Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    The Complete Novels of Jane Austen
    The Complete Novels of Jane Austen
    The Complete Novels of Jane Austen
    Ebook2,437 pages69 hours

    The Complete Novels of Jane Austen

    By Jane Austen and Ken Mondschein

    4.5/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    This new edition includes all of the completed novels of beloved author Jane Austen.
     

    Jane Austen’s stories of clever women, elusive love, and social mores have struck a chord with millions of fans who consider her work compelling, heartwarming, and essential. Adapted time and again for screen and stage, these enduring classics remain as enjoyable as ever, and are the perfect addition to every home library. This collector’s edition includes all six of Austen’s completed novels: Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Emma, Northanger Abbey, and Persuasion. New readers will be enchanted once they open the genuine leather cover, see the specially designed endpapers, and read these brilliant stories, while readers familiar with Austen's genius will enjoy the introduction from an acclaimed Austen scholar that provides background and context for the works they’ve always loved.
     
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherCanterbury Classics
    Release dateOct 8, 2019
    ISBN9781684129263
    The Complete Novels of Jane Austen
    Author

    Jane Austen

    Jane Austen was born in 1775 in rural Hampshire, the daughter of an affluent village rector who encouraged her in her artistic pursuits. In novels such as Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park and Emma she developed her subtle analysis of contemporary life through depictions of the middle-classes in small towns. Her sharp wit and incisive portraits of ordinary people have given her novels enduring popularity. She died in 1817.

    Read more from Jane Austen

    Related to The Complete Novels of Jane Austen

    Related ebooks

    Classics For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      The Trojan War Museum

      Jul 29, 2019

      The Trojan War Museum
      15 min read

    • Article

      Becoming Jane

      Aug 31, 2023

      Becoming Jane
      3 min read

    • Article

      What’s So Great About Jane?

      Mar 26, 2020

      What’s So Great About Jane?
      3 min read

    • Article

      Pioneering Women

      May 18, 2023

      Professional housekeeper, cook, confectioner, teacher, author; Elizabeth Raffald could be described by many job titles, but the most fitting is probably entrepreneur. Having spent some years working around Yorkshire, Raffald made her name in Manchest

      3 min read

    • Article

      Rewriting Her World

      Feb 18, 2021

      Rewriting Her World
      8 min read

    • Article

      The Life of GENTLEMAN JACK

      May 18, 2023

      The Life of GENTLEMAN JACK
      8 min read

    • Article

      Behind Every Great Woman Writer Is Another Woman

      Nov 15, 2017

      Persistent images of isolation can be used to weaken female power by giving the impression that there are no tried-and-tested models of intellectual collaboration between women. The post Behind Every Great Woman Writer Is Another Woman appeared first

      4 min read

    • Article

      Cosplaying Jane Austen

      Jul 22, 2017

      Cosplaying Jane Austen
      7 min read

    • Article

      Spirits Touching

      Oct 9, 2023

      by Emma Donoghue (Macmillan, $37.99) This novel focuses on two real people: Eliza Raine and her friend Anne Lister, pupils at an English boarding school in the early 1800s. As the background notes at the end helpfully explain, Eliza was born in Madr

      2 min read

    • Article

      Jane Austen Trivia

      Mar 26, 2020

      Who knew that Jane brewed her own beer? In a letter to her sister Cassandra in January 1800, Jane told her, “We are brewing spruce beer again.” During this period, brewing was a traditional chore for women because water was often contaminated and it

      5 min read

    • Article

      Biography

      Nov 30, 2022

      This thoughtful book is as close as we’ll get to a memoir of Wendy Whiteley. Author Ashleigh Wilson, who has known Wendy for decades and also wrote the biography of Brett Whiteley, sat down for a series of conversations over the course of a year. The

      2 min read

    • Article

      Belated Recognition

      Mar 1, 2021

      Belated Recognition
      6 min read

    • Article

      Great Read

      Sep 8, 2021

      Great Read
      5 min read

    • Article

      Many Sides Of The Law

      Mar 6, 2019

      I have been reading a lot of local true crime lately, between my work for this column, and in developing the Nanaimo Museum’s current feature exhibit, Nanaimo Mysteries. This exhibit focused on murders, a safe-cracker, Brother XII’s cult, and the sup

      11 min read

    • Article

      The real Mr Darcy

      Nov 2, 2022

      The real Mr Darcy
      8 min read

    • Article

      The Last Shakespeare

      Mar 6, 2020

      The Last Shakespeare
      5 min read

    • Article

      Story Of A New Zealand Saga

      Nov 8, 2020

      Story Of A New Zealand Saga
      7 min read

    • Article

      Dear Paul

      May 8, 2020

      Dear Paul
      5 min read

    • Article

      Home From Home

      Jun 23, 2021

      Home From Home
      6 min read

    • Article

      Willa Cather, Pioneer

      Feb 27, 2018

      Willa Cather, Pioneer
      10 min read

    • Article

      Great Read

      Sep 8, 2021

      Great Read
      5 min read

    • Article

      Dear Paul

      Mar 10, 2023

      Sometimes when we are researching our family history we stumble across a rather unique story and Colyn Storer and Lynn Plumer found exactly that, when they looked into the remarkable life of Elizabeth Waight. Elizabeth was born on 27 December 1840 at

      11 min read

    • Article

      Heart’s Content

      Jun 18, 2023

      In Emma of 83rd Street, the beloved characters and main storyline of Jane Austen’s Emma are transplanted from the fictional village of Highbury in England to Upper East Side, New York, and it works like a charm. Emma Woodhouse has just finished a deg

      5 min read

    • Article

      Hunter Valley ancestors

      Apr 12, 2023

      Hunter Valley ancestors
      3 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for The Complete Novels of Jane Austen

    4.5/5

    763 ratings21 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      Sense and Sensibility (finished April 2019): Of Jane Austen I think I’d only read Pride and Prejudice, and that was over 20 years ago, so I figured I’d take a run at the whole of her, starting with this one. (I’m mostly allergic to the movie and TV adaptations.)She’s good. Very funny, and shrewd. (Kingsley Amis, Hitchens reminded us, believed that the word “good” and its modifiers—“no good,” “somewhat good,” “bloody good,” etc.—are the only words needed for serviceable literary criticism.)
    • 4/5
      Good collection - have not read them all yet
    • 5/5
      I love Jane Austen and this is a nice collection. It looks nice on the shelf and it's a good size.
    • 5/5
      I have read everthing by Jane Austen, and for a while was a bit obsessed. I loved Pride and Prejudice, as well as Emma, but I also enjoyed Northanger Abby, not one of her most popular.
    • 5/5
      I love all Jane Austin because she's comfortable, she's clever, she's timeless, she's accessible, she's romantic... she's also trendy right now... The best book: Pride and Prejudice, of course. The next best: Persuasion. The one I like the least: Northanger Abbey. And, I should mention that this large book is not the best for: bedtime reading, a purse book, reading in line... etc. :)
    • 5/5
      Austen is so popular because of the television- and movie-adaptations now that she's popular for the wrong reasons, to some degree. She was a superb novelist--and extremely smart about gender, economics, power, and social-class.
    • 5/5
      This bargain book has held up well. The novels included are Pride & Prejudice, Emma, Northanger Abbey, Sense & Sensibility, Persuasion, Mansfield Park, Lady Susan. As mentioned, somehow the publisher has managed to package all of these novels in an easy-to-read typeface and not too unweildy of a volume, including a few quaint illustrations.
    • 5/5
      I think Jane Austen is one of the most brilliant writers ever. Here's why: I've learned quite a bit about how economics work in the world of Jane Austen. And one of the hallmarks of quality work is that it can speak to a multitude of audiences. I happen to be interested in economics. But there are serious issues of gender, class, religion, you name it, Austen's got it there. And of course, you could always read these books for pleasure as well. This is worth putting in your library
    • 5/5
      The complete Jane Austen. My best friend in the world of books.
    • 5/5
      Gorgeous book; stories from a master; one little-known story fragment included
    • 3/5
      For Pursuasion:Much like a modern situation comedy, this story relies on mistaken identity, mischance and misfits to make it work. Much like Pride & Prejudice, we have the story of two people destined to be together if only the details could be worked out. There is folly galore as well as an abundance of social propriety to be got through.Austen’s wit and sarcasm are very much in force in this novel, although slightly less so than in P&P. Once again we’re faced with a bevy of daughters and an entailed estate. Once again the cousin upon whom the estate is entailed does not get one of the principal daughters. He’s a jerk and she finds out just in time. I liked this much more than Emma, but not quite as much as P&P.
    • 5/5
      This is a great book.
    • 5/5
      Can't get enough Jane Austen! This copy of mine is so worn out from reading from it so often! I do have other copies of them all so I trade off so that I don't totally ruin one! Just something about 'em!! ;)
    • 4/5
      I love this book because it has all of Jane Austen's novels in one book. I have had this book a while and this is the first time I actually read through all her books. They are great!!!!
    • 2/5
      Do yourself a favor and go read "Pride and Prejudice." Seriously. It will sweep you away. People think the Stephanie Meyer books are good? Pfft. They obviously need to go read a real romance, not a YA romance masquerading as vampire lit.

