.

Keywords: Selfhood; Judgement; Reading Practice; Narrative Technique