Reading Order
Camilla Reading Order
Camilla, or A Picture of Youth (1796) by Fanny Burney is her third major novel and the one that shows her most fully in command of her powers — a five-volume novel of social comedy, moral testing, and the education of sensibility in which Camilla Tyrold, the most spontaneous and least prudent of three sisters, navigates the dangers of fashionable society, falls in love with the worthy Edgar Mandlebert, and nearly destroys both her own happiness and her family through a series of impulsive decisions. The novel is bigger and more ambitious than Evelina, longer and more morally complex than Cecilia, and it shows Burney at her most sophisticated in her treatment of money, embarrassment, social pressure, and the gap between good intentions and good judgment. Camilla is less read today than Evelina or Cecilia partly because of its sheer length (five volumes), partly because Burney's prose has become more dense and complex, and partly because Camilla herself is a more difficult heroine than Cecilia — her impulsiveness creates much of her suffering, and readers less sympathetic to the sentimental tradition can find this frustrating. But Jane Austen was a subscriber to Camilla by name (her name appears in the subscription list), and the influence of the novel on Austen's treatment of sensibility, financial embarrassment, and the intelligent woman misled by feeling is pervasive throughout her work.
Where to start
Camilla (1796) — the Oxford World's Classics edition edited by Edward A. Bloom and Lillian D. Bloom (1983; 2009) is the standard scholarly edition with the essential introduction. The novel is very long; reading Evelina and Cecilia first (in that order) gives the full picture of Burney's development and makes Camilla's more complex morality legible.
Complete Camilla Book List
- 1Buy
Camilla (Oxford World's Classics)
Fanny Burney (ed. Edward A. Bloom and Lillian D. Bloom)·2009·The standard scholarly edition — the Blooms' introduction is the definitive account of Camilla's place in Burney's career and its formal and moral innovations; essential notes on the subscription publication and the novel's reception. - 2Buy
Cecilia
Fanny Burney·1782·The predecessor that most directly illuminates Camilla's concerns — Cecilia's navigation of fashionable London is the more controlled version of Camilla's social adventures; reading Cecilia first shows Burney's development from the precision of the earlier novel to the sprawl and richness of Camilla. - 3Buy
Sense and Sensibility
Jane Austen·1811·Austen's novel of sensibility vs. sense owes the most to Camilla of all her works — Marianne Dashwood's impulsive sensibility and its near-catastrophic consequences are the direct descendant of Camilla Tyrold's impulsive goodness and similar near-catastrophe; Austen had Camilla's subscription copy in her own library. - 4Buy
Emma
Jane Austen·1815·Emma Woodhouse's confident but misguided social judgment is the Austenian development of what Burney was exploring in Camilla — the brilliant, feeling heroine whose excess of feeling (or in Emma's case, complacency) brings her to the brink of disaster before correction; Austen's most Burneyan heroine. - 5Buy
The Wanderer
Fanny Burney·1814·Burney's final novel — the most politically radical and personally revealing of her works; harder to read than Camilla but essential for the complete Burney; Juliet Granville's mysterious poverty illustrates concretely the concerns about women and money that Camilla develops in more social-comedic mode.
Camilla — Frequently Asked Questions
What is Camilla by Fanny Burney about?
Camilla, or A Picture of Youth (1796) by Fanny Burney follows Camilla Tyrold, the most spontaneous and least prudent of three sisters, as she navigates fashionable society and falls in love with the worthy Edgar Mandlebert. But Camilla's impulsiveness — her financial recklessness, her inability to foresee consequences, her excessive sensibility — repeatedly creates disaster for herself and her family, and the novel follows her education in practical wisdom. It is the most morally complex and formally ambitious of Burney's novels, and the one that most directly influenced Jane Austen's treatment of sensibility.
What is Jane Austen's debt to Camilla by Fanny Burney?
Jane Austen subscribed to Camilla by name — her name appears in the subscription list of 1796 — and the influence on her fiction is pervasive. Sense and Sensibility's Marianne Dashwood (impulsive sensibility versus prudent sense) is the most direct descendant of Camilla Tyrold. The concerns Burney explores throughout Camilla — financial embarrassment, the gap between good feeling and good judgment, the intelligent woman misled by her own sensibility, the morally worthy man who withholds his affection because he is uncertain of the heroine's character — recur throughout Austen's major novels. Camilla is, with Cecilia, the primary literary source for Austen's fictional world.
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