A Spontaneous Burst

"I never should have presumed to think of it at first," said she, "but for you. You told me to observe him carefully, and let his behaviour be the rule of mine--and so I have. But now I seem to feel that I may deserve him; and that if he does chuse me, it will not be any thing so very wonderful."

The bitter feelings occasioned by this speech, the many bitter feelings, made the utmost exertion necessary on Emma's side, to enable her to say on reply,

"Harriet, I will only venture to declare, that Mr. Knightley is the last man in the world, who would intentionally give any woman the idea of his feeling for her more than he really does."

Harriet seemed ready to worship her friend for a sentence so satisfactory; and Emma was only saved from raptures and fondness, which at that moment would have been dreadful penance, by the sound of her father's footsteps. He was coming through the hall. Harriet was too much agitated to encounter him. "She could not compose herself-- Mr. Woodhouse would be alarmed--she had better go;"--with most ready encouragement from her friend, therefore, she passed off through another door--and the moment she was gone, this was the spontaneous burst of Emma's feelings: "Oh God! that I had never seen her!"

The rest of the day, the following night, were hardly enough for her thoughts.--She was bewildered amidst the confusion of all that had rushed on her within the last few hours. Every moment had brought a fresh surprize; and every surprize must be matter of humiliation to her.--How to understand it all! How to understand the deceptions she had been thus practising on herself, and living under!--The blunders, the blindness of her own head and heart!--she sat still, she walked about, she tried her own room, she tried the shrubbery--in every place, every posture, she perceived that she had acted most weakly; that she had been imposed on by others in a most mortifying degree; that she had been imposing on herself in a degree yet more mortifying; that she was wretched, and should probably find this day but the beginning of wretchedness. (Vol III, Chapter 11)

Harriet’s declaration of her love for Mr. Knightly sparks a dual reaction in Emma. Immediately, she is caught in need of a response to her friend’s statement. What will she say? She cannot give Harriet best wishes and hope that Mr. Knightly will return the affections, as this would be a hollow and deceptive gesture—Emma herself loves Knightly, and would be happier that he end up with her than with Harriet. At the same time, she cannot admit to loving Knightly—it would harm her friendship with Harriet, and jealousy of another is something that Emma cannot verbalize. At last, she speaks only a statement of truth: “Harriet, I will only venture to declare, that Mr. Knightley is the last man in the world, who would intentionally give any woman the idea of his feeling for her more than he really does.” Whatever Emma is, she is not a liar.

Then comes the “spontaneous burst” of, “Oh God! That I had never seen her!” Harriet, who was “ready to worship her friend for a sentence so satisfactory,” would have been shocked at Emma’s 180˚, which seems at first glance to be a rampage of hatred towards her friend. Harold Bloom points out that this is a scene of submission for Emma, and that “the acute humiliation of the will could not be better conveyed than by ‘she tried the shrubbery’ and ‘every posture.’” (Bloom 62). Though Emma clearly loves her friend Harriet, her disappointed expectations culminate in this scene, an aesthetic eruption of neurotic energy.

One of my friends told me the other day, “Men will do whatever they really want to do; women are bound by more than you’d expect.” This passage of Emma is such a clear illustration of that. Why does Emma hide her real feelings from Harriet? Picture this scene with two men, and it falls apart entirely. Emma, as imaginative and willful as she is, is still bound by ties of friendship, propriety, and modesty. Emma will never die because women will never die; women like Emma will go on living, forever hiding what they truly feel.