Austen: Character and Disposition

     Based on my prior knowledge of Austen’s domestic novel form in general, I wasn’t surprised at how well she develops her characters, and the way she leaves readers feeling as if they know them.
      Austen allows the psychological interiority of her characters to manifest themselves physically, almost as if Austen expects that readers will be able to understand the characters’ emotions based on what they do physically. On Austen’s part, there seems to be many deliberate strategies of interiority to illuminate their dispositions. For example, in chapter two, Austen differentiates between external character and internal disposition.  She notes, “…lest the following pages should otherwise fail of giving any idea of what her character is meant to be; that her heart was affectionate, her disposition cheerful and open, without conceit of affectation of any kind…” (9). Austen continues to describe her mannerisms which illuminate Catherine’s interiority. Here, Austen notes that she will inform the readers of what Catherine’s disposition is like, lest we miss proper interpretation based on her action. Accordingly, I wonder what this indicates in terms of Austen’s employment of the domestic novel? That is, is it so domestic that the narrator must describe the interiority of her characters? It’s nearly as if Austen doesn’t trust reader interpretation of them based solely on what the characters do on the outside.
      One strategy of interiority Austen employs is blushing. For example, at the end of chapter 3, during the dance scene between Mr. Tilney and Catherine, Mr. Tilney asks Catherine what she is thinking of. He says, “not of your partner, I hope, for, by that shake of the head, your meditations are not satisfactory” (17). At this point, Austen writes, “Catherine coloured, and said, ‘I was not thinking of any thing’” (17). Accordingly, her blushing perhaps suggests her sexual naivety. Further interesting, is how Mr. Tilney reads into her physical movements as indicative of internal thoughts. Austen’s link between interiority and outside appearance can illuminate many aspects of character we have looked at in the past. For example, and most interestingly, in Richardson’s Pamela is frequently described to be blushing in the face of Mr. B’s advances towards her. While we have debated whether or not Pamela is truly innocent and naïve to his advances, the fact that Austen employs such strategies of interiority makes me reflect on our previous debates and the reasons Pamela did blush.
      Another example of character versus disposition is in the middle of chapter 9. Austen writes, “Catherine listened with astonishment; she knew not how to reconcile two such very different accounts of the same thing…” (44)… and Austen continues to describe what is going on in her head and how she’s rationalizing the two accounts. This quote reveals Catherine’s two layers: the first is how she is acting on the outside (listening), and the second is her interior thought process. What is interesting is how Austen tells us that Catherine wanted to ask Mr. Thorpe to clarify his opinion but “checked herself” and decided otherwise.
       Just another example of the same point, in chapter 24 after Henry turns Catherine’s suspicions that the General killed Mrs. Tilney, he asks her boldly how she could think such thoughts in the first place. Upon realizing the truth, and feeling shame for her suspicions, Austen writes in a single sentence paragraph “They had reached the end of the gallery; and with tears of shame she ran off to her own room” (136). Here, Catherine cries, but Austen is quick to ensure readers know exactly why she is crying, and what emotions her tears consist of (shame). Thus, the “tears of shame” indicate to the reader that Catherine is embarrassed of her prior suspicions, and she runs to her room in shame and humiliation.
      These types of character behaviors, like blushing and listening attentively, reveal psychological interiority on a far more complex level than anything we have read thus far. While we have established that there wasn’t a particular rise in the novel genre, I do agree with Watt’s argument that Austen was particularly successful in demonstrating a new extent of interiority of characters in the novel.