num_pages: 451
description: Emma Woodhouse is a wealthy, exquisite, and thoroughly self-deluded young woman who has "lived in the world with very little to distress or vex her."Jane Austen exercises her taste for cutting social observation and her talent for investing seemingly trivial events with profound moral significance as Emma traverses a gentle satire of provincial balls and drawing rooms, along the way encountering the sweet Harriet Smith, the chatty and tedious Miss Bates, and her absurd father Mr. Woodhouse—a memorable gallery of Austen's finest personages. Thinking herself impervious to romance of any kind, Emma tries to arrange a wealthy marriage for poor Harriet, but refuses to recognize her own feelings for the gallant Mr. Knightley. What ensues is a delightful series of scheming escapades in which every social machination and bit of "tittle-tattle" is steeped in Austen's delicious irony. Ultimately, Emma discovers that "Perfect happiness, even in memory, is not common." Emma is her most cleverly woven, riotously comedic, and pleasing novel of manners.
language: English
title: Emma
titlecomplete: Emma
characters: Emma Woodhouse, Mr. Weston, Miss Bates, John Knightley, Mr. George Knightley, Mr. Elton, Mrs. Elton, Robert Martin, Harriet Smith, Mr. Woodhouse, Mrs. Isabella Knightley, Frank Churchill, Jane Fairfax, Mrs. Anne Weston
genres: Classics, Historical, Novels, Classic Literature, Romance, Historical Fiction, Literature, Audiobook, 19th Century, Fiction
ratings_count: 848479
places: United Kingdom, Surrey, England, England
publisher: Barnes & Noble Classics