The Conundrum that is Emma Trivia Quiz

Answer: Enscombe

Frank Churchill "seemed to have all the life and spirit, cheerful feelings and social inclinations of his father", (Mr Weston), and " nothing of the pride and reserve of Enscombe". The Churchills of Enscombe were of an important Yorkshire family. Frank had been adopted by his childless aunt and uncle upon the death of his mother. Jane Austen's own brother, Edward Austen Knight, was adopted by childless rich connections.

Answer: Martin

Harriet had been at Mrs Goddard's school with Elizabeth Martin and had visited the family at Abbey Mill Farm, part of the Donwell estate, owned by Mr (George) Knightley. Robert Martin was much taken with Harriet and she was inclined to him before Emma's interference. Miss Nash is head-teacher at Mrs Goddard's; Mrs Hodges is the Donwell housekeeper; and William Larkins is the Donwell estate manager.

Answer: Maple Grove

Insufferable Augusta Elton, nee Hawkins, had married Mr Elton on his rebound from Emma's rejection. Miss Hawkins of Bath, "it might be fairly supposed from her easy conceit, had been the best of her own set. The rich brother-in-law near Bristol was the pride of the alliance, and his place and his carriages were the pride of him.

The very first subject after being seated was Maple Grove, 'My brother Mr. Suckling's seat;'--a comparison of Hartfield to Maple Grove." She is very vulgar and pretentious with her 'Mr. E.' and her 'caro sposo'.

Answer: Aladdin's Lamp

Miss Bates is the kind but poor chatterbox of Highbury, who cares for her aged mother and has her niece, the accomplished Miss Jane Fairfax, to stay. On arriving at the Crown she says, "So very obliging of you!--No rain at all. Nothing to signify. I do not care for myself. Quite thick shoes. And Jane declares--Well!--(as soon as she was within the door) Well! This is brilliant indeed!--This is admirable!--Excellently contrived, upon my word. Nothing wanting. Could not have imagined it.--So well lighted up!--Jane, Jane, look!--did you ever see any thing? Oh! Mr. Weston, you must really have had Aladdin's lamp. Good Mrs. Stokes would not know her own room again."

Answer: Knightley

George Knightley: " 'I cannot make speeches, Emma': he soon resumed; and in a tone of such sincere, decided, intelligible tenderness as was tolerably convincing.-'If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more. But you know what I am.--You hear nothing but truth from me.--I have blamed you, and lectured you, and you have borne it as no other woman in England would have borne it.--Bear with the truths I would tell you now, dearest Emma, as well as you have borne with them.

The manner, perhaps, may have as little to recommend them. God knows, I have been a very indifferent lover.--But you understand me.--Yes, you see, you understand my feelings--and will return them if you can.

At present, I ask only to hear, once to hear your voice.'" He is Emma's perfect knight.

Answer: "No husbands and wives in the case at present"

Emma, "But for Harriet's sake, or rather for my own, and as there are no husbands and wives in the case at present. I will break my resolution now."
Mr Elton: "No husbands and wives in the case at present indeed, as you observe. Exactly so. No husbands and wives."
Emma takes this as intentions towards Harriet, her sitter, when he means Emma, the artist.

Answer: Isabella

Isabella has been married to John Knightley, Mr Knightley's younger lawyer brother, for 7 years and has produced 5 children. The children are Henry, the eldest, named after Emma's father, John, named after her husband, Bella, after herself, little George after Mr Knightley and eight-month-old baby Emma, after our heroine.
"Mrs. John Knightley was a pretty, elegant little woman, of gentle, quiet manners, and a disposition remarkably amiable and affectionate; wrapt up in her family; a devoted wife, a doating mother" "She could never see a fault in any of them. She was not a woman of strong understanding or any quickness; and with this resemblance of her father, she inherited also much of his constitution; was delicate in her own health, over-careful of that of her children, had many fears and many nerves"
Although Jane Austen in her correspondence often mentions women who die "worn out by childbirth", including her brother's wife Elizabeth Bridges Knight, there is no indication that she thought anything of Isabella's 5 children in 7 years.

