Miss Marjoribanks
1866
What happens when a young woman decides she's simply better than everyone else in her provincial town, and proceeds to prove it? Lucilla Marjoribanks returns from school to find her widowed father adrift and Carlingford society desperately in need of elevation. Undeterred, she launches a campaign of Thursday evening parties designed to transform the town's social fabric, confident that she knows exactly what everyone needs. Oliphant crafts a heroine who is by turns ridiculous and remarkable, a woman whose absolute conviction in her own superiority is both her greatest flaw and her most fascinating quality. The novel operates on multiple levels: it's a sharp social satire about the ambitions and pretensions of provincial England, a subtle examination of what women could and could not do in Victorian society, and an unexpectedly poignant study of a father and daughter who love each other without quite understanding each other. Lucilla is impossible to admire unconditionally and impossible to dismiss. She wants to be a comfort to her father and a force for good in the world, but her methods are thoroughly, magnificently selfish. This is Victorian fiction for readers who wish Jane Austen had written about what comes after the wedding.
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“Dear Mrs Chiley," said Lucilla, "it doesn't matter in the least what you wear; there are only to be gentlemen, you, know, and one never dresses for gentlemen. (...) Their vanity is something dreadful-but it is one of my principles never to dress unless there are ladies.””
— Mrs. Oliphant
“At first, I always make it a point to give in to the prejudices of society. That is how I have always been so successful. I never went in the face of anybody's prejudices. Afterwards, you know, when one is known ....””
— Mrs. Oliphant
“There is a great deal in choosing colours that go well with one's complexion. People think of that for their dresses, but not for their rooms., which are of so much more importance. I should have liked blue, but blue gets so soon tawdry. I think, (...) that I have enough complexion at present to venture upon a pale spring green.””
— Mrs. Oliphant
“Then there rose up before her a vision of a parish saved, a village reformed, a county reorganised, and a triumphant election at the end, the recompense and crown of all, which should put the government of the country itself, to a certain extent, into competent hands.””
— Mrs. Oliphant
“... Miss Marjoribanks was of the numerous class of religionists who keep up civilities with heaven, and pay all the proper attentions, and show their respect for the divine government in a manner befitting persons who know the value of their own approbation.””
— Mrs. Oliphant
“As she stepped into the steamboat at Dover which was to convey her to scenes so new, Lucilla felt more and more that she who held the reorganisation of society in Carlingford in her hands was a woman with a mission.””
— Mrs. Oliphant
“Yes; Mr Cavendish," said Lucilla. "Do tell me his address. There is not a man in Carlingford who is good for anything, now that he is gone. You must see that as well as I do. As for flirting, I have always said he was the only man that knew anything about it. Do tell me where he is, and I will write to him; or, please, send him word for me, that absolutely he must come back. We are all dying for him, you may say."“I want him for my Thursdays.””
— Mrs. Oliphant
“But the fact is that men do become old fogies even when they have no children to look after, and lose their figure and their elasticity just as soon and perhaps a little sooner in the midst of what is called life than in any milder scene of enjoyment.””
— Mrs. Oliphant
“When a man is brilliant there is always a doubt in some minds whether he is trustworthy, or sincere, or to be relied upon; but an ordinary commonsense sort of talker is free from such suspicion.””
— Mrs. Oliphant
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Oliphant, Mrs.. Miss Marjoribanks. Lex, lex-books.com/book/miss-marjoribanks-5c89deb7-071d-44b0-9509-4a87f01408ae.Oliphant, M. (1866). Miss Marjoribanks. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/miss-marjoribanks-5c89deb7-071d-44b0-9509-4a87f01408aeOliphant, Mrs.. Miss Marjoribanks. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/miss-marjoribanks-5c89deb7-071d-44b0-9509-4a87f01408ae.
