The tone of Evelina shifts throughout the novel as the story moves from narrator to narrator via the various letters. The tones of the letters written by the two primary narrators—Evelina and Mr. Villars—are worth looking at the closest.
At the start of the novel, Evelina’s tone is an excited and enthusiastic one. This comes across when she writes to Mr. Villars about her time attending her first play at the theater:
O my dear Sir, in what raptures am I returned! Well may Mr. Garrick be so celebrated, so universally admired—I had not any idea of so great a performer […] I am afraid you will think me mad, so I won’t say any more; yet I really believe Mr. Garrick would make you mad too, if you could see him.
While Evelina is excited about her new life in London—going to the theater, spending time with the sophisticated Mirvan women, and attending balls with lots of potential suitors—Mr. Villars is more concerned. The tone of his letters simultaneously reflects his worry for his daughter and his joy at hearing of her thrilling new life. As he writes to Evelina:
I aim not at an authority which deprives you of liberty, yet I would fain guide myself by a prudence which should save me the pangs of repentance. Your impatience to fly to a place which your imagination has painted to you in colours so attractive, surprises me not; I have only to hope that the liveliness of your fancy may not deceive you […] To see my Evelina happy, is to see myself without a wish: go then, my child, and may that Heaven which alone can, direct, preserve, and strengthen you!
Here, Mr. Villars’s tone is that of a concerned parent—as he tells Evelina, he does not want to be “an authority which deprives you of your liberty” while warning her that it’s possible she may not find society in London to be all that she initially believes it to be. Following this warning, his tone shifts into a loving, heartfelt one as he states that Evelina’s happiness is all that he cares about and that he wishes her well.
Evelina’s tone in her letters ends up radically shifting as she confronts the struggles that Mr. Villars implied he was worried she might have to face. She becomes more and more anxious and burdened as men like Mr. Clements harass her, as Madame Duval and the Branghtons embarrass her, and as her friend Mr. Macartney considers committing suicide. Her letters reflect this newly anxious tone. The intensity of the emotions in her letters underlines her sensitivity and emotional intelligence.
Evelina and Mr. Villars both maintain their loving tone toward each other throughout the entire novel—they consistently remind each other of their love for the other, and it is clear that Mr. Villars’s guidance and support gets Evelina through the tough moments in her time in London. At the end of the novel—after Evelina marries the kind-hearted Lord Orville and reconciles with her birth father (Sir John Belmont)—her tone is happy and excited once more, and Mr. Villars’s letters reveal he is similarly content.
The tone of Evelina shifts throughout the novel as the story moves from narrator to narrator via the various letters. The tones of the letters written by the two primary narrators—Evelina and Mr. Villars—are worth looking at the closest.
At the start of the novel, Evelina’s tone is an excited and enthusiastic one. This comes across when she writes to Mr. Villars about her time attending her first play at the theater:
O my dear Sir, in what raptures am I returned! Well may Mr. Garrick be so celebrated, so universally admired—I had not any idea of so great a performer […] I am afraid you will think me mad, so I won’t say any more; yet I really believe Mr. Garrick would make you mad too, if you could see him.
While Evelina is excited about her new life in London—going to the theater, spending time with the sophisticated Mirvan women, and attending balls with lots of potential suitors—Mr. Villars is more concerned. The tone of his letters simultaneously reflects his worry for his daughter and his joy at hearing of her thrilling new life. As he writes to Evelina:
I aim not at an authority which deprives you of liberty, yet I would fain guide myself by a prudence which should save me the pangs of repentance. Your impatience to fly to a place which your imagination has painted to you in colours so attractive, surprises me not; I have only to hope that the liveliness of your fancy may not deceive you […] To see my Evelina happy, is to see myself without a wish: go then, my child, and may that Heaven which alone can, direct, preserve, and strengthen you!
Here, Mr. Villars’s tone is that of a concerned parent—as he tells Evelina, he does not want to be “an authority which deprives you of your liberty” while warning her that it’s possible she may not find society in London to be all that she initially believes it to be. Following this warning, his tone shifts into a loving, heartfelt one as he states that Evelina’s happiness is all that he cares about and that he wishes her well.
Evelina’s tone in her letters ends up radically shifting as she confronts the struggles that Mr. Villars implied he was worried she might have to face. She becomes more and more anxious and burdened as men like Mr. Clements harass her, as Madame Duval and the Branghtons embarrass her, and as her friend Mr. Macartney considers committing suicide. Her letters reflect this newly anxious tone. The intensity of the emotions in her letters underlines her sensitivity and emotional intelligence.
Evelina and Mr. Villars both maintain their loving tone toward each other throughout the entire novel—they consistently remind each other of their love for the other, and it is clear that Mr. Villars’s guidance and support gets Evelina through the tough moments in her time in London. At the end of the novel—after Evelina marries the kind-hearted Lord Orville and reconciles with her birth father (Sir John Belmont)—her tone is happy and excited once more, and Mr. Villars’s letters reveal he is similarly content.
