Model
Digital Document
Publisher
Florida Atlantic University
Description
Passive-aggression is an insidious form of tyranny that uses hypochondria and other tactics to manipulate. Presumably with her mother in mind, Jane Austen frequently portrays the passive-aggressive character and ridicules hypochondria, as in the satirical Sanditon. Mr. Woodhouse and Mrs. Churchill are life-denying parental figures in Emma, who use illness and hypochondria to manipulate their children, much like Mansfield Park's Lady Bertram, who uses hypochondria and social withdrawal to control her family. In Persuasion Mary Musgrove, a young copy of Lady Bertram, uses hypochondria and hysteria to manipulate, and Mrs. Clay passively ingratiates herself with the Elliot family in an attempt to become the next Lady Elliot. Through her novels Jane Austen shows the effects of this damaging, despotic behavior.
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