Mary Crawford

Mary Crawford is a major character in Jane Austen's 1814 novel, Mansfield Park. Mary is depicted as attractive, caring and charismatic. The reader is gradually shown, often through the eyes of Fanny Price, a hidden, darker side to Mary's personality. Her wit disguises her superficiality and her charisma disguises her self-centredness. Edmund Bertram, an earnest young man and destined for the clergy falls deeply in love with her. Only at the end of the novel does reality overcome his romantic fantasies and he leaves her with deep regret. There is love and warmth in Mary's character and she is capable of genuine kindness. She grows in respect for Edmund and his values despite her fervent opposition to them. This heightened tension between her moral and materialistic values makes Mary's future search for a suitable husband more complex. She has great potential but it is unclear whether she will ever overcome the corrupting influence of London society's narcissistic culture. First Appearance Mary Crawford, often characterised as the anti-heroine, first appears in the novel in the July of the year when Fanny Price, the shy and apparently insignificant heroine, is eighteen. Mary, accompanied by her brother, Henry, comes to the country with sophisticated London airs, tastes, and manners and with a decided interest in courtship. The Crawfords have been living in London with their uncle, the Admiral, but when he brings his mistress into the house, Mary decides it is time to leave. She fails to persuade her brother to move to his Norfolk estate and take her with him. Mary then accepts a warm invitation from her older half-sister, Mrs. Grant, to live with her at the parsonage where Dr. Grant, her husband and fifteen years her senior, has recently purchased the living. Mary is concerned that she will find the country and the people in it to be dull, but she comes to appreciate it. Character