ABSTRACT
The eccentricities of the Cranford inhabitants, for example, recalled from the safety of an adult perspective but recorded with the immediacy of a child's, become a laughing matter. Although steeped in a child's perspective, the humor of Cranford is far from innocent. Humor serves Mary and Peter not only as a means of assault against patriarchal authority, but as a defense against the conscious knowledge of that assault. Even more crucial to the pervasive humor of Cranford than the memorable contributions of its joking characters are the narrator's jokes—as distinct from those attributed to the thought or speech of the character Mary. The persona-protective quality of the narrator's humor extends even to the linguistic fabric of the novel, to the tropes, signs, grammar, and other discursive elements that comprise its means of circulation. Although denied overt expression in a culture that disallowed female perspectives generally, such daughterly conflict yet finds voice in the humor of Cranford.
