Mansfield Nine Trades Mary to Persuasion Navals

Wait Fanny! Captain Benwick would better appreciate Cowper.

(C. E. Brock at http://www.mollands.net/etexts/mansfieldpark/mpillus.html)

In the big leagues of baseball, major league players are traded between teams as often as baseball cards are traded among fans. After her whiff at the plate, our own Mary Crawford was traded to a team that barely has its land legs. At our last JASNA meeting, Marie Sprayberry tantalized us with the idea suggested by Matthew Melko that maybe there were better matches to be made in Jane Austen's works if the characters could be traded among the books like baseball players.

Thus she suggested Fanny might be better matched with Captain Benwick in the Persuasion/Mansfield Park division. After all, they are both of a poetic nature. Then there is the notorious Just Deserts division, where we might find Miss Lucy Steele with Lt. George Wickham and Miss Maria Bertram with Mr. John Willoughby. Ideal teammates indeed.

We had fun at the meeting suggesting other trades and pairing different Jane Austen characters. My favorite was Lady Susan Vernon with General Tilney. I'm sure they could top the Just Desserts division.

Her are the pairings from Marie's talk along with JASNA CWNY's suggestions

Jane Austen “Fantasy Baseball”

A. Marie Sprayberry

JASNA Central and Western NY, April 2016

Matthew Melko’s picks (from his Persuasions 27 article, “Re-Pairing Jane Austen”)

Ladies	Gentlemen
Miss Elinor Dashwood	Mr. George Knightley
Miss Catherine Morland	The Rev. Edmund Bertram
Miss Elizabeth Bennet	The Rev. Henry Tilney
Miss Fanny Price	The Rev. Edward Ferrars
Miss Emma Woodhouse	Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy
Miss Anne Elliot	Col. Brandon
Miss Marianne Dashwood	Mr. Henry Crawford
Miss Mary Crawford	Capt. Frederick Wentworth

A. Marie Sprayberry’s original picks, with more of the “bench players” included:

The Emma/Sense and Sensibility division (with one trade from Pride and Prejudice)

Ladies	Gentlemen
Miss Elinor Dashwood	Mr. George Knightley
Miss Marianne Dashwood	Mr. Frank Churchill
Miss Emma Woodhouse	Col. Fitzwilliam
Miss Jane Fairfax	Col. Brandon

The Persuasion/Mansfield Park division

Ladies	Gentlemen
Miss Anne Elliot	Capt. Frederick Wentworth
Miss Fanny Price	Capt. James Benwick
Miss Louisa Musgrove	Lt. William Price
Miss Elizabeth Elliot	Mr. Thomas Bertram
Miss Mary Crawford	Mr. William Elliot
Mrs. Penelope Clay	Mr. Henry Crawford

The Pride and Prejudice/Northanger Abbey division

Ladies	Gentlemen
Miss Elizabeth Bennet	The Rev. Henry Tilney
Miss Eleanor Tilney	Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy
Miss Jane Bennet	Mr. Charles Bingley
Miss Mary Bennet	The Rev. William Collins
Miss Lydia Bennet	Capt. Frederick Tilney

The “worthy, slightly dull, miscellaneous” division (your help here will be particularly welcome!)

Ladies	Gentlemen
Miss Georgiana Darcy	The Rev. Edmund Bertram
Miss Catherine Morland	The Rev. Edward Ferrars

The “just deserts” division

Ladies	Gentlemen
Lady Catherine de Bourgh	Sir Walter Elliot
Miss Caroline Bingley	General Tilney
Miss Maria Bertram	Mr. John Willoughby
Miss Charlotte Lucas	Mr. James Rushworth
Miss Catherine Bennet	The Rev. Philip Elton
Miss Augusta Hawkins	Mr. Robert Ferrars
Miss Lucy Steele	Lt. George Wickham

Special trade: Mrs. Norris, from the Jane Austen League to the Charlotte Brontë League, to teach at Lowood School in Jane Eyre.

Changes and additions suggested at the April 16 JASNA CWNY meeting in Pittsford:

Ladies	Gentlemen
Lady Susan Vernon	General Tilney
Miss Caroline Bingley	The Hon. John Yates
Miss Catherine Bennet	The Rev. James Morland
Miss Isabella Thorpe	The Rev. Philip Elton
Miss Catherine Morland	Mr. Charles Musgrove (Jr.)
Miss Mary Elliot	Mr. Perry
Mrs. Grant	Mr. Henry Woodhouse
Miss Julia Bertram	Capt. Denny

Still warming the bench by meeting’s end: The Rev. Edward Ferrars, Mrs. Jennings.

Additional suggestions: (1) doing another “fantasy baseball” round in which parents are matched with different children, and (2) doing more trades between the Jane Austen League and the Charlotte Brontë League.

Finally, to wrap up the meeting Marie treated us to her version of "Take Me Out to the Ball Game," newly entitled "Take Me Out to the Jane Game." Unfortunately, there was no video.

Take Me Out to the Jane Game

Miss Jane Austen was baseball-mad,

Had the fever and had it bad,

Just to cheer for her hero team

Every cent

Miss Jane spent.

When one Saturday Tom Lefroy

Called to see if she would enjoy

A dance or a show, Miss Jane said, “No,

I’ll tell you what you can do:

“Take me out to the Jane game,

Take me out with the crowd.

Buy me some pork pies and good spruce beer,

I don’t care if George Wickham is here!

“’Cause it’s root, root, root for the heroes,

If they don’t propose, it’s a shame.

’Cause it’s one, two, three strikes you’re out,

At the old Jane game!”