Literature's Funny Girl

An afternoon with Frances Burney leaves me in stitches

as the author trades sewing for humor...

All right, so my title isn’t quite as witty as something author Frances Burney might come up with, but it’s a start. After spending an afternoon with the formerly- anonymous-now-well-renowned writer, I feel the desire to exercise my (limited) wit in whatever ways I am able. My foray into the world of witticisms began when I met with Burney in a small café near her home.

Chocolate Impressions

At the café, I order tea and a biscuit, while Burney asks for chocolate. “The last time I was here,” she tells me, “they were out of chocolate. I was so upset, I’ve grown quite fond of the stuff, and the gentleman who waited on me could see that I wasn’t happy. He got all flustered trying to persuade me to order something else, he got all tongue tied rattling off the different teas they carry and trying to entice me.” She does an impression of the young man which is quite funny; Burney is known among her friends and family for her accurate impersonations of people, notably former employers. While she sips her chocolate contentedly, she tells me of one incident in which a fellow employee caught her in the act of mocking: “I was making fun of my lady behind her back to some of the others employees, when one manservant came up behind me and chided me for making fun. I, however, kept on, and soon he too was laughing! In fact, he said he was sorry I had not been on the staff longer, to have also made fun of the previous employer!” (9)

"I was making fun of my lady behind her back...when one manservant came up behind me and chided me for making fun. I, however, kept on, and soon he too was laughing!"

“Madam” of the House

After we finish our tea and chocolate, respectively, we settle into more serious topics of conversation; namely Burney’s childhood and home life. She explains to me that her mother died when she was ten (10), and her father, having several young children who needed a mother, remarried soon after. Burney and her brothers despised their new step-mother. She felt that Burney’s writing was not something that should be continued (11). “I hated her for that,” Burney told me. “Writing was my passion, it was all I really had since other avenues of expression were closed to me as a woman. Even writing was not terribly open to women, but I was used to some freedoms within the home. She tried to close those off to me as well.” I ask her how she dealt with her step-mother. “My father was a model citizen, a doctor, in fact. And as such he was very concerned with keeping up public appearances. For all intents and purposes, the Burneys were an ideal family. We always acted happy and polite in public, and my father was very proud of that. But at home things were different. When my father wasn’t around, my brothers and I would act out our anger by using humor. We all hated our step-mother, and so came up with nicknames for her. We called her The Lady, Precious, or Madam (12). We said terrible things about her, just awful. But we always did it in a humorous way, imitating or mocking and laughing about it. It was a great release from all the tension and anger that we felt.” I wonder if the step-mother ever found out? “I think she may have suspected,” Burney says, “but she never had any proof. So she couldn’t very well tell my father that we hated her without having any evidence.

The “Angel” at Home

The only good thing about her step-mother, Burney notes, was that with her came a step-sister, Maria Allen. While Burney tells me that she and Allen were not close, she did admire things about her step-sister’s character. “Maria was like no one I had ever met before in my life. At times she acted like the angel of the house, but Burney saw through this façade into the true interior of her step-sister, who defied the rules of society. In an excerpt from her journal, Burney wrote: “[I]f it is possible, she is too sincere; she pays too little regard to the World & indulges herself with too much freedom and raillery & pride of disdain, toward those whose vices or follies offend her. Were this a general rule of conduct, what real benefit it might bring to society! But being particular, it only hurts and provokes Individuals: but yet I am unjust to my own opinion in censuring the first who shall venture, in a good cause, to break through the confinement of custom & at least shew the way to a new & Open path,” (13).

Rebel Nature

Being from the 21st century where a sense of humor is a coveted trait, I don't quite understand why Burney is considered a rebel. What makes What makes laughter and comedy subversive? "It's all relative," she says, "to female expectations. Anything that goes against the norm is seen as rebellious." But I still don't understand why laughter is against the norm. So I prod further. Burney laughs. "I don't really understand it either," she says. "But apparently men think that laughter will demoralize women. They think that it is all right for them to engage in teasing and joking, but it is just not polite for women to do so. We are even forbidden from laughing in public! (14) So how is Burney trying to challenge the status quo? "In my writing I create characters who use laughter and comedy without realizing its supposed "dangers." Take Evelina, for example, who laughs out loud in public. (15) Comedy is seen as something that is impolite, as it pokes fun at people and things that may be deemed inappropriate (16). Also, anger and agression were seen to be unfeminine, yet they are often the emotions at the root of comedy. So to laugh and make fun are seen as unladylike virtues (17). But I cherish laughter and comedy for its sheer joy. As someone who has dealt with pain early in life, laughter serves as an escape from my negative feelings. As the essayist Francis Hutcheson said in his Reflections on Laughter (1750), "Laughter, like many other dispositions of our mind, is necessarily pleasant to us, when it begins in the natural manner, from some perception in the mind of something ludicrous? Every one is conscious that a state of Laughter is an easy and agreeable state, that
the recurring or suggestions of ludicrous images tends to dispel fretfulness, anxiety, or sorrow, and to reduce the mind to an easy, happy state," (18). I have used comedy in my life to alleviate the pain that I have felt, from my mother's death, my anger toward my step-mother, and my dissatisfaction with things in society (19) One of the things I did to channel my anger was to rewrite a conduct book in a humourous way, in order to show how utterly absurd they are.

After our interview, Burney and I say our goodbyes and go our separate ways. As I walk down the street, I hear a peal of laughter behind me. I smile, knowing that in the 21st century, all women and not just some like Burney will be able to laugh and joke to their heart's content.*

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