Fanny Price has grown up acutely conscious of her inferior status as a “poor relation” living with her wealthy cousins, the Bertram family. Yet as she enters womanhood, she dares to love their youngest son, Edmund—from afar. Secret longings aside, there is peace at the Bertrams’ idyllic estate, until the handsome and charming Crawford siblings arrive.
Soon, Fanny finds herself unwillingly competing with the dazzling, witty Mary for Edmund’s affections—and is shocked to acquire a determined new suitor of her own. With five marriageable young people embroiled in courtships, entanglements, and intrigues, it’s only a matter of time before scandal reveals the true feelings of all the residents at Mansfield Park.
Unique in its moral design and its brilliant interplay of the forces of tradition and change, Mansfield Park is one of Austen’s most complex and controversial works.
