Jane Austen's Synthesis Essay

Elisabeth Lenkos’ article questions Henry Austen’s idea that William Gilpin formed Jane Austen’s taste in her posthumously published novels of Northanger Abbey and Persuasion. Critics do not doubt Henry’s word since the scenery in Austen’s novels reflect his preferences. Lenkos points out that Jane Austen and William Gilpin have different strengths and priorities. Austen wrote about characters with emotional depth and used beauty and sublimity as a backdrop to her characters. Whereas, Gilpin used natural beauty and scenery to paint slight emotional effect to the reader. Austen’s plots emulate her Gothic forebears that she admired, but her story revolves around a coming of age story of a young female heroine, Catharine who evolves into maturity

She dives into Ann Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho, to compare and contrast to Austen’s Northanger Abbey, but has very little to say about Gilpin’s affinity with the picturesque in nature. Radcliffe’s novel is more romantic than Austen’s novel because Radcliffe gives a geography lesson and treats her nature scenes as a character, whereas Austen and Gilpin do not. Austen uses nature as a backdrop to her characters, and Gilpin’s idea is some vague idea of being picturesque. The article did not effectively support the thesis. She did not prove how Gilpin did or did not influence Jane Austen’s writing. If anything, she proved in her article how much Austen learned from Ann Radcliffe and how she had her own writing style. She did not get her writing style from Gilpin. Lenkos did not support the idea of why Henry Austen would pay homage to William Gilpin accompanying his sister’s novel, when in fact, Jane was not influenced by Gilpin. Did Lenkos accomplish her purpose of showing how Gilpin influenced Jane Austen and why Henry would pay homage to Gilpin? No, it does not support the