 Let's examine the character of Mrs. Peniman in Washington Square. Remember that she is Catherine's aunt who when Catherine was a young baby had been invited to stay at the Sloper household in order to help raise her and She just ended up staying there indefinitely. Now, Mrs. Peniman is kind of the comical figure in this story, okay? So in Washington Square, we can kind of see her as the clown-like figure, the Jester at the court, okay? So, you know, whilst Dr. Sloper is like the king of his castle, the Sloper residence, Mrs. Peniman is kind of like the Jester. She's the clown-like figure. Now on the one hand, she is presented as a real romantic, okay? She has these romantic aspirations for Catherine who she raises and she finds Catherine quite plain and very boring and a bit too practical for liking and especially when you know, she sees Catherine and Maurice as having this great affair eloping. And she really tries to meddle in this relationship and to push Catherine towards fulfilling these romantic ideas she has of Catherine, you know, being this great heroine and eloping and doing something totally out of the ordinary. Catherine actually disappoints her because she wants to follow her father's wishes, okay? So Catherine, of course, also decides later on to marry Maurice even if her dad refuses, but she doesn't want to do so in such a dramatic way. So Mrs. Peniman, on the one hand, is shown as incredibly romantic in her ideas and her aspirations, especially for Catherine. However, we can also see her as a very gullible character. She is totally taken in by the external appearance of Maurice Townsend. He's very charming. He really takes to her and Maurice himself can see that she's very easy to manipulate. So he uses her as his gateway into the Sloper household. He constantly filters all of the information that is giving and feeding to Catherine through Mrs. Peniman. He tries to use Mrs. Peniman and successfully so in kind of, you know, changing Catherine's mind, making her fall in love with him more deeply. But of course, once he realizes that Catherine's dad, Dr. Sloper, will not let go of his inheritance and give it to him. He then also tries to use Mrs. Peniman in order to deliver the terrible news that is broken up with Catherine. And all through this, Mrs. Peniman still sees him as this perfect man, the son she never had. The guy who really fulfills this romantic kind of chivalrous ideals that she has in her mind. So she's a very gullible character. But remember, she offers some comical relief within this story. She's very light-hearted, but she's also a little bit aloof, a little bit silly, a bit gullible. So of course, when you're writing about her, if you're writing about her for Washington Square, these are some of the quotations that you can consider. And of course, the language and structural techniques, you can pick out on what she says. Now, the first thing is, of course, when she meddles in Catherine's and Maurice's relationship, and she really wants to see them marry, she wants to see them elope, and she tells Catherine that Maurice, he said he's ready to marry you, ellipsis. It's quite of everything. And of course, the repetition of the pronoun he here shows that Mrs. Peniman is just so committed to this idea that Maurice totally loves Catherine out of the goodness of his heart. And even if Dr. Sloper and Catherine have treated him badly, even if Dr. Sloper refuses to accept him, Maurice is so kind enough to still marry Catherine in spite of everything. So she has this romantic narrative that she has in her mind, and she uses that to manipulate Catherine into also supporting this engagement to Maurice Townsend. The next quotation relating to Mrs. Peniman is when she is defending Maurice's character to Dr. Sloper. She says, you think you know him, but you don't. And again here, the repetition of the pronouns you, she's being accusatory towards Dr. Sloper. You think you know him, you think that he's only after your money, you think that he's this nursery character, blah, blah, blah. But I'm standing up for him. You don't really truly know him. And again, of course, we can see here that she's truly gullible. Dr. Sloper actually doesn't really respect her intellect. He kind of sees her as a little bumbling fool. Remember, he has another sister called Mrs. Arman. Mrs. Arman, he really respects. Whilst Mrs. Peniman, who lives in his house, kind of sees her as a little bit bumbling. And also, he sees her results in raising Catherine as also disappointed because Catherine grows up to be dull, plain, boring. The next quotation, which illustrates Mrs. Peniman's character is, when we learn the deep affection she has for Maurice, she sees Maurice as the son she never had. And the novel states, if Maurice had been her son, she would have certainly have sacrificed Catherine to a superior conception of his future. In other words, what this is illustrating is, Mrs. Peniman would have sacrificed Catherine's happiness, anything to do with Catherine. If Maurice had been her son, she would have committed herself totally and devoted