And Henry's defence

In the end, all Henry Tilney can manage is to argue that history is good for teaching us how to read. Worse, he begins slyly mocking Catherine's intelligence; this is a strange thing for the "love interest" in our story to be doing.

“Very probably. But historians are not accountable for the difficulty of learning to read; and even you yourself, who do not altogether seem particularly friendly to very severe, very intense application, may perhaps be brought to acknowledge that it is very well worth–while to be tormented for two or three years of one’s life, for the sake of being able to read all the rest of it. Consider — if reading had not been taught, Mrs. Radcliffe would have written in vain — or perhaps might not have written at all.”

And then Catherine, having been given the opening to talk about what really interests her, gives what Austen describes as a "a very warm panegyric" on Radcliffe, although she does not report its contents.

"Panegyric" is an interesting word choice here. It is the sort of thing you might give if you were talking on a subject of some importance—perhaps even historical importance. Irony? If it is, it's heavy-handed irony of a particularly obvious kind—like making fun of evangelicals at a Darwin convention—that Austen rarely stoops to.

The thing I want to make clear, however, is that neither Henry nor his sister give us a single reason why history should be read in its own right. Nor do they answer any of Catherine's three cogent criticisms: why aren't more women featured; why aren't there more good qualities displayed in the people history is about; why is it so boring.

Catherine does not say, but could, "It's wonderful that people learn to read with history texts but they could just as easily be learned with other, more entertaining books."

Austen's feminist critique of history

I don't know that there is much to do here other than to let Catherine speak it and let Miss Tilney respond. Here is Catherine:

"The quarrels of popes and kings, with wars or pestilences, in every page; the men all so good for nothing, and hardly any women at all — it is very tiresome: and yet I often think it odd that it should be so dull, for a great deal of it must be invention. The speeches that are put into the heroes’ mouths, their thoughts and designs — the chief of all this must be invention, and invention is what delights me in other books.”

She's right. The men are often good for nothing and the women are usually missing. And she is also correct that the writing of history involves a lot of invention and yet it is usually boring. This is odd, as Catherine notes, because invention is often what makes other writing interesting.
Miss Tilney replies but, and I do so want to like her, she doesn't actually answer any of Catherine's criticisms:

“Historians, you think,” said Miss Tilney, “are not happy in their flights of fancy. They display imagination without raising interest. I am fond of history — and am very well contented to take the false with the true. In the principal facts they have sources of intelligence in former histories and records, which may be as much depended on, I conclude, as anything that does not actually pass under one’s own observation; and as for the little embellishments you speak of, they are embellishments, and I like them as such. If a speech be well drawn up, I read it with pleasure, by whomsoever it may be made — and probably with much greater, if the production of Mr. Hume or Mr. Robertson, than if the genuine words of Caractacus, Agricola, or Alfred the Great.”

But Catherine isn't concerned that the embellishments may be false, she is concerned that they aren't more interesting. We might begin to wonder if either of the Tilney's is paying all that much attention to poor Catherine.

History (3)

You are fond of that kind of reading?”

“To say the truth, I do not much like any other.”

“Indeed!”

“That is, I can read poetry and plays, and things of that sort, and do not dislike travels. But history, real solemn history, I cannot be interested in. Can you?

So, is Catherine Morland just an airhead? The type was not unknown in the Regency. If this book is just a burlesque on Radcliffe, she might well be. And surely she should care.

Austen can be read both ways here. It certainly seems by the end of this that Catherine ought to care about history more. There are two things that make me hesitate though. The first is, as lots of people have noticed, a "feminist" critique of history. The other is that no one listens to poor Catherine.

Language

Before we get back to history, a moment on the great niceness controversey:

The word ‘nicest,’ as you used it, did not suit him; and you had better change it as soon as you can, or we shall be overpowered with Johnson and Blair all the rest of the way.”

Thus did Miss Tilney reprove her brother's mockery of Catherine's language. Whose side is Austen on? Whose side should we be on? It's a friendly little dispute—we don't have to get worked up about it. Brothers and sisters tease each other this way all the time.

The Johnson Miss Tilney refers to is, of course, Sam; and Blair is Hugh Blair. Blair is not so respected now. He has two strikes against him in modern eyes: he wrongly certified the Ossian poems as legitimate and he connected the effective use of rhetoric with social improvement (we would say social climbing).

He was much admired at the time, however, and he was a leading latitudinarian, just like Austen's father. Austen also consistently links effective speaking with social and even moral stature. I'm inclined to agree. No one has to agree with me.

What I think does matter is this. The discussion will now turn to history. Is the point Austen makes here about the value of history or about the value of learning to use language effectively?

History (2)

The discussion of history is book-ended by Catherine's praise of Radcliffe. Henry, providing evidence for those who think Austen is mercilessly mocking Radcliffe, teases Catherine about the language she uses in her praise:

But now really, do not you think Udolpho the nicest book in the world?”

“The nicest — by which I suppose you mean the neatest. That must depend upon the binding.”

But just lines before this Henry has said he is a huge fan of Radcliffe and that was confirmed by his sister so we have no reason to doubt his admiration for the great Gothic novelist. What he is picking on Catherine about is her use of language. Should we agree with him? Here is how the discussion plays out

“Henry,” said Miss Tilney, “you are very impertinent. Miss Morland, he is treating you exactly as he does his sister. He is forever finding fault with me, for some incorrectness of language, and now he is taking the same liberty with you. The word ‘nicest,’ as you used it, did not suit him; and you had better change it as soon as you can, or we shall be overpowered with Johnson and Blair all the rest of the way.”

“I am sure,” cried Catherine, “I did not mean to say anything wrong; but it is a nice book, and why should not I call it so?”

“Very true,” said Henry, “and this is a very nice day, and we are taking a very nice walk, and you are two very nice young ladies. Oh! It is a very nice word indeed! It does for everything. Originally perhaps it was applied only to express neatness, propriety, delicacy, or refinement — people were nice in their dress, in their sentiments, or their choice. But now every commendation on every subject is comprised in that one word.”

“While, in fact,” cried his sister, “it ought only to be applied to you, without any commendation at all. You are more nice than wise. Come, Miss Morland, let us leave him to meditate over our faults in the utmost propriety of diction, while we praise Udolpho in whatever terms we like best.

History in Northanger Abbey (1)

At some point soon I'm going to get to the crucial central chapter (Bk 2, Chapter one in this case).

There are two questions from the first half to deal with first though. The first is the extended discussion of history between Catherine, Miss Tilney and Henry Tilney in Chpater 14 of bk one.

It begins with a discussion of Radcliffe and Catherine's remark that Henry probably doesn't read novels. He asks her why she would think this and she replies:

"Because they are not clever enough for you—gentlemen read better books."

This is not just some fancy of Catherine's. Women read far more novels than men did, as is still the case. And just as the novel market today was criticized for being a lot of crap, so to the market of Austen's day. Sexists of the time argued that the trash was a consequence of the supposedly undiscriminating taste of women.

Nowadays, Sir Walter Scott is not read nearly as much as he was then but he was credited with making the novel respectable in much the same way that Christy Mathewson is often credited with making baseball respectable.

Scott wrote novels that men wanted to read. He knew that Austen was the better novelist but no one else did. His was the name to conjure with. And what Scott did was to introduce history to the novel. The moral pressure to put big important details, such as history, in novels was very real and Austen was determined to resist it. What does she make of history here?