Emma

The novel begins after Emma Woodhouse has bid farewell to her governess Miss Taylor on the occasion of her marriage to Mr. Weston. Miss Taylor raised Emma and her older sister Isabella after the death of their mother, which happened too long ago for Emma to remember. Since Isabella’s marriage, Miss Taylor evolved more into Emma’s friend than her instructor, meaning that Emma was allowed to do exactly as she pleased. The omniscient narrator judges that the perils “of Emma’s situation were the power of having rather too much her own way, and a disposition to think a little too well of herself” (1).

Emma feels melancholy about losing her companion and at the prospect of long evenings with her father Mr. Woodhouse, who though affectionate is not her intellectual equal. However, she comforts herself with the knowledge that she was the one who made the match between Miss Taylor and Mr. Weston. This was a particular triumph for Emma, owing to the gossip that Mr. Weston, a widower, would never remarry.

When Mr. Knightley, a local gentleman and Isabella’s brother-in-law, comes to visit, he is cuts Emma down to size, saying that she made a “lucky guess” with regard to the match between Mr.