      After reading "Pride and Prejudice," though, do yourself another favor and don't bother with the rest of Jane Austen's novels. P&P is the pinnacle of her literary talent, and unfortunately most of her other novels have the same feel--girl meets boy, they go to Bath, girl loses boy, girl gets boy back, they get married and girl's life is miraculously perfect. Oh, and they live happily ever after, of course. With their annoying relatives.

      Personally speaking, I rather liked "Persuasion," as well as parts of "Mansfield Park" and "Northanger Abbey," but nothing glows so brilliantly as "Pride and Prejudice."
    • 5/5
      I love Jane Austen. This was the perfect book for me all of Jane's work in one book. Jane is the queen of classic books that never fade with the times. She is a must read author.
    • 5/5
      No one can beat Jane Austen when you are looking for a good book to read!
    • 4/5
      I got a 99 on this test for Frucci! I liked this book because it made sense. It was a good old fashioned story that was a welcome break from all the Heart of Darkness crap we did. I loved Mr. Darcy: a completely misunderstood guy. I think I drank about 4 cups of tea while reading this book, and spent only one weekend reading the whole thing. On the whole, not as ominous a task as I first thought.
    • 5/5
      And here is another reason why this is the best sort of book: it *is* long, and *patient*, and *content*-- but it has also very short chapters, and very close to reality, so as not to make one.... confused, or, should I say, stressed and, "nervous". I dare not say more. (10/10)
    • 5/5
      Jane Austen. That name conjures up so many different feelings. For some, the name immediately presents an image of long dresses and gloves and carriages, delicious British accents, and all the fun of social intrigue and careful manners. For others, it represents boredom, interminable miniseries (in which nothing blows up and everyone constantly has long and unintelligible conversations), and stuffy classics without any pictures. To this second group, I warn you... this is pretty much a love letter to her work. Read on at your own peril. I was first introduced to Jane Austen through an old thread on NarniaWeb.com that asked people to list their all-time favorite authors and titles. Somehow I had reached my early twenties without ever having read Austen, or even knowing who she was. (We may have watched the five-hour BBC movie when I was younger, but I don't remember anything clearly.) In this thread, this "Jane Austen" person was mentioned again and again. So several months later when I saw a hardback volume of her complete novels at a library booksale, I picked it up. Hardbacks were three for a dollar that day, and this has to be one of my best booksale purchases ever. I read that volume of six novels in two weeks, in a state of utter astonishment and delight. Jane Austen isn't known for expanding readers' horizons and ideas, being concerned primarily with her characters' inner lives and small social circles, but she certainly enlarged mine. Since that first baptism I have reread the novels many times, immersed myself in the many excellent miniseries and movies based on her works, and converted a great many people to the delights of her society (my husband included; to this day there is nothing we enjoy more than curling up on the couch and visiting Regency England for five hours together). I love Jane Austen because she is just so fun. She explodes all the silly notions we modern readers have about the stuffiness and stodginess of "classic literature," and shows us that we are the stuffy ones for indulging in such chronological snobbery. Just because you lived in a time before photography was invented doesn't mean you couldn't have a wicked sense of humor and an eye for the ridiculous. I love Jane Austen because she and I share many of the same moral and religious convictions, and her heroines learn, grow, and change over the course of their stories. They are the kind of characters I can both identify with and admire. And yet Austen is never preachy. I love Jane Austen because her prose style is so impeccable. She says so much with so little, and inferring her meaning helps the reader enter into the story more deeply. She is humorous, but she knows how to be serious. She is entertaining; she is also compassionate. She never crosses into the realm of bitter satire; her sarcasm is playful rather than pushy. Her sharp wit flavors a warm humor and sensitivity. And people think her books are boring!I love Jane Austen because I can read her stories in so many different moods. She can be a comfort read; she can be a challenging intellectual exercise. You can think about her stories and characters purely from a reader's point of view, reading breathlessly for that happy ending you know is coming, reveling in all the fun along the way—or you can go all scholarly and English-majorly on her and write papers about her views on society, her attitude toward the role of women, her thoughts on the domestic arrangements of the time, her criticism of various social hypocrisies, etc. Her novels are always in season.I love Jane Austen because I can talk about her to readers with whom I have nothing else in common. The things to love about her work are so strong that they overcome objections that contemporary readers may have to her worldview or prose style. So yes, I love Jane Austen. And I can think of no better way to celebrate my 500th review on LibraryThing than to express my enduring affection and respect for this body of work that has given me so many hours of pleasure. Thank you, Jane Austen.
    • 5/5
      If you want to strengthen your vocabulary and just feel good about a lovely romantic story, this is the book for you.

    Book preview

    The Complete Novels of Jane Austen - Jane Austen

    INTRODUCTION

    It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a collection of the novels of Jane Austen must be in want of an introduction. The task is not an easy one since, despite her enduring popularity, Jane Austen was writing in a world and for an audience that were vastly different from today’s. This brief essay is intended to introduce the reader to the life and times of Jane Austen and show how even though her themes—love, friendship, gossip, and the difference between appearances and reality—are eternal, the circumstances her characters must contend with were particular to her time and place.

    Moreover, the ways in which Austen dealt with the unequal status of women in her time both in her work and her own life have led many to claim her as a feminist before her time. Her heroines are not mere background in a drama where men move the action, or stock characters who behave in stereotypical ways; far from it, in fact. Elizabeth Bennett, Emma Woodhouse, and Marianne Dashwood are their own people. They have thoughts, feelings, preferences, and judgments (in Emma Woodhouse’s case, sometimes foolish ones). In this emphasis on women’s subjectivity—their internal lives and experiences—her influence on women as readers and writers of fiction has been immense. But Jane Austen was not precociously modern; rather, she did what women in similar positions have done throughout the ages: she strategically managed her talents and advantages to make her way in the world.

