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Abstract
Austen showcases her sophisticated authorial craftsmanship and style through the varied employment of rhetorical strategies drawn from her knowledge and thorough understanding of Edmund Spenser’s allegorical Faerie Queene in her novel of manners Emma. Young Jane Austen’s satiric talents are realized within the subtexts of Emma as she imbues the novel with her political opinions and expresses her critique of the Prince Regent. Austen satirizes the unpopular and hypocritical “first gentleman of Europe”(Baker 9) the Prince Regent in Emma by replicating his character within Frank Churchill and contrasting him with Mr. Knightley; Austen’s satire of the Prince Regent was reinforced through allusions to Spenser’s Faerie Queene, Book I, and her utilization of its tropes on duplicity helped her to “fashion an ideal gentleman” and “governor” (Spenser 1) as an exemplar for Prince George. Through the use of free indirect speech and careful placement of minute details Austen is also able to control the readers’ response and enables them to search for and experience finding truth just like Emma and Mr. Knightley. The Prince in his desire for popularity proclaimed himself the “first gentleman of Europe” but in Emma, Austen counters the Price Regent’s claim by “fashioning a true gentleman” exemplar in Mr. Knightley
