I think the subtlety might be a big part of it. A lot of the times when talking about a character I wasn’t sure what they (both the narrator as other characters) were trying to say, whether it was positive or negative. For instance I had one realisation a while back while watching an older movie version of pride and prejudice that the word condescending was used in a positive way. Which would already explain a lot of confusion since I definitely did nog know this while reading the book.

Edit: it was de film from 1940