Book Review: Emma is Jane Austen's longest book, and although not much happens, there's little friction, conflict, or plot, the book never seemed too long. Reading Emma just seemed like staying in the fantasy of Austenland a little longer than usual. In these times, the longer the escape into moral safety the better. Austen herself famously said that Emma Woodhouse was "a heroine whom nobody but myself will like much." I believe she was famously wrong, and Emma is adorable, and both Austen and the reader excessively enjoy Emma page after page. After the silent martyrdom of Fanny Price in Mansfield Park (who would better fit Austen's quote), the snobby, self absorbed, spoilt, and misguided Emma is a gem. I found her irresistible, fully alive, because at heart she is always generous, good-natured, and well-intentioned. Of course, my mother always said the road to Hell is paved with good intentions ... . We watch as Emma, a little young for her age, perhaps, learns and grows and joins the world. Along the way we meet some near-Dickensian characters: Emma's father, a tireless hypochondriac, an English fretter who is never happier than when he is miserable; Miss Bates who is incapable of limiting herself to five words when there is time for a hundred or more, never tiring, always happy; the tiresome Mrs. Elton who has the worst side of all of Emma's qualities and haunts every page on which she appears. Austen seems sweet, but sometimes there's arsenic hidden in the sugar. Per usual we see the English class system of the time, with the aristocracy happily oblivious of those toiling below. My only small complaint about Emma is the absence of plot and conflict, in which the most dire events are the accidental unkindness and the occasional snub, but this is amply compensated as we spend so much time inside Emma's and Austen's minds. If the reader has encountered Austen before, how the cast will play out their roles is fairly obvious from the start, but no less enjoyable for all of that. [4★]
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