Answer: Goddard

The other suggestions are the names of her three teachers. Jane Austen continues: "a real, honest, old-fashioned Boarding-school, where a reasonable quantity of accomplishments were sold at a reasonable price, and where girls might be sent to be out of the way, and scramble themselves into a little education, without any danger of coming back prodigies." This is where Harriet Smith resides, "Harriet Smith was the natural daughter of somebody. Somebody had placed her, several years back, at Mrs. Goddard's school, and somebody had lately raised her from the condition of scholar to that of parlour-boarder.

This was all that was generally known of her history."

Answer: Hartfield

"the Woodhouses had been settled for several generations at Hartfield, the younger branch of a very ancient family" "The landed property of Hartfield certainly was inconsiderable, being but a sort of notch in the Donwell Abbey estate, to which all the rest of Highbury belonged; but their fortune, from other sources, was such as to make them scarcely secondary to Donwell Abbey itself, in every other kind of consequence; and the Woodhouses had long held a high place in the consideration of the neighbourhood."

Answer: Taylor

"Sixteen years had Miss Taylor been in Mr. Woodhouse's family, less as a governess than a friend, very fond of both daughters, but particularly of Emma. Between _them_ it was more the intimacy of sisters. Even before Miss Taylor had ceased to hold the nominal office of governess, the mildness of her temper had hardly allowed her to impose any restraint; and the shadow of authority being now long passed away, they had been living together as friend and friend very mutually attached, and Emma doing just what she liked; highly esteeming Miss Taylor's judgment, but directed chiefly by her own." The Westons live at 'Randalls', the third most important house in Highbury after Donwell and Hartfield.

Answer: Lieutenant

"Jane Fairfax was an orphan, the only child of Mrs. Bates's youngest daughter. The marriage of Lieutenant Fairfax of the _______ regiment of infantry, and Miss Jane Bates, had had its day of fame and pleasure, hope and interest; but nothing now remained of it, save the melancholy remembrance of him dying in action abroad--of his widow sinking under consumption and grief soon afterwards--and this girl."

Jane was later adopted by a friend of her father's, Colonel Campbell, who had a little girl of much the same age. It is this Miss Campbell's husband, Mr Dixon, that Emma fantasises is attracted to Jane more than his wife.

Answer: Evil

Evil is a favourite word of Jane Austen's in Emma.
In Emma's first description: "The real evils, indeed, of Emma's situation were the power of having rather too much her own way, and a disposition to think a little too well of herself; these were the disadvantages which threatened alloy to her many enjoyments. The danger, however, was at present so unperceived, that they did not by any means rank as misfortunes with her." Living with her father must have been rather 'gruelling'?

Answer: York Tan

The limited choice was between York Tan and Men's Beavers. Ford's was well patronised by everybody in Highbury. As Emma says "Oh! yes, gloves and every thing. I do admire your patriotism. You will be adored in Highbury. You were very popular before you came, because you were Mr. Weston's son--but lay out half a guinea at Ford's, and your popularity will stand upon your own virtues." He had rapidly patronised Ford's as a diversion, when being cross-questioned by Emma about Jane Fairfax and Weymouth.

Answer: Men

Men will go anywhere for a good meal. Emma is very snooty about the Coles but suffers an emotional volte-face when she is seemingly excluded from their party. "But she had made up her mind how to meet this presumption (an invitation) so many weeks before it appeared, that when the insult came at last, it found her very differently affected. Donwell and Randalls had received their invitation, and none had come for her father and herself; and Mrs. Weston's accounting for it with "I suppose they will not take the liberty with you; they know you do not dine out," was not quite sufficient.

She felt that she should like to have had the power of refusal; and afterwards, as the idea of the party to be assembled there, consisting precisely of those whose society was dearest to her, occurred again and again, she did not know that she might not have been tempted to accept."

Answer: Anna Weston

Apart from Anna, only Isabella's daughter little Emma Knightley exists as a child (8 months old at the beginning). Mrs Dixon may have given birth but we have no information on this. Caroline Otway is an acquaintance of Miss Bates.
Your acrostic should read EMMA KNIGHTLEY MA. Mr. Knightley and Emma's own better self have done a good job in moulding Emma by the time that they marry. She might even deserve the encomium of Mr. Weston's conundrum that M (em) and A (ah) spell perfection.