Evelina or the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World by Frances Burney certainly depicts the story of a young girl who comes into a new society. Evelina Anville, the seventeen year-old innocent and sweet heroine of the novel, travels to Howard Grove, London with friends of her guardian’s family. Evelina spends six months in London, during which time she experiences a lot of things, and comes of age, which is inevitably linked to this new society she is thrust into. Evelina relies on her own judgment to learn to navigate the city, and overtime, she also overcomes her insecurities. Evelina’s coming of age is depicted as intricately connected to London itself.
The subtitle of the novel not only suggests Evelina’s entrance into society but also her entrance into the pivotal institution of the family (Burney 21). As an illegitimate child in a society where private matters are made public, Evelina makes fruitless attempts to obscure her lineage from suitors. Burney shows how Evelina struggles from preventing her lineage from becoming public knowledge in the close urban society of London. By showing Evelina as a young girl who is initially ignorant of the world, Burney an outside outlook is provided to the readership on the urban society. Evelina gains some real-world experience in this new society, which is quite contrary to her initial “ignorance” and “secluded retirement” (Burney 95).
Evelina, an example of innocence, and Mr. Villars, Evelina’s guardian is aware of this. This is why he says to her, “Remember, my dear Evelina, nothing is so delicate as the reputation of a woman; it is at once the most beautiful and most brittle of all human things.” (Burney 166). Thus, the society she is thrust into is a place where she must protect her delicacy, her fragility and her innocence above all else. Her social standing is precarious considering the ill repute and uncertainty of her family history, Evelina has to be extra careful in London’s society to avoid encouraging unwanted attention, and risking her chance of securing a good husband.
“But, really, I think there ought to be a book of the laws and customs à-la-mode, p resented to all young people upon their first introduction into public company” (Burney 84). Evelina’s anxiety is apparent from this statement by her, and it reflects the central conflict she has to deal with in the novel. Evelina was initially completely ignorant of the rules she was supposed to follow and wrote about this in her early letters to Mr. Villars. At this point in the novel she laments of who she wishes she could consult from a rulebook when stuck in situations such as the assembly. She refuses to dance with Mr. Lovel there because of his extremely elegant appearance, but she accept Lord Orville’s dance request.
Later, she tells Sir Clement that she is engaged as an attempt to avoid mistake she at the previous assembly; however, she ends getting embarrassed by him in front of Lord Orville. Moreover, Mr. Lovel also embarrasses her at the theater, and she is rattled by his allusions about her low birth. It becomes evident that Evelina does not know the ways of conducting oneself in the midst of such company. The blunders she makes add to her frustration. No doubt, a plethora of rules that guided private and public behavior was a typical characteristic of fashionable society of London in the 18th century, especially when it came to women of the time. It was quite natural for a young woman like Evelina to feel absolutely perplexed if she had no previous experience in such an environment.
As mentioned Evelina struggles throughout the novel to extract herself from dangerous situations, seek advice and counsel, and stave off advances in order to maintain her innocence. Overall, she succeeds in maintaining her reputation, and a loving and rich husband is the reward she gets at the end of the novel. However, by the end of the novel, Evelina is no longer the “young, artless, and inexperienced” (Burney 96) girl she initially was because of her change of setting and also the fact that she is exposed to a wide variety of characters.
Works Cited
Burney, Frances. Evelina (Oxford World's Classics). Oxford University Press, 2008. Print.
