Evelina (Bedford Cultural Editions) (Dover Thrift Editions) (Modern Library Classics (eBook))

by Frances Burney

Edward A Bloom

'Lord Orville did me the honour to hand me to the coach, talking all the way of the honour I had done him! O these fashionable people!' Frances Burney's first and most enduringly popular novel is a vivid, satirical, and seductive account of the pleasures and dangers of fashionable life in late eighteenth-century London. As she describes her heroine's entry into society, womanhood and, inevitably, love, Burney exposes the vulnerability of female innocence in an image-conscious and often cruel world where social snobbery and sexual aggression are played out in the public arenas of pleasure-gardens, theatre visits, and balls. But Evelina's innocence also makes her a shrewd commentator on the excesses and absurdities of manners and social ambitions - as well as attracting the attention of the eminently eligible Lord Orville. Evelina, comic and shrewd, is at once a guide to fashionable London, a satirical attack on the new consumerism, an investigation of women's position in the late eighteenth century, and a love story. The new introduction and full notes to this edition help make this richness all the more readily available to a modern reader.

• ISBN10: 0192840312
• ISBN13: 9780192840318
• Publish Date: 1 May 2002 (first published 1 April 1965)
• Publish Status: Active
• Out of Print: 28 July 2008
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: Oxford University Press
• Edition: New edition
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 499
• Language: English

Reviews

[celinenyx]

Decent intrigue, but the back and forth got tiresome and Evelina's relations are all equally annoying. When I read the blurb, I assumed that the dangers of society that the innocent Evelina encounters in London would include several vices. However, the mean and repetitive danger is that of sexual threat/rape. Every time Evelina goes to any public place, she loses track of her family due to some unfortunate incident, and she is literally grabbed and moved around by several men. One of the most insistent of them, Clement Willoughby, even stuffs her into his carriage and won't stop grabbing her hand while she screams for help. It is truly quite harrowing to read, especially for the feeling of helplessness that pervades the text - despite her constant protestations, Willoughby keeps bothering her, even in the presence of her friends and family members.

While Evelina's troubles might be realistic, they were horrifying to read due to the lack of agency and resources available to her. She has no other hope but to hang onto her chastity, while clearly others are not all that concerned about hurting her or not. Evelina is well-written, and the epistolary format actually worked well for me, but the content was rather bleak and gave me little joy.

---
Trigger warnings: ongoing rape-threat (unskippable), suicide and suicide ideation, death of parent, unwanted/unrecognized by other parent.

[Linda]

I own both the paperback and the kindle edition of this book, and I have read and rated both.

I had to read this for class, and while we only read the beginning in class, I found that to be so interesting I decided to write my final essay using this book. Now, I kind of wish I hadn't.

The pacing is frantic, and Evelina is always speaking quickly and loudly, even though everything actually happens in letters. Evelina's naïvete that I found so endearing in the beginning grated on my nerves after a while, and I just wished she would grow up already.

Some of the problems pointed out are very important, even still today, where women are often seen as objects, needing a man to validate them.