Characters we have met in real life: Mansfield Park
May. 4th, 2026 12:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nineveh_ukTom Bertram on being upbraided by his father for getting into debt to such an extent that his extremely wealthy father can't get him it out of it without selling the living promised to his younger son.
“I blush for you, Tom,” said [Sir Thomas], in his most dignified manner; “I blush for the expedient which I am driven on, and I trust I may pity your feelings as a brother on the occasion. You have robbed Edmund for ten, twenty, thirty years, perhaps for life, of more than half the income which ought to be his. It may hereafter be in my power, or in yours (I hope it will), to procure him better preferment; but it must not be forgotten that no benefit of that sort would have been beyond his natural claims on us, and that nothing can, in fact, be an equivalent for the certain advantage which he is now obliged to forego through the urgency of your debts.”
Tom listened with some shame and some sorrow; but escaping as quickly as possible, could soon with cheerful selfishness reflect, 1st, that he had not been half so much in debt as some of his friends; 2dly, that his father had made a most tiresome piece of work of it; and, 3dly, that the future incumbent, whoever he might be, would, in all probability, die very soon.
We've all met Tom. We've probably all been Tom to some extent, but usually aged more about 5 than 25. Unfortunately, one can think of people who retain this characteristic many decades later in life.
It's also interesting to see the ordinal adverbs not spelt out as "firstly" etc, which one would expect from a modern novel.
Anyway, I have just restarted reading Mansfield Park. It's been well over a decade since I last did, and Austen seemed a good option for my current project of making an effort to read more for relaxation.
“I blush for you, Tom,” said [Sir Thomas], in his most dignified manner; “I blush for the expedient which I am driven on, and I trust I may pity your feelings as a brother on the occasion. You have robbed Edmund for ten, twenty, thirty years, perhaps for life, of more than half the income which ought to be his. It may hereafter be in my power, or in yours (I hope it will), to procure him better preferment; but it must not be forgotten that no benefit of that sort would have been beyond his natural claims on us, and that nothing can, in fact, be an equivalent for the certain advantage which he is now obliged to forego through the urgency of your debts.”
Tom listened with some shame and some sorrow; but escaping as quickly as possible, could soon with cheerful selfishness reflect, 1st, that he had not been half so much in debt as some of his friends; 2dly, that his father had made a most tiresome piece of work of it; and, 3dly, that the future incumbent, whoever he might be, would, in all probability, die very soon.
We've all met Tom. We've probably all been Tom to some extent, but usually aged more about 5 than 25. Unfortunately, one can think of people who retain this characteristic many decades later in life.
It's also interesting to see the ordinal adverbs not spelt out as "firstly" etc, which one would expect from a modern novel.
Anyway, I have just restarted reading Mansfield Park. It's been well over a decade since I last did, and Austen seemed a good option for my current project of making an effort to read more for relaxation.