Story summary
Northanger Abbey summary
A young woman who has read too many Gothic novels goes to Bath and then to a famous old abbey, hoping for a mystery, and finds something more surprising: real people.
Catherine Morland is seventeen, the daughter of a country clergyman, and she has no particular beauty or accomplishment. What she does have is a head full of Gothic novels, with their black veils, locked cabinets and haunted abbeys. When the Allens invite her to Bath for the winter season, she is sure her real adventure has begun.
This is a comedy of manners with a little Gothic fun in it. It is about friendship, first love, and learning to see people as they are, and it should suit readers who enjoy Jane Austen's wit, a heroine who is allowed to make mistakes, and a gentle tease of the novels people love to read.
Main characters
The plot
Spoilers from here on, including the ending.
Fullerton and the road to Bath
Catherine grows up at Fullerton Parsonage, a lively girl who prefers cricket to scales. At seventeen she dreams of mysterious abbeys. Mr. and Mrs. Allen invite her to Bath, and her mother lets her go.
Friends and rivals in Bath
At first Catherine knows no one in the ballrooms. Then Henry Tilney is introduced to her, dances with her and teases her about the conversation of a Bath gentleman. Soon she meets Isabella Thorpe, who swears a quick friendship, and Isabella's loud brother John, who hauls Catherine off for a gig ride and tells her a lie so she misses a walk with Henry and his sister Eleanor. Catherine apologizes to Eleanor in person and the Tilneys forgive her.
An engagement and a flirtation
James Morland arrives and becomes engaged to Isabella. John Thorpe hints at courting Catherine and boasts to General Tilney that she is a great heiress. Captain Frederick Tilney arrives and Isabella flirts with him while still engaged. The General, thinking Catherine rich, invites her to Northanger Abbey.
The abbey of her dreams
Henry tells Catherine a Gothic tale on the drive, and she arrives expecting horrors. She finds a modern house with comfortable grates, but she still opens a black cabinet at night and discovers a roll of papers. In the morning it is a washing bill. Her imagination is not cured: she decides General Tilney murdered his wife, sneaks into the late Mrs. Tilney's room, and finds only a bright, ordinary bedroom. Henry catches her in the gallery and gently shames her out of her fantasy.
Letters and Woodston
James writes that Isabella has broken their engagement for Captain Tilney. Isabella later writes to Catherine as if nothing is wrong, and Catherine refuses to answer. A visit to Henry's parsonage at Woodston makes her feel at home.
Sent away
While Henry is away, the General returns from London in a fury and orders Catherine out at seven the next morning with no carriage. She goes home alone by public coach, with money Eleanor presses on her.
The proposal and the wedding
At Fullerton, Henry rides up and explains that John Thorpe told his father Catherine was poor. He says he told his father he would not be kept from her. He proposes in the meadow and Catherine accepts. When Eleanor marries a Viscount, the General gives his consent, and Catherine and Henry marry at Fullerton and begin their life at Woodston.
Themes
- Imagination and reality
- Catherine reads real life through the novels she loves and gets it wrong, imagining a murderer where there is only a stern and snobbish man. The book teaches her to look at what is in front of her.
- True and false friendship
- Isabella makes grand promises and drops them when something better comes along, while Eleanor says little and stands by Catherine. Catherine learns to judge friends by what they do.
- Money and marriage
- General Tilney welcomes Catherine when he thinks she is rich and expels her when he believes she is poor. Henry's choice of Catherine for love is set against the mercenary behavior around them.
- The pleasure of reading
- Henry defends novels and enjoys them, and the story laughs at Gothic excess without scorning the habit of reading. Catherine's love of books is part of what makes her lovable.
Questions about Northanger Abbey
- How does Northanger Abbey end?
- General Tilney sends Catherine home, but Henry defies him and rides to Fullerton to propose. After Eleanor marries a Viscount, the General consents, and Catherine and Henry marry and live at Woodston.
- Is Northanger Abbey a Gothic novel?
- It makes fun of Gothic novels. Catherine expects secret passages and murder, but the abbey turns out to be comfortable and the villain is a man with ordinary faults.
- Do Catherine and Henry end up together?
- Yes. Henry teases her, supports her when she is ashamed, and then rejects his father's orders for her sake.
- Where and when is Northanger Abbey set?
- The story begins in the Fullerton parsonage, moves to the fashionable city of Bath, then to Northanger Abbey, and ends in the English countryside. It is set in Jane Austen's Regency England.
- Who is the villain in Northanger Abbey?
- Catherine imagines General Tilney is a murderer, but the real trouble is vain, money-minded people like the General, John Thorpe and Isabella Thorpe.