    Life and Times of Jane Austen

    Jane Austen was born on December 16, 1775, in Steventon, Hampshire, England. Her father, George, was a clergyman in the Anglican church; both he and her mother, Cassandra, née Leigh, came from old and distinguished families, but neither could expect to inherit much wealth. George’s income was only £200 per year, only twice that of a skilled laborer and one-fifth that of even the poorer members of the gentry class about whom Austen would later write. She had seven siblings: Besides her elder sister, also named Cassandra like their mother, there were her brothers James, who would succeed his father as vicar of Steventon; George, who was developmentally disabled; Edward, who became a wealthy landowner; Henry, who went to Oxford but joined the army instead of the clergy and then became a banker; and Francis and Charles, who both became naval officers.

    Owing to her family’s straitened circumstance, Jane Austen’s formal education was limited. She had only three years of formal schooling, interrupted by a near-fatal bout of typhus. Austen nonetheless received a good education for the time: her father made extra money as a schoolmaster and had a sizable library. In fact, young Jane seemed to be something of a prodigy who, from an early age, entertained her social circle by reading from her compositions and acting in amateur theatrical productions—especially comedies—with her family and friends. Such performances were very fashionable in the late eighteenth century. Austen was also encouraged in her literary aspirations by her father and by Anne Lefroy, wife of one of her father’s colleagues and herself a published author. Among Austen’s early works was Lady Susan, an epistolary novel (a story told through the letters allegedly sent by the characters) she wrote between 1793 and 1795 about a cunning, manipulative, and seductive widow. In its cynicism, Lady Susan is quite unlike Austen’s rather more cheerful later works. Elinor and Marianne was another early epistolary novel; though no manuscript survives, it was later reworked into the core of Sense and Sensibility. In 1796 she began First Impressions, which later became Pride and Prejudice; her father attempted to have it published in London, but it was rejected. Two years later, in 1798, she began Susan, which later became Northanger Abbey. Though the London publisher Benjamin Crosby paid £10 for the copyright, the novel remained unpublished until Austen bought it back from him in 1816.

    Jane Austen’s Steventon years were also marked by her only known love affair. Tom Lefroy, the nephew of Anne Lefroy, came to visit in the winter of 1795–96 during the interval between finishing his college education and beginning law school. However, neither Austen’s family nor Lefroy’s were able to afford marriage; with five elder sisters and six younger siblings, it was imperative that Lefroy make a good match. Austen nonetheless apparently thought much of Lefroy, mentioning him two years later in a letter. In his later years, after having become Lord Chief Justice of Ireland (which was at that time a British colony), Lefroy, for his part, admitted that he had indeed been in love with Austen. He traveled to England to pay his respects when he learned of her death, and later purchased one of her publisher’s rejection letters for an early version of Pride and Prejudice.

    In fact, Jane Austen would receive only one known offer of marriage in her life, from Harris Bigg-Wither, the younger brother of two family friends, in 1802. Bigg-Wither was wealthy but unattractive and somewhat boorish. While Austen initially accepted, she quickly regretted her decision and withdrew her consent. What would have become of Jane Austen’s literary career had she married is, of course, a question we will never be able to answer.

    In contrast to Austen’s nonstop writing from early adolescence to the age of twenty-five or so, the years from 1800 to 1804 were rather less productive. George Austen retired from the clergy and moved his family to the resort town of Bath. Scholars speculate whether his daughter’s lack of productivity was due to depression or a busy social life, but it was only in 1804 that she began writing The Watsons, a novel about an impoverished clergyman with four unmarried daughters—a project she abandoned when her own father died in 1805.

    It was her father’s death and her desire to provide for her family that likely renewed Jane Austen’s drive to become a professional writer. Though her four brothers pledged their financial support, she, her mother, and her sister were forced to move frequently. Fortunately, Thomas and Catherine Knight, the distant relatives who had given George Austen his position as the vicar of Steventon, were childless and had adopted Jane’s elder brother Edward as their heir around 1783. Thomas died in 1794, leaving the estate to Catherine for her lifetime; however, Catherine decided to move to Canterbury and gave the family estate, Chawton House, to Edward on the condition that he change his surname to Austen-Knight. Edward was thus able to provide his sisters and mother a house to live in from 1809 on; Jane Austen’s dear friend Martha Lloyd also lived with them. Colloquially known as the cottage, this was a large seventeenth-century brick building a short walk from her brother’s great house.

    It was while Austen was living a quiet life at Chawton that the publisher Thomas Egerton began publishing her novels—first Sense and Sensibility in 1811, then Pride and Prejudice in 1813, and Mansfield Park in 1814. They were well received, garnering fans that included the prince regent, the future George IV. (George III, who suffered from mental illness, was deemed unfit to rule in 1811; his son, also named George, was named regent to keep the necessary ceremonial aspects of the monarchy going.) Austen’s satirical Plan of a Novel, according to Hints from Various Quarters (not published until 1926) was a parody of suggestions for her next work made by the prince’s librarian, the unctuous James Stanier Clarke. Clarke had invited her to visit the prince regent and suggested she dedicate the forthcoming Emma to his patron—requests that she could hardly refuse, even though she did not approve of the future George IV’s dissolute lifestyle. Emma, on the other hand, was released by John Murray, who also published Sir Walter Scott and Lord Byron, in 1815. Murray offered Austen the small fortune of £450 for the manuscript, plus the copyrights of Mansfield Park and Sense and Sensibility (she had retained that of Pride and Prejudice), but she instead chose to publish at her own expense and pay Murray a 10 percent commission.

    Interestingly, Austen’s name did not appear on her own books in her lifetime; the byline read merely a Lady. A gentlewoman’s accomplishments—writing, watercolor, music—were only intended to enhance her charms for a potential suitor. Of course, a well-born woman would never do such things professionally. Publishing anonymously was a means of maintaining this fiction. But Austen was interested in money: Learning from her experience with Susan, she did not sell the copyright, but rather, the books were sold on commission with the publisher fronting publication expenses and paying Austen royalties. If the book did not sell, she would have been liable for the losses. Because women could not sign contracts, her brother Henry had to act as her agent and back her financially.

    Illness and Death

    Throughout her life, Austen suffered from a number of diseases, ranging from whooping cough to an ear infection to rheumatism. Despite denying that she was unwell and making fun of hypochondriacs, she began feeling seriously ill in early 1816 from an illness retrospectively diagnosed as Addison’s disease or perhaps Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Other misfortunes struck the family in that year, as well: Henry’s bank failed in March, causing his bankruptcy and significant losses to the other siblings, and an uncle’s hoped-for inheritance turned out to have been left entirely to his wife. (Henry would turn back to the clergy, and succeeded his brother James as vicar of Steventon upon the latter’s death in 1819.)

    Despite her near-constant physical decline, Austen finished Persuasion in August 1816 and began work on a new novel known as Sanditon. Fearing for their sister’s health, Cassandra and Henry brought her to Winchester to be nearer her doctor in May 1817. She died there on July 18 at the age of 41 and was buried in Winchester Cathedral. Her epitaph, written by her brother James, speaks of the extraordinary endowments of her mind but does not mention her as a published writer. It was only when Persuasion and Northanger Abbey were published posthumously that her brother Henry contributed a biographical note and publicly revealed his sister’s identity for the first time.

    Regency England

    Unfortunately, we do not have an abundance of information on Jane Austen’s life in her own words. Only 161 of the perhaps 3,000 letters she wrote during her lifetime survive; the rest were destroyed by her relatives—especially by her sister Cassandra, to whom many of them were addressed. The reality of her acid pen was quite in opposition to the image of quiet and respectable Aunt Jane the family later wished to portray—for instance, in Henry’s 1818 Biographical Notice or her nephew James Edward Austen-Leigh’s A Memoir of Jane Austen (1869). But by understanding what life was like in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, we can perhaps reconstruct something of how this brilliant young woman in straitened circumstances understood and dealt with her world.

