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I finished proofing Jane Austen's "Mansfield Park" last night (I'll upload it to the MR library in the next day or so). I have to say that I have mixed feelings about this one. It's almost unquestionably the toughest of Jane Austen's novels for the modern reader to feel empathy for the protagonist, Fanny Price, because the values she holds dear (which are basically that a woman should be submissive, obedient to those in power over her, and regard virtue as her primarily consideration) are so alien to modern society. Eg, she is shocked and horrified by the scandalous idea that her cousins want to put on a play in their house while their father is absent (and, in fact, the play indirectly leads to one of her cousins, who has recently married, running away with another man, so she is proved right).
I enjoyed the book very much in the end, but it's far from being an easy read.
As a matter of interest, Fanny's appalling Aunt in the book, "Mrs Norris", who pokes her nose into everything that doesn't concern her, was the inspiration for the caretaker's cat of the same name in the "Harry Potter" books.
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