by Yo

Created on: June 14, 2008

Characters in novels can be seen as pawns. Authors, in their need to tell a story, create characters that do their bidding and become the vehicles on which their story travels. In Jane Austen's Emma, the character of Harriet Smith is not only a pawn for the author, but she is also a pawn for all the characters in the story. Without her, the main character, Emma Woodhouse, would not evolve.

Harriet Smith, described by the narrator and all characters as attractive, sweet, docile, and simple, is an orphan of unknown origin who resides in a boarding school. After their first meeting, Emma Woodhouse, a "handsome, clever, and rich" (Austen p. 723) unmarried young woman, sees Harriet as "useful". She is useful as a walking companion, a project for improvement, and then as a further test subject for Emma's matchmaking skill.

Throughout the novel, Emma easily leads Harriet into thinking and feeling as Emma decides she should. Upon receiving a marriage proposal from Mr. Martin, a farmer that Emma feels is "unworthy" of her, Harriet immediately runs to Emma:

"Who could have thought it! She was so surprized she did not know what to do. Yes, quite a proposal of marriage; and a very good letter, at least she thought so. And he wrote as if he really loved her very muchbut she did not knowand so, she was come as fast as she could to ask Miss Woodhouse what she should do." (Austen p. 749)

Upon the encouragement of Emma, Harriet refuses the proposal of Mr. Martin, a catch according to Mr. Knightly, a respected landowner and Emma's Brother-in-Law. She follows Emma's guidance and falls in loves the Vicar, Mr. Elton. Mr. Elton is higher in station than Harriet and is "not at all likely to make an imprudent match" (Austen p. 759). The matchmaking attempt does not result in success and when she discovers that Mr. Elton is not in love with Harriet, Emma admits that she has "talked poor Harriet into being very much attached" (Austen p. 800) to Mr. Elton. However Emma knows, as does the reader, the shallowness of Harriet's feelings, "Harriet's nature should not be of that superior sort in which the feelings are most acute and retentive" (Austen p. 801). Harriet proves more complex in her reaction than her previous behavior leads us to believe she would. She talks endlessly of Mr. Elton, although she admits "[t]he affection of such a man as Mr. Elton would have been too great a distinction" (Austen p. 803). It is not until he publicly humiliates her that she loses her attachment to him.
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