    Jane Austen’s era is usually referred to as the Regency, defined as the period between 1811, when George III was deemed unfit to rule, and 1820, when his son ascended the throne. It is sometimes extended into the reign of George IV’s brother William IV, who succeeded him in 1830, but ended definitively with the ascent of Queen Victoria in 1837. As conservative as the time seemed to be, with its strict class structures, it was also a time of rapid change. Even as industrialization replaced traditional ways of work with centralized factories, the Enclosure movement pushed farmers off their lands in the name of more efficient agriculture. The French Revolution, which began in 1789, had ceded to Napoleon’s rule in 1799, and from 1803 to 1815 Britain led a coalition of other nations in trying to depose the French emperor. Two of Austen’s brothers saw active naval service in this conflict and Eliza de Feuillide, her cousin, close friend, and sister-in-law, had previously been married to a French nobleman who was guillotined during the Reign of Terror. Nor were things quiet at home: The displaced handworkers, known as Luddites, smashed the machines that had taken their jobs, and the political activists known as Chartists pushed—sometimes violently—for a more representative Parliament and an end to high grain prices and government corruption. Yet, industrialization, Luddites, and Chartists are nowhere in her work, and the French threat is referred to only obliquely. Rather, Austen’s world is one almost entirely contained within the domestic sphere, with balls and other social events being almost the sole forays into the public world.

    To understand why, the first thing a reader needs to understand about Austen is the social class she was born into—the landed gentry. These were people of good family, though technically commoners and thus below the hereditary nobility (the peers who had inherited seats in the House of Lords) on the social scale—a sort of rural middle class. Many were descendants of medieval peasants who had grown prosperous enough that they could hire workers instead of farming with their own hands; others were descended from the minor nobility. By Austen’s time, gentry had come to mean those who could earn an income solely through the rent they charged tenant farmers and who did not engage in commerce. As nebulous as this might seem to us, the distinctions were clear to the status-minded British. For instance, many of the gentry were entitled to bear coats of arms, and somewhat after Austen’s time, their families began to be recorded in Burke’s Landed Gentry, the Who’s Who of this class. The landed gentry declined in the 1870s following an agricultural depression, and again after World War I, when many were forced to sell their estates. Those born into the gentry often became, or intermarried with, the other middling sorts—attorneys, military officers, politicians, and, of course, the clergy. However, they were distinct from merchants and the new elite of industry who were emerging—though many of the former, having grown prosperous, would seek to divest themselves of their businesses, use their profits to buy an estate, send their sons to Oxford and Cambridge, and thus move their families up socially into the gentry.

    Entering the clergy was another way that a man of good family, particularly a younger son, could earn a living and provide for a wife and family while avoiding working with his hands and thus losing his social status. A position as a clergyman was for life and came with a benefice, that is, a salary. Though there were around 11,500 such posts in England—most, like the one held by Austen’s father, not paying very much at all—there were never enough for all the ordained clergy. Some were bestowed by universities such as Cambridge and Oxford, some belonged to the Crown, about a fifth belonged to the church itself, and over half were controlled by the gentry and nobility. Some of these positions, such as being a rector (the one who received most of the income from the parish) could pay very well—though not necessarily so, as in the case of Austen’s father. Being a vicar, or ordinary clergyman, paid less, and a post as a curate, or assistant, could pay very little indeed—around £50 a year, far below the £300 considered to be the lowest level of the gentry. As the daughter of a clergyman, Austen was well familiar with the politics around such positions and the courting of those who controlled them, and indeed, the entire subplot around Wickham in Pride and Prejudice surrounds a controversy over obtaining a prosperous benefice.

    Just as Jane Austen did not approve of the prince regent, the gentry did not necessarily approve of the nobility’s lifestyles. In fact, Jane’s brothers James and Henry edited a magazine during their college days, The Loiterer, that satirized the indolent upper class. Under the influence of the prince’s close friend, George Bryan Beau Brummell, men’s fashion in the universities, in the military, and in civilian life became more elaborate and expensive than ever before; though Brummell fell out of favor when the Regency era began in 1811, his influence remained. The prince regent himself spent prodigiously; was estranged from his wife, Princess Caroline; had numerous affairs, including an invalid marriage to his longtime mistress, the Catholic Maria Fitzherbert; and ate and drank his way to obesity and an early grave.

    The world of the gentry was also much more circumscribed than that of the nobility, or even that of those who lived in towns. Travel was difficult before the invention of railroads. They often did not have the resources to undertake the grand tour of Europe that was fashionable for young men of means. (The Knights had sent Edward, their adopted heir, on such a tour.) Nor would it have been seen as seemly for Austen to comment on politics or write histories, as did her contemporary Sir Walter Scott. So if Austen’s worldview seems rather parochial, it is because she was forced to concern herself with the things deemed proper for a woman of her social class—love and marriage.

    Love, Marriage, Money, and Sentiment in Jane Austen’s World

    If the idea of romantic love was the consistent theme in Jane Austen’s works, it was not disinterested love. Marriage was the sole means of support allowable for a dignified woman of means. As shown by Austen needing her brother to sign her contracts with her publisher, a woman’s legal and social standing was not equal to that of men in Austen’s period. Rather, she was considered a minor under her closest male relative, likely to be passed over for an inheritance and unable to control her own property if she had any. The key to security, if not freedom or safety, was obtaining an advantageous marriage—upon which a woman was considered a legal minor under her husband. Even this had its risks; many women died in childbirth. The other side of the coin was that a young man was unable to marry until he had either come into or made his fortune—thus, the unhappy conclusion of Jane Austen’s flirtation with Tom Lefroy. Sex before marriage was, needless to say, out of the question—such would lead to pregnancy, and, worse, the loss of a family’s status. This explains why Wickham’s seduction of Lydia in Pride and Prejudice was such a disaster for the Bennetts.

    Yet, along with this reality came the idea of sentiment, or emotion. Fashionable novels of the eighteenth century made much of the unrestrained display of feelings and their characters’ understanding of, and reaction to, the feelings of the other characters. In so doing, readers were themselves educated in how to think and feel. Thus, as in literature, it was expected that a young lady of good family would be in love with her beau (as Mr. Bennett insisted his daughters would be). Even Princess Charlotte, daughter of the unpopular prince regent, refused to bend to her father’s will in choosing a husband. Of course, as heir to the British throne, Princess Charlotte’s fortune was not in question. For most people, such sentiment needed to be tempered by a fine understanding of the social realities of class and money. Love and marriage in Jane Austen’s time was really balanced between the two poles of sense and sensibility. Austen was a reader before she was a writer, and sentimental novels and plays—and her reaction to them—were in the DNA of everything she wrote.

    Equally influential was the dramatic genre known as the comedy of manners, such as Oliver Goldsmith’s She Stoops to Conquer. Such plays satirize the mores of contemporary society, tend to revolve around some scandal, and feature stock characters who engage in witty verbal repartee. They were a means of social commentary and allowed Austen to be able to mock the sense of fashion that was so important to the upper class. (Though, of course, the prince regent decided that her novels themselves would become fashionable!)

