Satirizing the Gothic in Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey

In Northanger Abbey, Jane Austen is satirizing the Gothic genre. It is in response to Ann Radcliffe's The Romance of the Forest. The title of Austen's novel itself is very gothic, giving readers an image of a distant and vast abbey (as in Radcliffe's novel), but the story itself is not.

The beginning of Northanger Abbey sets us up for what is to be a satire of the Gothic genre. The novel begins with “No,” almost as a sort of negation. Catherine, as Austen indicates, was never thought to be a “heroine.” Austen is fighting a gender stereotype that is typical of Gothic novels, and is suggesting that maybe Catherine is simply not heroic.

Parents are often absent in gothic novels. For example, Adeline's mother in The Romance of the Forest is absent. In Northanger Abbey, however, both of Catherine’s parents are alive and well. Austen introduces Catherine’s mother, “a woman of useful plain sense….and, what is more remarkable, with a good constitution” (15). Thus, she is healthy and strong, so there is no inclination that she will die.

            The Morland family is described to be very plain “who seldom aimed at wit of any kind,” (64) and if this does not anger Gothic readers, the following description of Catherine might: “She had a thin awkward figure, a sallow skin without colour, dark lank hair, and strong features” (15). Gothic heroines are typically very beautiful, often as a result of their inner goodness. Catherine, however, is “awkward,” has sickly skin, and lifeless hair. She does not fit the image of the Gothic heroine, and Austen may be suggesting that this image is rather unrealistic. And if Catherine’s lack of physical superiority is not enough, Austen relates to us that Catherine is “occasionally stupid” (16). Catherine does not like to play music, and when it came to writing and accounts, “her proficiency in either was not remarkable” (16). Austen introduces a normal, everyday woman, defying the traditional convention of creating the superior Gothic heroine.

            Austen builds up suspense in Northanger Abbey, as is typical of Romantic and Gothic novels. However, she replaces the supernatural with realism. For example, where a manuscript should be, Austen gives us a laundry list instead! Austen is suggesting that the supernatural is not in nature and that novels should return to the domestic. Austen wrote the same novel six times, believing that domestic fiction will offer women new choices if they lack money or lineage.

Austen is critical of Catherine’s reading of Gothic novels. Isabella enters the room while Catherine is reading Mysteries of Udolpho, and Catherine remarks: “I should like to spend my whole life in reading it” (39). Catherine wants to be in the novel and Austen’s nightmare is that women become the fiction and are steered away from reality. Moreover, Catherine’s perspective is so colored by Gothic novels that she can’t even see English landscape: “ ‘I never look at it,’ said Catherine, as they walked along the side of the river, ‘without thinking of the south of France’ ” (102). Therefore, Austen satirizes the Gothic genre, implying that the domestic novel is more benefiting for women.

It has been very interesting to see how authors experimented with the novel in the 18th century. It seems that Jane Austen is insisting that novels stray away from the Romantic or Gothic genre and instead, focus on a more realistic and advantageous genre, the domestic.