What I found perhaps to be most interesting regarding Maria Edgeworth's treatment of Anglo-Irish society was her choice of narrator. Thady Quirk is perfectly positioned, both through his longevity and his thoroughly intermediate career as Rackrent caretaker. Due to the fact that he is able to identify neither with the working peasant classes or the aristocracy, we are unable to truly gain an accurate perception of either group.
This is especially evident in regards to the working class. Oftentimes, Irish landowners had worked a plot for generations, only to have it distributed by the English government to a wealthy Protestant. For fear of immense legal trouble and starvation, the peasant would be forced to give up to majority of his crop. Furthermore, the landowner was very rarely physically present (as we see a bit of in Rackrent), as most wealthy Anglo-Irishmen owned flats in London. The unfairness of the arrangement, though, is never fully realized, due to Thady's borderline character.
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