Original scientific paper

https://doi.org/10.15291/sic/1.15.lc.1

“Please Don’t Tell Mrs. Wattlesbrook”: The Panopticon in Austenland (2007)

Valentina Markasović ; Josip Juraj Strossmayer University of Osijek, Croatia

Abstract

Shannon Hale’s perhaps most famous work, Austenland (2007), is a romance novel centered on Jane Hayes, an Austen aficionado, dissatisfied with her love life. In an attempt to remedy this, she travels to a faux-Regency getaway destination, Austenland. An abundance of regulations and the behavior of Mrs. Wattlesbrook, the owner, create a strictly ruled society. This paper aims to analyze how Austenland’s Pembrook Park represents a society that monitors its subjects by using the concept of the panopticon. Drawing on the theories of Jeremy Bentham and Michel Foucault, the panopticon will be explained as a system in which subjects are under constant surveillance. The concept will then be applied to Hale’s novel to show why the characters abide by Mrs. Wattlesbrook’s rules even when she is not around, with only minor attempts at rebellion. Thus, the novel shows the effective use of a panoptic system in governing subjects in a given society.

Keywords

Austenland, Shannon Hale, panopticon, popular fiction, surveillance

Hrčak ID:

325639

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/325639

Publication date:

15.12.2024.

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