Cecilia, or Memoirs of an Heiress

by Frances Burney, Fanny Burney, Fanny Burney

Book Overview

Cecilia is an heiress, but she can only keep her fortune if her husband will consent to take her surname. Fanny Burney's unusual love story and deft social satire was much admired on its first publication in 1782 for its subtle interweaving of comedy, humanity and social analysis.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0192839098
• ISBN13: 9780192839091
• Release Date: July 1999
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
• Length: 1056 Pages
• Weight: 1.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.6" x 7.7" x 5.1"

Customer Reviews

Too short even though 900+ pages!

This book was too short, even though it was 940 pages. I absolutely love this book and it is in my top 10 favorite books of all time. “Cecilia” takes place in 18th century England and focuses on an orphan heiress, Cecilia. Under her uncle’s will, she will only remain his heiress if the man she marries takes her last name. The central focus of the book is the love story between Cecilia and a man of higher rank. Due to the inequality in rank, their relationship is put through many trials. The book also follows Cecilia and her interactions with her three guardians, as well as the friendships she forms. The book is a commentary on society and class. Do not be intimidated by the length of this book. Burney’s writing and story had me glued to its pages. Cecilia is an amazing character and a strong role model. She is generous and intelligent, though not perfect, providing a realistic depiction. She is also very funny, which I feel like is rare to see in female characters. Cecilia and her love interest (I do not want to spoil his name) are very interesting characters, full of depth. What is wonderful is that Burney writes male characters who are not perfect. He is flawed and it is recognized. This book definitely takes you on an emotional rollercoaster and had my heart racing many times, but it was worth it. If you like Austen, then you will like “Cecilia”. Be aware though that Burney’s work is definitely darker than Austen. It is not Bronte level dark but it has its moments. “Cecilia” is actually mentioned in Austen’s “Northanger Abbey” and “Persuasion”. The title of “Pride and Prejudice” may also have been inspired by “Cecilia”, where one of the characters gives a great speech about pride and prejudice. I cannot recommend this book enough! When I finished it, I immediately wanted to read it again.

One of the first modern novels - engaging and timeless.

It is a known fact that novelist Jane Austen looked upon Frances Burney for inspiration. Austen must have recognized the genius of this late-18th Century female writer, and whether or not she ever matched Burney's multi-faceted quality is still an open question. On the surface, this is the tale of Miss Cecilia Beverley, a young, beautiful and wealthy heiress looking for the suitable match - hardly an original theme. But under this veil, there is the dramatic genius of a novelist whose characters impersonate the virtues and vices of her time in vivid tones much more reminiscent of Dickens than of Austen. Miss Beverley's path to love and marriage winds its way through a series of circumstances, most of which are engendered by her agenda-driven acquaintances, guardians, friends and false-friends. From a dramatic perspective, the pace is quick, and the reader's emotions are immediately engaged for Cecilia - a fresh yet not prudish heroine whose temperate virtues never degenerate into the caricaturesque. Will she find love, or will she succumb to the many traps laid before her? The reader will find many good twists in this regard! An acute observer of human nature, Burney populates her novel with personality-types that are as current today as they were then - from the regretful young man who married into money in a haste to the empty-headed socialite with more wealth than sense. However, the author never presents these characters from a moralizing position - and her implied judgment of some of the characters never borders on the proselytizing. Drama is always kept alive by highly dynamic scenes (I don't want to give anything away, but I assure you that they are good) and by lots of tension between characters. The daughter of a famed musicologist, Dr. Burney, the author manages to weave the thread of her own views on aesthetics, which she does tastefully and unintrusively adding a wonderful dimension to the story. At times you feel like you are sitting at a fashionable dinner-table hearing duscussions about the relative merits of Handel's music versus Italian opera. In all, this remains one of my favorite novels. Although the book is relatively long, the good writing, captivating plot and the tasty character-studies make the read quick and intense. Also, Burney never indulges in lengthy descriptions, off-stage scenes or other tracts that would otherwise slow down the good pace of the story for the modern reader. As a matter of fact, I loved this book and its author so much that I purchased the original 1781 edition. As an interesting aside, Frances Burney's biography makes in itself an interesting novel. She grew up in a culturally-fertile environment, became and expatriate who married a Frenchman in the height of the trouble-years between England and France, and survived a mastectomy without anesthetic to live well into her eighties. Why she is not better known as an author and a great personality remains a mystery to me.

Great Read

I read this novel some 6-7 years ago, after I read Evelina and simply loved it. I loved Cecilia even more. It is true that it is a very long novel but it is very much worth your time. It is about an heiress who will inherit a large amount of money on the condition that the man who marries her will take her surname. She is put under the care of three different people, who represent three different characters. One is a miser, the other is a spendthrift and the third one is: well I don't actually remember the third one. But her emotions regarding the man she is in love with but cannot marry because his proud family will never consent to let him drop his surname,the pain they both feel ... Very very good novel. I couldn't keep from crying in the end.

Why isn't Fanny Burney famous?

Why isn't Fanny Burney famous? That's exactly what I began to wonder after a friend convinced me that I should read Evelina. I thought I hated 18th century literature based on the class I took on it in college--if only we had read Fanny Burney then! She writes with wit and style--it's easy to see why Jane Austen admired her so much! Even though this book is very lengthy, it is not possible to get bored reading it, and although times have changed a lot since Fanny Burney's time, the book still seems alive and relevant to modern readers as many of the unfortunate realities of society that Cecilia struggles with are still with us today in different forms. The characters in this novel are so real you will feel like you know them by the end of the book. Some of the chapters are so funny you will find yourself laughing out loud! I think Fanny Burney deserves to be much more famous. It would be wonderful if someone would make a film of this novel to help spread the word that Fanny Burney's books are great reading!

A great book!

This was truely an enjoyable reading experience. Surprisingly for a book of this time period, it got off right away to a super start and just got better as the pages turned. Burney's ability with the English language was well beyond imressive, it was stunning. She quickly developed an inspired set of characters interacting with one another in delightful scenes. The masquerade ball was hilarious. I heartily recommend this outstanding piece of literature.

Review of Cecilia

Any 18th century novel of manners can make Emily Post seem coarse and rude. The heroine of this novel so high minded and refined that she can only go from a bad situation to a worse one. It was, for this reason, a bit painful to read. This novel is 941 pages long, but it is not boring. The author is a master of the form and can sustain the reader. As an 18th century novel, it is full of information on the way people lived in those days. The author, Frances Burney, has a gift with prose styles and dialects, so that one could easily imagine how people spoke and gestured to each other. Cecilia is a hopeful love story of a young heiress who risks everything for love. The novel resembles the style of novel Jane Austen wrote, but is much more complex and displays much more learning and worldliness because its author, Frances Burney, was much more worldly and learned than Jane Austen. It is too bad that this author is not better known.