    The gothic novel was a particular subgenre of the sentimental novel featuring gloomy tales of horror set in the ruins of the medieval past. The Castle of Otranto (1764) by Horace Walpole was the prototype of the genre, with many others, from Mary Shelley to Bram Stoker, following throughout the nineteenth century. Gloom, dread, ruined castles, ancestral curses, and fainting heroines were staples of the form. Catherine Morland, heroine of Austen’s Northanger Abbey, is a fan of gothic writer Ann Radcliffe, and many of the misunderstandings in the novel derive from the contrasts between Catherine’s indulging in literacy conceits and Austen’s more realistic literary world.

    So, Austen was not only influenced by the fashionable genres of her day—she transformed and reacted to them as well, bringing her unique perspective as a woman. Her take on love and marriage, as shown by the famous first line of Pride and Prejudice, is decidedly ironic: It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. Without appreciating the ways in which a brilliant but perhaps frustrated and disappointed woman mocked both her peers and her betters, we cannot truly understand the work of Jane Austen. Neither can we understand how she paved the way for literary realism—that is, presenting everyday things truthfully.

    The Novels

    This volume contains all six of Austen’s complete novels: Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814), Emma (1815), Northanger Abbey (1818), and Persuasion (1818). The latter two were published posthumously after Austen’s death on July 18, 1817. (Austen also left behind some juvenilia, the short epistolary novel Lady Susan, and two incomplete novels, Sandition and The Watsons.)

    Sense and Sensibility hinges on young women needing to secure a future: Elinor, Marianne, and Margaret Dashwood are left penniless by their father’s death and their half-brother’s perfidy. They move to be near their relative, Sir John Middleton, and Marianne meets John Willoughby, a handsome young man with excellent prospects. A cousin of Sir John’s wife, Lucy Steele, comes to visit and reveals that she keeps another young man, Edward Ferrars, imprisoned in a loveless engagement. Willoughby is revealed to be a seducer and a man of low morals. The characters must maneuver their ways through a tangled web of relationships, motivations, and property settlements to find wedded bliss.

    Pride and Prejudice concerns the Bennett sisters, and especially Elizabeth Bennett and her relationship with the rich but seemingly aloof and proud Mr. Darcy. Darcy’s foil is Mr. Wickham, a superficially charming member of the militia but, like Willoughby in Sense and Sensibility, a thorough scoundrel who represents the amorality of the aristocracy.

    Mansfield Park is Austen’s least well-reviewed novel but sold very well. Fanny Price, one of ten children, is sent to live in her uncle’s home. There, she is raised in the ways of the aristocracy and eventually marries her cousin Edmund Bertram. In keeping with Jane Austen’s emphasis on rewarding virtue, punishing vice, and mocking the foibles of the upper class, the novel also deals with an affair coming out of Maria Bertram’s loveless marriage with a rich but insipid man.

    Emma, the last of Austen’s books to be published during her lifetime, concerns Emma Woodhouse’s misguided attempts to play matchmaker to her friends and family. The results are disastrous: Her friend Harriet’s heart is broken by the social-climbing Mr. Elton; Emma, for her part, makes a number of other social missteps. In the end, she marries her neighbor George Knightly, who is the only one to reproach her for her schemes.

    The first of Jane Austen’s novels to be completed, but only published posthumously, Northanger Abbey is a commentary on the cult of sentiment and on young women’s reading. Catherine Morland is, like Austen herself, the daughter of a poor rural clergyman. Invited to stay at the titular country home of the Tilneys, she is embarrassed when nothing there conforms to the conceits of the gothic novels of which she is so fond. A hitch in her love affair with Henry Tilney occurs when his father, General Tilney, sends her home, believing the Morlands to be penniless. Meanwhile, Henry’s elder brother Frederick seduces and then abandons the boastful and selfish Isabella Thorpe.

    Persuasion’s heroine, Anne Eliot, at twenty-seven, is older and wiser than Austen’s other protagonists. Anne regrets breaking her engagement to the young naval officer Frederick Wentworth, especially since her family has now fallen into debt and is forced to move to Bath. She manages through an appeal to emotion, rather than by calculation, to reconcile with the now-Captain Wentworth, who has grown wealthy from prize money from the war. Austen’s own title for the work was The Eliots; Henry named it Persuasion when it was published posthumously.

    Well received during her lifetime, Jane Austen’s works were bought by the publisher Richard Bentley in 1833 and included in his Standard Novels series. They have never been out of print since that time. Austen’s novels have all been repeatedly adapted into films—particularly Pride and Prejudice, which was first produced in 1938. Other adaptations include modernizations (Northbound), game shows (The Jane Games), and the completely outlandish (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies). Her own life has been—besides the subject of considerable academic study—explored in documentaries and TV series, as well as in the film Becoming Jane, a fictionalized version of her romance with Tom Lefroy. Her cultural influence has, needless to say, been immense. Everything from modern romantic comedies to the acclaimed series Downton Abbey, which chronicles the declining years of the gentry whom Austen wrote about, owes a significant debt to her. For a woman born into constrained, if relatively privileged, circumstances, to have such an influence is a mark of Jane Austen’s enduring genius.

    Ken Mondschein, PhD

    Northampton, Massachusetts

    February 18, 2019

    Sense and

    Sensibility

    CHAPTER 1

    The family of Dashwood had long been settled in Sussex. Their estate was large, and their residence was at Norland Park, in the centre of their property, where, for many generations, they had lived in so respectable a manner as to engage the general good opinion of their surrounding acquaintance. The late owner of this estate was a single man, who lived to a very advanced age, and who for many years of his life, had a constant companion and housekeeper in his sister. But her death, which happened ten years before his own, produced a great alteration in his home; for to supply her loss, he invited and received into his house the family of his nephew Mr. Henry Dashwood, the legal inheritor of the Norland estate, and the person to whom he intended to bequeath it. In the society of his nephew and niece, and their children, the old gentleman’s days were comfortably spent. His attachment to them all increased. The constant attention of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Dashwood to his wishes, which proceeded not merely from interest, but from goodness of heart, gave him every degree of solid comfort which his age could receive; and the cheerfulness of the children added a relish to his existence.

    By a former marriage, Mr. Henry Dashwood had one son: by his present lady, three daughters. The son, a steady respectable young man, was amply provided for by the fortune of his mother, which had been large, and half of which devolved on him on his coming of age. By his own marriage, likewise, which happened soon afterwards, he added to his wealth. To him therefore the succession to the Norland estate was not so really important as to his sisters; for their fortune, independent of what might arise to them from their father’s inheriting that property, could be but small. Their mother had nothing, and their father only seven thousand pounds in his own disposal; for the remaining moiety of his first wife’s fortune was also secured to her child, and he had only a life-interest in it.

    The old gentleman died: his will was read, and like almost every other will, gave as much disappointment as pleasure. He was neither so unjust, nor so ungrateful, as to leave his estate from his nephew;—but he left it to him on such terms as destroyed half the value of the bequest. Mr. Dashwood had wished for it more for the sake of his wife and daughters than for himself or his son;—but to his son, and his son’s son, a child of four years old, it was secured, in such a way, as to leave to himself no power of providing for those who were most dear to him, and who most needed a provision by any charge on the estate, or by any sale of its valuable woods. The whole was tied up for the benefit of this child, who, in occasional visits with his father and mother at Norland, had so far gained on the affections of his uncle, by such attractions as are by no means unusual in children of two or three years old; an imperfect articulation, an earnest desire of having his own way, many cunning tricks, and a great deal of noise, as to outweigh all the value of all the attention which, for years, he had received from his niece and her daughters. He meant not to be unkind, however, and, as a mark of his affection for the three girls, he left them a thousand pounds apiece.

