Mansfield Park is a study of three families - the Bertrams, the Crawfords and the Prices - with the isolated figure of the heroine, Fanny Price, at its centre.
Fanny's quiet passivity, her steadfast loyalty, and love for the son of the Bertram family who regard her as the poor relation, and who have taken her under their roof, are among the qualities whose true worth is not appreciated until they are tried against the brilliant and witty Mary and Henry Crawford, the unfortunate consequences of whose influence are felt by everyone.
Jane Austen uses Fanny's emotional involvement with the people around her to explore the social and moral values by which she and they try to order their lives.
Note: There is another version of Mansfield Park uploaded by HarryT which is worth considering. The main differences known to me are:
- HarryT's version has illustrations, whereas this one doesn't.
- This version, although originally derived from Gutenberg sources, has been carefully edited to conform as closely as possible to Jane Austen's original novel as documented by the R. W. Chapman edition of 1923, as documented in turn by the Penguin Classics edition of 1966 and the Oxford World's Classics edition of 1980. This has involved a few spelling, but very many punctuation changes, which (to me) make the novel a subtly different reading experience.
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