First Impression Friday will be a meme where you talk about a book that you JUST STARTED! Maybe you’re only a chapter or two in, maybe a little farther. Based on this sampling of your current read, give a few impressions and predict what you’ll think by the end.

Synopsis:

Fanny Price’s rich relatives offer her a home at Mansfield Park so that she can be properly brought up. However, Fanny’s childhood is a lonely one as she is never allowed to forget her place. Her only ally is her cousin Edmund. But when the glamorous and exciting Henry and Mary Crawford arrive in the area, Edmund starts to grow close to Mary, and Fanny finds herself dealing with feelings she has never experienced before.

Happy weekend everyone! We have made it through another hectic work week. The first week following the end of the quarter is usually a hectic time for me as I have to prepare several reports. It is doubly more hectic at year-ends and half-year-ends. This is one of the reasons I usually don’t enjoy my birthday but I am still glad I could celebrate it yesterday with some of my friends. Anyway, I hope everyone ended the work week on a high note. I hope the week went the way you wanted it to. I hope that, after a long week at the office, you will be able to recharge and regain some of the manna you’ve lost during the weekend. I hope that you will be able to rest, relax, and reflect. I hope that you were able to pursue things that you are passionate about. More importantly, I hope that everyone is doing well, in body, mind, and spirit.

But before I could officially close the first work week of July and the second half of the year, let me cap another blogging week with a fresh but late First Impression Friday update. We are already halfway through the year. As we chalked up one-half of the year, I hope that the year has been great for everyone. I hope that the second half of the year will also be brimming with good news, blessings, and positive energy. In terms of reading, I will be spending a third consecutive month reading works of European literature; this was a journey that commenced in May. I guess there are just too many works written by European writers I have been itching to read. As these books shuttle me across the continent, I got to experience an enthralling journey that allowed me to explore writers whose oeuvres I have not explored before while, at the same time, reintroducing familiar ones.

Among the familiar names I got to revisit during this literary journey is renowned British writer Jane Austen who I first encountered back in university days. I wasn’t a fan of Pride and Prejudice then but I guess that is more on my lack of appreciation of literary classics. It remains one of the books I want to reread and I am pretty sure my perspective will change. This is the reason why I read her other works, Emma, Sense and Sensibility, and, more recently, Northanger Abbey. However, it has been nearly four years since I read Northanger Abbey. Luckily, during the Big Bad Wolf sale, I was able to cop copies of the two Austen novels I have yet to read: Mansfield Park and Persuasion. Further, I noted how my foray into European literature was lacking in female voices. With this, I decided to include Mansfield Park in my ongoing literary journey.

In a way, Mansfield Park shares similarities to Northanger Abbey. At the heart of the former is Fanny Price, the eldest daughter born to an impoverished family living in Portsmouth. Her father was a disabled sailor who drank heavily. When she was ten, Fanny was sent to the titular Mansfield Park to live with her more affluent relatives. Mansfield Park is a vast estate owned by Sir Thomas and Lady Maria Bertram. The Lady Bertram is Fanny’s mother’s sister. The Bertrams have four children of their own: Tom, Edmund, Maria, and Julia. The Bertram children were all older than Fanny. Fanny also has another aunt, Mrs. Norris, the wife of the clergyman at the Mansfield parsonage. She was also a busybody who ran the Bertram household. However, she was particularly unpleasant to Fanny.

Fanny was also not received warmly by her cousins. Tom was a spendthrift and also a drunk. Maria and Julia, on the other hand, were cruel. They were shallow and were only driven by the desire to marry well and stay fashionable. However, Fanny found companionship with Edmund. Edmund plans to become a clergyman. In her earlier years at Mansfield Park, Fanny felt out of place. This was exacerbated by the discomfort she felt being surrounded by luxury and wealth. However, she slowly got used to the atmosphere as she grew up. She eventually becomes Lady Bertram’s reliable companion, keeping her reclusive aunt company when she stays at home while the rest of the family leaves to socialize.

The novel reverberates with familiar Austen themes. Morality plays a seminal role as the story paints the psychological portrait of the people Fanny met at Mansfield Park. The values of rural communities surface as the story moves forward. Fanny, like most Austen characters, is a spectator and observer as these rural values, including family values, interplay. This is always a fascinating facet of Austen’s works. I am more than halfway through the book and I can’t wait to see how Fanny develops as a character. I am also expecting some romantic overtones but this is an Austen novel. The romance can either blossom or peter out. It will ultimately depend on the character’s motivations. Anyway, I am glad to be back in Austen territory which I hope I get to complete this weekend.

How about you fellow reader? What book or books are you going to take with you this weekend? I hope you get to enjoy whatever you are reading right now. Happy weekend!