    Mr. Dashwood’s disappointment was, at first, severe; but his temper was cheerful and sanguine; and he might reasonably hope to live many years, and by living economically, lay by a considerable sum from the produce of an estate already large, and capable of almost immediate improvement. But the fortune, which had been so tardy in coming, was his only one twelvemonth. He survived his uncle no longer; and ten thousand pounds, including the late legacies, was all that remained for his widow and daughters.

    His son was sent for as soon as his danger was known, and to him Mr. Dashwood recommended, with all the strength and urgency which illness could command, the interest of his mother-in-law and sisters.

    Mr. John Dashwood had not the strong feelings of the rest of the family; but he was affected by a recommendation of such a nature at such a time, and he promised to do everything in his power to make them comfortable. His father was rendered easy by such an assurance, and Mr. John Dashwood had then leisure to consider how much there might prudently be in his power to do for them.

    He was not an ill-disposed young man, unless to be rather coldhearted and rather selfish is to be ill-disposed: but he was, in general, well respected; for he conducted himself with propriety in the discharge of his ordinary duties. Had he married a more amiable woman, he might have been made still more respectable than he was:—he might even have been made amiable himself; for he was very young when he married, and very fond of his wife. But Mrs. John Dashwood was a strong caricature of himself;—more narrow-minded and selfish.

    When he gave his promise to his father, he meditated within himself to increase the fortunes of his sisters by the present of a thousand pounds apiece. He then really thought himself equal to it. The prospect of four thousand a year, in addition to his present income, besides the remaining half of his own mother’s fortune, warmed his heart, and made him feel capable of generosity.—Yes, he would give them three thousand pounds: it would be liberal and handsome! It would be enough to make them completely easy. Three thousand pounds! he could spare so considerable a sum with little inconvenience.—He thought of it all day long, and for many days successively, and he did not repent.

    No sooner was his father’s funeral over, than Mrs. John Dashwood, without sending any notice of her intention to her mother-in-law, arrived with her child and their attendants. No one could dispute her right to come; the house was her husband’s from the moment of his father’s decease; but the indelicacy of her conduct was so much the greater, and to a woman in Mrs. Dashwood’s situation, with only common feelings, must have been highly unpleasing;—but in her mind there was a sense of honor so keen, a generosity so romantic, that any offence of the kind, by whomsoever given or received, was to her a source of immoveable disgust. Mrs. John Dashwood had never been a favourite with any of her husband’s family; but she had had no opportunity, till the present, of showing them with how little attention to the comfort of other people she could act when occasion required it.

    So acutely did Mrs. Dashwood feel this ungracious behaviour, and so earnestly did she despise her daughter-in-law for it, that, on the arrival of the latter, she would have quitted the house forever, had not the entreaty of her eldest girl induced her first to reflect on the propriety of going, and her own tender love for all her three children determined her afterwards to stay, and for their sakes avoid a breach with their brother.

    Elinor, this eldest daughter, whose advice was so effectual, possessed a strength of understanding, and coolness of judgement, which qualified her, though only nineteen, to be the counsellor of her mother, and enabled her frequently to counteract, to the advantage of them all, that eagerness of mind in Mrs. Dashwood which must generally have led to imprudence. She had an excellent heart;—her disposition was affectionate, and her feelings were strong; but she knew how to govern them: it was a knowledge which her mother had yet to learn; and which one of her sisters had resolved never to be taught.

    Marianne’s abilities were, in many respects, quite equal to Elinor’s. She was sensible and clever; but eager in everything: her sorrows, her joys, could have no moderation. She was generous, amiable, interesting: she was everything but prudent. The resemblance between her and her mother was strikingly great.

    Elinor saw, with concern, the excess of her sister’s sensibility; but by Mrs. Dashwood it was valued and cherished. They encouraged each other now in the violence of their affliction. The agony of grief which overpowered them at first, was voluntarily renewed, was sought for, was created again and again. They gave themselves up wholly to their sorrow, seeking increase of wretchedness in every reflection that could afford it, and resolved against ever admitting consolation in future. Elinor, too, was deeply afflicted; but still she could struggle, she could exert herself. She could consult with her brother, could receive her sister-in-law on her arrival, and treat her with proper attention; and could strive to rouse her mother to similar exertion, and encourage her to similar forbearance.

    Margaret, the other sister, was a good-humored, well-disposed girl; but as she had already imbibed a good deal of Marianne’s romance, without having much of her sense, she did not, at thirteen, bid fair to equal her sisters at a more advanced period of life.

    CHAPTER 2

    Mrs. John Dashwood now installed herself mistress of Norland; and her mother and sisters-in-law were degraded to the condition of visitors. As such, however, they were treated by her with quiet civility; and by her husband with as much kindness as he could feel towards anybody beyond himself, his wife, and their child. He really pressed them, with some earnestness, to consider Norland as their home; and, as no plan appeared so eligible to Mrs. Dashwood as remaining there till she could accommodate herself with a house in the neighbourhood, his invitation was accepted.

    A continuance in a place where everything reminded her of former delight, was exactly what suited her mind. In seasons of cheerfulness, no temper could be more cheerful than hers, or possess, in a greater degree, that sanguine expectation of happiness which is happiness itself. But in sorrow she must be equally carried away by her fancy, and as far beyond consolation as in pleasure she was beyond alloy.

    Mrs. John Dashwood did not at all approve of what her husband intended to do for his sisters. To take three thousand pounds from the fortune of their dear little boy would be impoverishing him to the most dreadful degree. She begged him to think again on the subject. How could he answer it to himself to rob his child, and his only child too, of so large a sum? And what possible claim could the Miss Dashwoods, who were related to him only by half blood, which she considered as no relationship at all, have on his generosity to so large an amount. It was very well known that no affection was ever supposed to exist between the children of any man by different marriages; and why was he to ruin himself, and their poor little Harry, by giving away all his money to his half sisters?

    It was my father’s last request to me, replied her husband, that I should assist his widow and daughters.

    He did not know what he was talking of, I dare say; ten to one but he was lightheaded at the time. Had he been in his right senses, he could not have thought of such a thing as begging you to give away half your fortune from your own child.

    He did not stipulate for any particular sum, my dear Fanny; he only requested me, in general terms, to assist them, and make their situation more comfortable than it was in his power to do. Perhaps it would have been as well if he had left it wholly to myself. He could hardly suppose I should neglect them. But as he required the promise, I could not do less than give it; at least I thought so at the time. The promise, therefore, was given, and must be performed. Something must be done for them whenever they leave Norland and settle in a new home.

    "Well, then, let something be done for them; but that something need not be three thousand pounds. Consider, she added, that when the money is once parted with, it never can return. Your sisters will marry, and it will be gone forever. If, indeed, it could be restored to our poor little boy—"

    Why, to be sure, said her husband, very gravely, that would make great difference. The time may come when Harry will regret that so large a sum was parted with. If he should have a numerous family, for instance, it would be a very convenient addition.

    To be sure it would.

    Perhaps, then, it would be better for all parties, if the sum were diminished one half.—Five hundred pounds would be a prodigious increase to their fortunes!

    "Oh! beyond anything great! What brother on earth would do half so much for his sisters, even if really his sisters! And as it is—only half blood!—But you have such a generous spirit!"

    I would not wish to do anything mean, he replied. One had rather, on such occasions, do too much than too little. No one, at least, can think I have not done enough for them: even themselves, they can hardly expect more.

    "There is no knowing what they may expect, said the lady, but we are not to think of their expectations: the question is, what you can afford to do."

    Certainly—and I think I may afford to give them five hundred pounds apiece. As it is, without any addition of mine, they will each have about three thousand pounds on their mother’s death—a very comfortable fortune for any young woman.

