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Constance Fenimore Woolson's Anne
Apr. 9th, 2016 01:11 pmI’m still working on Constance Fenimore Woolson’s Anne. I am probably going to be reading this book forever and complaining about it every week, because my God does Woolson shamelessly favor her heroine. Anne ought to be taught in a class entitled “Not Like the Other Girls: A History,” because the narrative is constantly chastising almost every woman except Anne for their foibles. Men can have all the foibles they want, it seems - one of Anne’s father’s foibles is that Anne is the only one of his five children that he actually likes - but God forbid women should have any.
And except for Aunt Lois, who gets a partial exception on account of being a New Englander, none of the women realize that Anne is so very special, while all the men see it. Oh, Anne’s not, perhaps, pretty as yet - every single description of her actually makes her sound beautiful, but no matter - but nonetheless the few educated men on the island recognize that here is a rare girl with an unusual capacity for... something...
It’s not entirely clear what this something is. I think it’s deep thinking, although in fact Anne doesn’t display much capacity for that either - or, at least, Woolson does not see fit to share with us any of Anne’s deep thoughts. She doesn’t even include her own opinions in her own letters - or, more likely, includes her opinions under the guise of objective observations. She's a mere conduit for observation, in contrast to her poor sister Tita, who is constantly chastised by the narrative for her “selfism.”
It's not even that Tita's selfish, mind you; it's not that she demands more for herself than for anyone else. It's the fact that she's concerned about herself at all that the narrative scolds her about. Here's the description of Tita's relationship with her religious advisor, for instance:
"In all his broad parish he had no penitent so long-winded, exhaustive, and self-centred as little Tita. He took excellent care of the child, was very patient with her small ceremonies and solemnities, tried gently to lead her aright, and, with rare wisdom, in her own way, not his. But through it all. in the visits of the Douglas family to the hermitage, his real interest was centred in the Protestant sister [Anne], the tall unconscious young girl who had not yet, as he said to himself, begun to live."
Even Tita's own religious guide prefers Anne to Tita! Everyone on the entire island prefers Anne to Tita! The narrative castigates her for her jealousy - it’s rare for Tita to do anything without Woolson appending the adverb “jealously” - but can you blame her?
"Unconscious" is the key descriptor of Anne here: a modern writer would probably render it as "unselfconscious." Anne is barely conscious of herself or her opinions at all, and this above all else is what the narrative prizes in her.
It's not Anne's fault that her author favors her shamefully. When Woolson stops explaining how everyone on the island loves Anne best and doesn't care for her poor half-siblings at all (the three younger brothers don't even get individual names, for crying out loud!), I start to like her myself. But inevitably Woolson has to get in the way again to tell us how Anne is best.
For goodness sake, even Anne's hands are better than everyone else's! "Strong hands, generous hands, faithful hands; not the little, idle, characterless, faithless palms so common in America, small, dainty, delicate, and shapeless, coming from a composite origin."
Anne, you see, is pure Saxon blood through and through, unlike her half-sister Tita and Tita's unnamed trio of brothers. Their mother was three-quarter French and one-quarter Indian and their hands, I can but presume, are tiny and shapeless and redolent of bad character, which is why after their father dies the only reason their island neighbors are willing to take them in at all is for the love of Anne.
Sorry, I got distracted. Even though Woolson's favoritism is not Anne's fault, sometimes it makes it hard to like Anne anyway. Anne is about to go away to school and I have no doubt she will be baffled by the chattering magpie schoolgirls surrounding her. She will conclude that the fault is in her for not being able to chatter along, only for Woolson to loftily inform us all that this is simply yet another sign of Anne's superiority: not just the fact that she's too deep-thinking for chit-chat, but also that she's so un-self-regarding that she views her inability to chit-chat as a flaw.
And except for Aunt Lois, who gets a partial exception on account of being a New Englander, none of the women realize that Anne is so very special, while all the men see it. Oh, Anne’s not, perhaps, pretty as yet - every single description of her actually makes her sound beautiful, but no matter - but nonetheless the few educated men on the island recognize that here is a rare girl with an unusual capacity for... something...
It’s not entirely clear what this something is. I think it’s deep thinking, although in fact Anne doesn’t display much capacity for that either - or, at least, Woolson does not see fit to share with us any of Anne’s deep thoughts. She doesn’t even include her own opinions in her own letters - or, more likely, includes her opinions under the guise of objective observations. She's a mere conduit for observation, in contrast to her poor sister Tita, who is constantly chastised by the narrative for her “selfism.”
It's not even that Tita's selfish, mind you; it's not that she demands more for herself than for anyone else. It's the fact that she's concerned about herself at all that the narrative scolds her about. Here's the description of Tita's relationship with her religious advisor, for instance:
"In all his broad parish he had no penitent so long-winded, exhaustive, and self-centred as little Tita. He took excellent care of the child, was very patient with her small ceremonies and solemnities, tried gently to lead her aright, and, with rare wisdom, in her own way, not his. But through it all. in the visits of the Douglas family to the hermitage, his real interest was centred in the Protestant sister [Anne], the tall unconscious young girl who had not yet, as he said to himself, begun to live."
Even Tita's own religious guide prefers Anne to Tita! Everyone on the entire island prefers Anne to Tita! The narrative castigates her for her jealousy - it’s rare for Tita to do anything without Woolson appending the adverb “jealously” - but can you blame her?
"Unconscious" is the key descriptor of Anne here: a modern writer would probably render it as "unselfconscious." Anne is barely conscious of herself or her opinions at all, and this above all else is what the narrative prizes in her.
It's not Anne's fault that her author favors her shamefully. When Woolson stops explaining how everyone on the island loves Anne best and doesn't care for her poor half-siblings at all (the three younger brothers don't even get individual names, for crying out loud!), I start to like her myself. But inevitably Woolson has to get in the way again to tell us how Anne is best.
For goodness sake, even Anne's hands are better than everyone else's! "Strong hands, generous hands, faithful hands; not the little, idle, characterless, faithless palms so common in America, small, dainty, delicate, and shapeless, coming from a composite origin."
Anne, you see, is pure Saxon blood through and through, unlike her half-sister Tita and Tita's unnamed trio of brothers. Their mother was three-quarter French and one-quarter Indian and their hands, I can but presume, are tiny and shapeless and redolent of bad character, which is why after their father dies the only reason their island neighbors are willing to take them in at all is for the love of Anne.
Sorry, I got distracted. Even though Woolson's favoritism is not Anne's fault, sometimes it makes it hard to like Anne anyway. Anne is about to go away to school and I have no doubt she will be baffled by the chattering magpie schoolgirls surrounding her. She will conclude that the fault is in her for not being able to chatter along, only for Woolson to loftily inform us all that this is simply yet another sign of Anne's superiority: not just the fact that she's too deep-thinking for chit-chat, but also that she's so un-self-regarding that she views her inability to chit-chat as a flaw.
