Who’s going to be triggered by Northanger Abbey? It’s hardly Game of Thrones | Catherine Bennett

Greenwich University is warning students to prepare themselves for the ‘toxic friendships’ Jane Austen satirises in her novel

Spoilers – but does it matter? Now Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey is identified by a British university as a vehicle for potentially disturbing “gender stereotypes” and “toxic relationships and friendships”, perhaps the safest way to approach the satire is, if at all, second hand.

The University of Greenwich’s trigger warning (TW) is for undergraduates, but since the original intention of such alerts was to prepare readers for some possible reminder of upsetting experiences, it’s older ones who should be most grateful for this vigilance. Who, after all, is likely to have squeezed in more toxic relationships or suffered more acutely from gender stereotyping? Can such a novel be considered remotely safe for mature women, even those of us too young to have been jilted by an army captain in a Georgian pump room? Plainly, since Greenwich has stuck a warning on it, not.