    To be sure it is; and, indeed, it strikes me that they can want no addition at all. They will have ten thousand pounds divided amongst them. If they marry, they will be sure of doing well, and if they do not, they may all live very comfortably together on the interest of ten thousand pounds.

    That is very true, and, therefore, I do not know whether, upon the whole, it would not be more advisable to do something for their mother while she lives, rather than for them—something of the annuity kind I mean.—My sisters would feel the good effects of it as well as herself. A hundred a year would make them all perfectly comfortable.

    His wife hesitated a little, however, in giving her consent to this plan.

    To be sure, said she, it is better than parting with fifteen hundred pounds at once. But, then, if Mrs. Dashwood should live fifteen years we shall be completely taken in.

    Fifteen years! my dear Fanny; her life cannot be worth half that purchase.

    Certainly not; but if you observe, people always live forever when there is an annuity to be paid them; and she is very stout and healthy, and hardly forty. An annuity is a very serious business; it comes over and over every year, and there is no getting rid of it. You are not aware of what you are doing. I have known a great deal of the trouble of annuities; for my mother was clogged with the payment of three to old superannuated servants by my father’s will, and it is amazing how disagreeable she found it. Twice every year these annuities were to be paid; and then there was the trouble of getting it to them; and then one of them was said to have died, and afterwards it turned out to be no such thing. My mother was quite sick of it. Her income was not her own, she said, with such perpetual claims on it; and it was the more unkind in my father, because, otherwise, the money would have been entirely at my mother’s disposal, without any restriction whatever. It has given me such an abhorrence of annuities, that I am sure I would not pin myself down to the payment of one for all the world.

    It is certainly an unpleasant thing, replied Mr. Dashwood, "to have those kind of yearly drains on one’s income. One’s fortune, as your mother justly says, is not one’s own. To be tied down to the regular payment of such a sum, on every rent day, is by no means desirable: it takes away one’s independence."

    Undoubtedly; and after all you have no thanks for it. They think themselves secure, you do no more than what is expected, and it raises no gratitude at all. If I were you, whatever I did should be done at my own discretion entirely. I would not bind myself to allow them anything yearly. It may be very inconvenient some years to spare a hundred, or even fifty pounds from our own expenses.

    I believe you are right, my love; it will be better that there should be no annuity in the case; whatever I may give them occasionally will be of far greater assistance than a yearly allowance, because they would only enlarge their style of living if they felt sure of a larger income, and would not be sixpence the richer for it at the end of the year. It will certainly be much the best way. A present of fifty pounds, now and then, will prevent their ever being distressed for money, and will, I think, be amply discharging my promise to my father.

    "To be sure it will. Indeed, to say the truth, I am convinced within myself that your father had no idea of your giving them any money at all. The assistance he thought of, I dare say, was only such as might be reasonably expected of you; for instance, such as looking out for a comfortable small house for them, helping them to move their things, and sending them presents of fish and game, and so forth, whenever they are in season. I’ll lay my life that he meant nothing farther; indeed, it would be very strange and unreasonable if he did. Do but consider, my dear Mr. Dashwood, how excessively comfortable your mother-in-law and her daughters may live on the interest of seven thousand pounds, besides the thousand pounds belonging to each of the girls, which brings them in fifty pounds a year apiece, and, of course, they will pay their mother for their board out of it. Altogether, they will have five hundred a year amongst them, and what on earth can four women want for more than that?—They will live so cheap! Their housekeeping will be nothing at all. They will have no carriage, no horses, and hardly any servants; they will keep no company, and can have no expenses of any kind! Only conceive how comfortable they will be! Five hundred a year! I am sure I cannot imagine how they will spend half of it; and as to your giving them more, it is quite absurd to think of it. They will be much more able to give you something."

    Upon my word, said Mr. Dashwood, I believe you are perfectly right. My father certainly could mean nothing more by his request to me than what you say. I clearly understand it now, and I will strictly fulfil my engagement by such acts of assistance and kindness to them as you have described. When my mother removes into another house my services shall be readily given to accommodate her as far as I can. Some little present of furniture too may be acceptable then.

    Certainly, returned Mrs. John Dashwood. "But, however, one thing must be considered. When your father and mother moved to Norland, though the furniture of Stanhill was sold, all the china, plate, and linen was saved, and is now left to your mother. Her house will therefore be almost completely fitted up as soon as she takes it."

    That is a material consideration undoubtedly. A valuable legacy indeed! And yet some of the plate would have been a very pleasant addition to our own stock here.

    "Yes; and the set of breakfast china is twice as handsome as what belongs to this house. A great deal too handsome, in my opinion, for any place they can ever afford to live in. But, however, so it is. Your father thought only of them. And I must say this: that you owe no particular gratitude to him, nor attention to his wishes; for we very well know that if he could, he would have left almost everything in the world to them."

    This argument was irresistible. It gave to his intentions whatever of decision was wanting before; and he finally resolved, that it would be absolutely unnecessary, if not highly indecorous, to do more for the widow and children of his father, than such kind of neighbourly acts as his own wife pointed out.

    CHAPTER 3

    Mrs. Dashwood remained at Norland several months; not from any disinclination to move when the sight of every well known spot ceased to raise the violent emotion which it produced for a while; for when her spirits began to revive, and her mind became capable of some other exertion than that of heightening its affliction by melancholy remembrances, she was impatient to be gone, and indefatigable in her inquiries for a suitable dwelling in the neighbourhood of Norland; for to remove far from that beloved spot was impossible. But she could hear of no situation that at once answered her notions of comfort and ease, and suited the prudence of her eldest daughter, whose steadier judgement rejected several houses as too large for their income, which her mother would have approved.

    Mrs. Dashwood had been informed by her husband of the solemn promise on the part of his son in their favour, which gave comfort to his last earthly reflections. She doubted the sincerity of this assurance no more than he had doubted it himself, and she thought of it for her daughters’ sake with satisfaction, though as for herself she was persuaded that a much smaller provision than 7000£ would support her in affluence. For their brother’s sake, too, for the sake of his own heart, she rejoiced; and she reproached herself for being unjust to his merit before, in believing him incapable of generosity. His attentive behaviour to herself and his sisters convinced her that their welfare was dear to him, and, for a long time, she firmly relied on the liberality of his intentions.

    The contempt which she had, very early in their acquaintance, felt for her daughter-in-law, was very much increased by the farther knowledge of her character, which half a year’s residence in her family afforded; and perhaps in spite of every consideration of politeness or maternal affection on the side of the former, the two ladies might have found it impossible to have lived together so long, had not a particular circumstance occurred to give still greater eligibility, according to the opinions of Mrs. Dashwood, to her daughters’ continuance at Norland.

    This circumstance was a growing attachment between her eldest girl and the brother of Mrs. John Dashwood, a gentleman-like and pleasing young man, who was introduced to their acquaintance soon after his sister’s establishment at Norland, and who had since spent the greatest part of his time there.

    Some mothers might have encouraged the intimacy from motives of interest, for Edward Ferrars was the eldest son of a man who had died very rich; and some might have repressed it from motives of prudence, for, except a trifling sum, the whole of his fortune depended on the will of his mother. But Mrs. Dashwood was alike uninfluenced by either consideration. It was enough for her that he appeared to be amiable, that he loved her daughter, and that Elinor returned the partiality. It was contrary to every doctrine of hers that difference of fortune should keep any couple asunder who were attracted by resemblance of disposition; and that Elinor’s merit should not be acknowledged by everyone who knew her, was to her comprehension impossible.

