“She misunderstands everything, gets excited and ultimately becomes disappointed. Catherine can be described as an anti-heroine. Austen writes: “it may be stated, for the reader’s more certain information lest the following pages should otherwise fail of giving any idea of what her character is meant to be that her heat was affectionate and her mind about as ignorant and uninformed as the female mind at seventeen usually is” (Austen Chapter 2).įurthermore, the reader is told from the beginning of the story that Catherine is not a heroine, so the parody starts to shine through. In the novel, Austen has a distinct narrator, one that speaks to the reader. Indeed, by mocking Ann Radcliffe’s moral substance, one cannot be sure whether she praises virtue or villainy” (Chevaleyre 21). Yet she does not totally reject the model she is mocking. Jane Austen teases Ann Radcliffe’s style from beginning to end. “Like many novels of the eighteenth century, Austen’s work mocks the sentimental novel. Furthermore, Northanger Abbey is also a parody, imitating Ann Radcliff’s The Mysteries of Udolpho by creating a similar plot, tone, and characters. Northanger Abbey is a satire because it mocks eighteenth-century literature, specifically Radcliffian Gothic literature. Austen utilizes all of these elements in her novel with a twist and turns them into an ordinary, mundane element.Ī satire is defined as the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people’s stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues, intended to arouse amused contempt for its target. Gothic novels consist, for the most part, of a gloomy setting, supernatural beings, curses or prophecies, damsels in distress, romance and heroes. Northanger Abbey, Jane Austen’s first novel gives Catherine Morland the opportunity to make new friends, meet romantic interests and live the mysteries of her Gothic novels on a coming-of-age tale.

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