Evelina is incredibly charming and contains a devastating depiction of how social conventions endanger young women and make it difficult for them to describe or evade bad actors. The dialogue is sparkling. There are a couple of scenes of bizarrely mean humor that indicate 18th-century English empathy was ... limited. I still recommend it highly.
Belinda is a wreck because it has the wrong protagonist. After reading it, I learned that Edgworth had indeed planned the lead to be the character I found most interesting but was worried they might be too immoral. The actual lead, as you might expect, is incredibly bland. It has some historical interest in the positive depiction of a mixed-race marriage, which apparently was cut out of later editions; you will probably be unsurprised that, despite the intent, the depiction is horribly racist.
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Date: 2025-05-28 03:43 pm (UTC)Evelina is incredibly charming and contains a devastating depiction of how social conventions endanger young women and make it difficult for them to describe or evade bad actors. The dialogue is sparkling. There are a couple of scenes of bizarrely mean humor that indicate 18th-century English empathy was ... limited. I still recommend it highly.
Belinda is a wreck because it has the wrong protagonist. After reading it, I learned that Edgworth had indeed planned the lead to be the character I found most interesting but was worried they might be too immoral. The actual lead, as you might expect, is incredibly bland. It has some historical interest in the positive depiction of a mixed-race marriage, which apparently was cut out of later editions; you will probably be unsurprised that, despite the intent, the depiction is horribly racist.