herself totally to his happiness and making what he wants come true. Even more so, even if Catherine was still her niece, she would have more so been loyal to Maurice than Catherine. And arguably, we can see that as she misses Peniman in her actions, she still kind of takes Maurice's side. She totally takes Maurice's side and also doesn't even feel any type of empathy or sympathy for Catherine. She doesn't try and see how Catherine, especially when she's heartbroken, and then Maurice leaves, and then towards the end of the story, Mrs. Peniman tries to get Catherine to see Maurice once more. It still seems like, even after all the years that have passed, she's still on Maurice's side, even if he acted like a coward and totally left Catherine when he knew he couldn't get Dr. Slope's money. Now, going back to this quotation, the main language analysis you can do is the use of sibilants and sun she sacrificed in Superior. Now, the next quotation which illustrates how Mrs. Peniman is disappointed by Catherine who she sees as very boring. Catherine doesn't fit into her romantic conception of how a woman should be swept off her feet and how she should just be, you know, the standstill in distress. Mrs. Peniman is disappointed that Catherine isn't like that. And we learn how she sees Catherine is. She thinks that she was really too modest. So she was really too modest for consistent pathos. Pathos means sympathy. She feels like Catherine, you know, her behavior is too predictable, a bit modest, a bit kind of, you know, very, she's too logical. She's too rational for her. And this loses Mrs. Peniman's sympathy for her. Okay. The next quotation relating to Mrs. Peniman is when we can see again how much she loves Maurice, how taken she is by him. It states, Mrs. Peniman was not a brave woman and Maurice Ellipsis had struck her as a young man of great force of character. Now, the adjectives brave and great force. Again, this kind of presents Mrs. Peniman as very, very, very gullible. Okay. This is kind of her clown-like aspect. She's a jester in the court. Okay. Again, the words brave and great force show how totally wrong she is on Maurice's character. She's totally miscalculated him. She thinks he's the chivalrous guy. She thinks he's a charming man. She's totally taken in by his charms. Again, what we can see here is her naivety, but equally, the naivety of a lot of people in upper class New York society who it just took somebody who looks the part, who looked like a charming man, who looks like a knight in shining armor, and they'll be totally taken in by them. And this person can then still from them or do something against them. Okay. So Mrs. Peniman is very, very gullible and she represents the gullible section of elite New York society who just relied totally on superficial appearances. Maurice looks good. He says the right things. Therefore, he must be a good person. She is totally guided by what she sees on Maurice's external appearance. The next quotation relating to Mrs. Peniman's character is, here we can see her romantic wishes. We learned Mrs. Peniman's real hope was that the girl would make a secret marriage. And this declarative sentence, remember declarative sentences, a sentence that states a fact, feeling or mood. Here we can see that Mrs. Peniman has these romantic aspirations for Catherine. And she's very, very disappointed that Catherine never follows his romantic aspirations. Catherine is a bit more rational and a bit logical. You know, she's not going to let Mrs. Peniman officiate their wedding. She's not going to, she's not going to go off in a lope against her father's wishes. She does decide that she is going to marry Maurice against her father's wishes, but she's not going to do it in a sudden way. However, this goes against, of course, what Mrs. Peniman's real hope was, which is that the girl would just elope. She'd make a secret marriage and then reveal it to society. Okay. Again, what this is illustrating is that Mrs. Peniman is almost like a hopeless romantic. The final quotation relating to her character is, when she tells Catherine, why are you so dry Catherine? Mrs. Peniman said at last. And of course the adjective here dry, you know, this is when Catherine was falling in love with Maurice. And you know, Mrs. Peniman wants to see more emotion. She wants to see Catherine saying, Oh, he's swept. You know, I'm so swept off my feet. Oh, I'm such a damsel. But Catherine, you know, she, she is in love, but she's a bit more muted in how she expresses her love. And Mrs. Peniman, this inviolates her, right? She's saying, Oh, why are you so dry? Why are you not fitting into what I expect women in love should look like, okay, or should act like? And once more, we can see here that Mrs. Peniman again is fairly comical, but equally we can see that it's this kind of gullible mindset that she has, which obviously makes her completely misled by Maurice. And we can also see that this is the reason why Dr. Sloper also really looks down on her. Okay, so that's really it when it comes to Mrs. Peniman's character in Washington Square.