Austen Jane - Northanger Abbey

Catherine Morland is obsessed with all things supernatural and mysterious. Are there secrets lurking behind Northanger Abbeys walls? Or is Catherine letting her imagination run wild? This satirical novel by author Jane Austen was published posthumously in 1817. The text is in the public domain. This First Avenue Classics version has placed the text into a new design to make this book appealing and easier to read in both digital and paperback formats. The eBook contains a hyperlinked Table of Contents for navigation. The First Avenue Classics version is unabridged and has been proofed for formatting errors. Errors and alternate spellings found in the original book have not been changed.

Copyright 2017 by Lerner Publishing Group, Inc.

All rights reserved. International copyright secured. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwisewithout the prior written permission of Lerner Publishing Group, Inc.

First Avenue Editions

A division of Lerner Publishing Group, Inc.

241 First Avenue North

Minneapolis, MN 55401 USA

For reading levels and more information, look up this title at www.lernerbooks.com.

In fixed layout formats of this book, the main body text is set in Janson Text LT Std 55 Roman 11/15.

Typeface provided by Adobe Systems.

Library of Congress Cataloging - in - Publication Data

Names: Austen, Jane, 1775-1817, author.

Title: Northanger Abbey / by Jane Austen.

Description: Minneapolis : First Avenue Editions, a division of Lerner Publishing Group, [2017] | Series: First Avenue Classics

Identifiers: LCCN 2016008200 (print) | LCCN 2016013987 (ebook) | ISBN 9781512426182 (softcover : acid-free paper) | ISBN 9781512426199 (eb pdf)

Subjects: LCSH: Young womenEnglandFiction. | Horror talesAppreciationFiction. | Books and readingFiction. | GentryEnglandFiction. | MarriageEconomic aspectsFiction. | GSAFD: Satire. | Love stories. | Gothic fiction.

Classification: LCC PR4034 .N7 2017 (print) | LCC PR4034 (ebook) | DDC 823/.7dc23

LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2016008200

Manufactured in the United States of America

1-41375-23319-7/22/2016

Table of Contents

Advertisement by the authoress, to Northanger Abbey

THIS little work was finished in the year 1803, and intended for immediate publication. It was disposed of to a bookseller, it was even advertised, and why the business proceeded no farther, the author has never been able to learn. That any bookseller should think it worth-while to purchase what he did not think it worth-while to publish seems extraordinary. But with this, neither the author nor the public have any other concern than as some observation is necessary upon those parts of the work which thirteen years have made comparatively obsolete. The public are entreated to bear in mind that thirteen years have passed since it was finished, many more since it was begun, and that during that period, places, manners, books, and opinions have undergone considerable changes.

Chapter 1

No one who had ever seen Catherine Morland in her infancy would have supposed her born to be an heroine. Her situation in life, the character of her father and mother, her own person and disposition, were all equally against her. Her father was a clergyman, without being neglected, or poor, and a very respectable man, though his name was Richardand he had never been handsome. He had a considerable independence besides two good livingsand he was not in the least addicted to locking up his daughters. Her mother was a woman of useful plain sense, with a good temper, and, what is more remarkable, with a good constitution. She had three sons before Catherine was born; and instead of dying in bringing the latter into the world, as anybody might expect, she still lived onlived to have six children moreto see them growing up around her, and to enjoy excellent health herself. A family of ten children will be always called a fine family, where there are heads and arms and legs enough for the number; but the Morlands had little other right to the word, for they were in general very plain, and Catherine, for many years of her life, as plain as any. She had a thin awkward figure, a sallow skin without colour, dark lank hair, and strong featuresso much for her person; and not less npropitious for heroism seemed her mind. She was fond of all boys plays, and greatly preferred cricket not merely to dolls, but to the more heroic enjoyments of infancy, nursing a dormouse, feeding a canary-bird, or watering a rose-bush. Indeed she had no taste for a garden; and if she gathered flowers at all, it was chiefly for the pleasure of mischiefat least so it was conjectured from her always preferring those which she was forbidden to take. Such were her propensitiesher abilities were quite as extraordinary. She never could learn or understand anything before she was taught; and sometimes not even then, for she was often inattentive, and occasionally stupid. Her mother was three months in teaching her only to repeat the Beggars Petition; and after all, her next sister, Sally, could say it better than she did. Not that Catherine was always stupidby no means; she learnt the fable of The Hare and Many Friends as quickly as any girl in England. Her mother wished her to learn music; and Catherine was sure she should like it, for she was very fond of tinkling the keys of the old forlorn spinnet; so, at eight years old she began. She learnt a year, and could not bear it; and Mrs. Morland, who did not insist on her daughters being accomplished in spite of incapacity or distaste, allowed her to leave off. The day which dismissed the music-master was one of the happiest of Catherines life. Her taste for drawing was not superior; though whenever she could obtain the outside of a letter from her mother or seize upon any other odd piece of paper, she did what she could in that way, by drawing houses and trees, hens and chickens, all very much like one another. Writing and accounts she was taught by her father; French by her mother: her proficiency in either was not remarkable, and she shirked her lessons in both whenever she could. What a strange, unaccountable character!for with all these symptoms of profligacy at ten years old, she had neither a bad heart nor a bad temper, was seldom stubborn, scarcely ever quarrelsome, and very kind to the little ones, with few interruptions of tyranny; she was moreover noisy and wild, hated confinement and cleanliness, and loved nothing so well in the world as rolling down the green slope at the back of the house.

Such was Catherine Morland at ten. At fifteen, appearances were mending; she began to curl her hair and long for balls; her complexion improved, her features were softened by plumpness and colour, her eyes gained more animation, and her figure more consequence. Her love of dirt gave way to an inclination for finery, and she grew clean as she grew smart; she had now the pleasure of sometimes hearing her father and mother remark on her personal improvement. Catherine grows quite a good-looking girlshe is almost pretty today, were words which caught her ears now and then; and how welcome were the sounds! To look almost pretty is an acquisition of higher delight to a girl who has been looking plain the first fifteen years of her life than a beauty from her cradle can ever receive.

Mrs. Morland was a very good woman, and wished to see her children everything they ought to be; but her time was so much occupied in lying-in and teaching the little ones, that her elder daughters were inevitably left to shift for themselves; and it was not very wonderful that Catherine, who had by nature nothing heroic about her, should prefer cricket, baseball, riding on horseback, and running about the country at the age of fourteen, to booksor at least books of informationfor, provided that nothing like useful knowledge could be gained from them, provided they were all story and no reflection, she had never any objection to books at all. But from fifteen to seventeen she was in training for a heroine; she read all such works as heroines must read to supply their memories with those quotations which are so serviceable and so soothing in the vicissitudes of their eventful lives.