Mansfield Park

Fanny Price is ten years old when she is removed from the poverty of her parents' house and sent to live with her aunt and her rich cousins at Mansfield Park. Never allowed to forget her humble origins, Fanny grows up in the Mansfield household with no allies except for Edmund, her aunt's youngest son and even though she comes to possess that rare beauty which is neither vain nor weak, grounded as it is in astuteness and intelligence, she is never loved nor acknowledged by those in Mansfield Park. When the Crawford brother and sister duo arrive from London, however, to take up residence in the neighbourhood, they set in motion a series of romantic engagements within the Mansfield mansion that lead to scandal, heartbreak and much disrepute. And in the midst of everything must stand Fanny, protecting herself and all that she holds dear, from the wily schemes of Henry Crawford who is more than a bit of a rogue, even as she guards her heart for Edmund. Mansfield Park, published in 1814, remains a unique novel in Jane Austen's oeuvre.