    Edward Ferrars was not recommended to their good opinion by any peculiar graces of person or address. He was not handsome, and his manners required intimacy to make them pleasing. He was too diffident to do justice to himself; but when his natural shyness was overcome, his behaviour gave every indication of an open, affectionate heart. His understanding was good, and his education had given it solid improvement. But he was neither fitted by abilities nor disposition to answer the wishes of his mother and sister, who longed to see him distinguished—as—they hardly knew what. They wanted him to make a fine figure in the world in some manner or other. His mother wished to interest him in political concerns, to get him into parliament, or to see him connected with some of the great men of the day. Mrs. John Dashwood wished it likewise; but in the meanwhile, till one of these superior blessings could be attained, it would have quieted her ambition to see him driving a barouche. But Edward had no turn for great men or barouches. All his wishes centered in domestic comfort and the quiet of private life. Fortunately he had a younger brother who was more promising.

    Edward had been staying several weeks in the house before he engaged much of Mrs. Dashwood’s attention; for she was, at that time, in such affliction as rendered her careless of surrounding objects. She saw only that he was quiet and unobtrusive, and she liked him for it. He did not disturb the wretchedness of her mind by ill-timed conversation. She was first called to observe and approve him farther, by a reflection which Elinor chanced one day to make on the difference between him and his sister. It was a contrast which recommended him most forcibly to her mother.

    It is enough, said she; to say that he is unlike Fanny is enough. It implies everything amiable. I love him already.

    I think you will like him, said Elinor, when you know more of him.

    Like him! replied her mother with a smile. I feel no sentiment of approbation inferior to love.

    You may esteem him.

    I have never yet known what it was to separate esteem and love.

    Mrs. Dashwood now took pains to get acquainted with him. Her manners were attaching, and soon banished his reserve. She speedily comprehended all his merits; the persuasion of his regard for Elinor perhaps assisted her penetration; but she really felt assured of his worth: and even that quietness of manner, which militated against all her established ideas of what a young man’s address ought to be, was no longer uninteresting when she knew his heart to be warm and his temper affectionate.

    No sooner did she perceive any symptom of love in his behaviour to Elinor, than she considered their serious attachment as certain, and looked forward to their marriage as rapidly approaching.

    In a few months, my dear Marianne, said she, "Elinor will, in all probability, be settled for life. We shall miss her; but she will be happy."

    Oh! Mama, how shall we do without her?

    My love, it will be scarcely a separation. We shall live within a few miles of each other, and shall meet every day of our lives. You will gain a brother, a real, affectionate brother. I have the highest opinion in the world of Edward’s heart. But you look grave, Marianne; do you disapprove your sister’s choice?

    Perhaps, said Marianne, I may consider it with some surprise. Edward is very amiable, and I love him tenderly. But yet—he is not the kind of young man—there is something wanting—his figure is not striking; it has none of that grace which I should expect in the man who could seriously attach my sister. His eyes want all that spirit, that fire, which at once announce virtue and intelligence. And besides all this, I am afraid, Mama, he has no real taste. Music seems scarcely to attract him, and though he admires Elinor’s drawings very much, it is not the admiration of a person who can understand their worth. It is evident, in spite of his frequent attention to her while she draws, that in fact he knows nothing of the matter. He admires as a lover, not as a connoisseur. To satisfy me, those characters must be united. I could not be happy with a man whose taste did not in every point coincide with my own. He must enter into all my feelings; the same books, the same music must charm us both. Oh! mama, how spiritless, how tame was Edward’s manner in reading to us last night! I felt for my sister most severely. Yet she bore it with so much composure, she seemed scarcely to notice it. I could hardly keep my seat. To hear those beautiful lines which have frequently almost driven me wild, pronounced with such impenetrable calmness, such dreadful indifference!—"He would certainly have done more justice to simple and elegant prose. I thought so at the time; but you would give him Cowper."

    "Nay, Mama, if he is not to be animated by Cowper!—but we must allow for difference of taste. Elinor has not my feelings, and therefore she may overlook it, and be happy with him. But it would have broke my heart, had I loved him, to hear him read with so little sensibility. Mama, the more I know of the world, the more am I convinced that I shall never see a man whom I can really love. I require so much! He must have all Edward’s virtues, and his person and manners must ornament his goodness with every possible charm."

    Remember, my love, that you are not seventeen. It is yet too early in life to despair of such a happiness. Why should you be less fortunate than your mother? In one circumstance only, my Marianne, may your destiny be different from hers!

    CHAPTER 4

    What a pity it is, Elinor, said Marianne, that Edward should have no taste for drawing."

    No taste for drawing! replied Elinor, why should you think so? He does not draw himself, indeed, but he has great pleasure in seeing the performances of other people, and I assure you he is by no means deficient in natural taste, though he has not had opportunities of improving it. Had he ever been in the way of learning, I think he would have drawn very well. He distrusts his own judgement in such matters so much, that he is always unwilling to give his opinion on any picture; but he has an innate propriety and simplicity of taste, which in general direct him perfectly right.

    Marianne was afraid of offending, and said no more on the subject; but the kind of approbation which Elinor described as excited in him by the drawings of other people, was very far from that rapturous delight, which, in her opinion, could alone be called taste. Yet, though smiling within herself at the mistake, she honoured her sister for that blind partiality to Edward which produced it.

    I hope, Marianne, continued Elinor, "you do not consider him as deficient in general taste. Indeed, I think I may say that you cannot, for your behaviour to him is perfectly cordial, and if that were your opinion, I am sure you could never be civil to him."

    Marianne hardly knew what to say. She would not wound the feelings of her sister on any account, and yet to say what she did not believe was impossible. At length she replied:

    Do not be offended, Elinor, if my praise of him is not in everything equal to your sense of his merits. I have not had so many opportunities of estimating the minuter propensities of his mind, his inclinations and tastes, as you have; but I have the highest opinion in the world of his goodness and sense. I think him everything that is worthy and amiable.

    I am sure, replied Elinor, with a smile, that his dearest friends could not be dissatisfied with such commendation as that. I do not perceive how you could express yourself more warmly.

    Marianne was rejoiced to find her sister so easily pleased.

    Of his sense and his goodness, continued Elinor, no one can, I think, be in doubt, who has seen him often enough to engage him in unreserved conversation. The excellence of his understanding and his principles can be concealed only by that shyness which too often keeps him silent. You know enough of him to do justice to his solid worth. But of his minuter propensities, as you call them, you have from peculiar circumstances been kept more ignorant than myself. He and I have been at times thrown a good deal together, while you have been wholly engrossed on the most affectionate principle by my mother. I have seen a great deal of him, have studied his sentiments and heard his opinion on subjects of literature and taste; and, upon the whole, I venture to pronounce that his mind is well-informed, enjoyment of books exceedingly great, his imagination lively, his observation just and correct, and his taste delicate and pure. His abilities in every respect improve as much upon acquaintance as his manners and person. At first sight, his address is certainly not striking; and his person can hardly be called handsome, till the expression of his eyes, which are uncommonly good, and the general sweetness of his countenance, is perceived. At present, I know him so well, that I think him really handsome; or at least, almost so. What say you, Marianne?

    I shall very soon think him handsome, Elinor, if I do not now. When you tell me to love him as a brother, I shall no more see imperfection in his face, than I now do in his heart.

    Elinor started at this declaration, and was sorry for the warmth she had been betrayed into, in speaking of him. She felt that Edward stood very high in her opinion. She believed the regard

    Enjoying the preview?
    Page 1 of 1