Edgeworth’s “Castle Rackrent” is an incredible read. I
hardly expected to become so enthralled with the Rackrent saga- who am I to
care about an old Irish estate and its many turnovers into new hands as decades
unfold?
I attribute the quality of this work to Edgeworth’s decision
to write from the point of view of Honest Thady, an estate worker who has built
his life around Castle Rackrent and its progression through time. Had the
narrative been presented in a subjectless third person point of view, the
reader would have lost the sense of personal attachment that Thady adds to his
accounts of each of his Rackrent masters and “his ladies.” Perhaps these stylistic
choices are the elements that most define the Romantic period, as they project a
personalized tint on normal characters and their actions. With any other
narrator, the reader would have missed the connections drawn between Sir Patrick
and Sir Condy, the two masters who Thady holds with the highest regards.
Similarly, Thady pushes the reader to react either negatively or positively to
each of the women that is brought to Castle Rackrent, sentiments that-given
many readers’ disinterest in the intricacies of female characters-would
probably fail to present themselves in a more objective documentation of Rackrent
Estate.
I agree that the power of this story comes from Edgeworth's use of "Honest" Thady as her narrator. He guides the readers attention to what he believes is important throughout the story, that people might not have paid as much attention to. He is a great example of the "unreliable narrator" which was actually a new literary concept that had its beginnings in the 18th century. While we talked extensively in class about how he wasn't exactly honest or loyal as he claimed to be, I also felt that it was very interesting that for most of the novel he actually was more loyal to the Rackrent's then he was to his own son, Jason.
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