Note: contains SPOILERS
Jane Austen’s final published novel (as well as my last one to critique) was Persuasion, which came out in 1818, six months after her death. It’s a tale of regret and forgiveness—and of remorse, for all that our protagonist says, to my dismay,
“I should have suffered more in continuing the engagement than I did even in giving it up, because I should have suffered in my conscience. I have now, as far as such a sentiment is allowable in human nature, nothing to reproach myself with.”
Yet Anne Elliot jilted poor Frederick Wentworth
over eight years prior, at the advice of her mentor and her family! Ah well, perhaps
the ‘now’ is key here, as she’s speaking at the story’s resolution, when such
remorse is water under the bridge.
 |
| Author Sophia Alexander with Persuasion by Jane Austen |
The novel is also an exploration of flexibility vs. resoluteness. Wentworth disdains Anne for not having been more resolute in her love for him, but when the woman he’s wooing injures herself despite the warnings of others,
“Anne wondered whether it ever occurred to him now, to question the justness of his own previous opinion as to the universal felicity and advantage of firmness of character; and whether it might not strike him that, like all other qualities of the mind, it should have its proportions and limits.”
This novel is not as immediately engaging as Austen’s others—I
had to restart it more than once, and some time elapses before Anne’s
lamentable romantic history is mentioned. After two or three chapters, however,
Persuasion becomes comparable to Jane Austen’s other works.
Again I find myself defending the characters from Jane’s pen,
convinced that they’re at least loosely based on her personal acquaintances and
experiences. Their dialogue is so very realistic, yet Jane’s interpretation
doesn’t always seem fair. In this case, it’s regarding Anne’s sisters. No,
they’re not always considerate, and they do often overlook her. However,
they’re overlooked, too! Even Anne doesn’t give them their due, only tolerating
them—actually lamenting that she doesn’t have good relations to bring to the
table if she marries!
Mary, the youngest, is the only one of the sisters to be
married with children. This alone should raise her in standing in her family,
yet it doesn’t seem to. In fact, her in-laws don’t even wish to grant her the
precedence she’s entitled to, insisting she should give way.
Jane Austen mocks Mary’s own insistence on joining her
self-centered but good-natured husband on his jaunts, as if she’s the selfish
one for insisting on going; yet if she didn’t, she’d be regularly left behind,
miserable and neglected at home. In fact, Mary is wondrously adaptable and
magnanimous, quickly cheering once she’s on her way, not holding grudges about
not being invited nor about apparently not being at all necessary to Charles
Musgroves’—nor anyone else’s—happiness.
At least Charles seems not to overtly mind her presence, and
allows her to tag along with him. But he once wanted to marry Anne, and even his
mother regrets that Anne isn’t the mother of her only grandchildren! Poor Mary.
Meanwhile, Mary at least makes Anne feel needed by asking her to come
tend her when she’s unwell, and by sharing her woes.
Even though Anne does try to take care of her sister in a
myriad of ways, she does it with a certain disdain, clearly regarding Mary as selfish,
shallow, and incompetent. In reality, however, Mary is the only sister to have
grandchildren (for either side of the family), and the only one who made a
good, timely, comfortable marriage with an estate, thus by far the most
‘successful’ of them.
When Charles’ sister meets with an accident, it’s decided by
the men that Anne should stay behind to tend her, but then Mary speaks up for
herself, declaring that it should be she who stays with Louisa. In fact, she’s
Louisa’s sister-in-law and spends time with Louisa almost daily, whereas Anne
is merely the visiting relative. Of course Mary wants to stay with Louisa, whom
she does very much care about. And after all, it isn’t Louisa asking for Anne.
Yet Mary’s choice to stay with Louisa is the furthest thing from appreciated,
represented as merely another selfish action.
As for Mary’s indispositions, Jane Austen seems to suggest they
are inconsequential because they come and go so rapidly. Likely they are to a
degree psychosomatic, and of course they’re a nuisance, but Mary deserves
credit for not clinging to them. As Emerson says, ‘a foolish consistency is the
hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and
divines.’ Nope, as soon as Mary feels better, she’s up and ready to go. This may make her laughable, but it keeps her
from turning into an invalid.
My sympathy for the beautiful eldest sister, Elizabeth,
revolves around her pragmatism. Whereas Anne is too idealistic to care about
preserving their position in society, Elizabeth takes it on as her central
duty. One might scoff at Elizabeth’s elitism, but Jane Austen wouldn’t be a
novelist if she hadn’t had her education and books and leisure time to write.
Anne reaps the benefits of those family members who work to retain their
status, all the while maintaining such disdain for them. Remember, however,
that Jane Austen never in all her novels makes much more than a peep against
colonialism or slavery (see Mansfield Park’s blog), which
suggests that her concerns are quite insular. In Persuasion, many of the
naval officers of their acquaintance have made a fortune in the East Indies
War—which concerned European powers, primarily, but had everything to do with
colonialism, of which India returned vastly more wealth to Great Britain than
all the other colonies did, combined. Jane expresses only unmitigating respect
for the naval officers, ranking them of the very best sort.
Elizabeth, the eldest Elliot sibling, is approaching the spinster-ish
age of thirty (when fertility declines precipitously), but she’s managed to retain
her looks and her dignity while running Sir Walter’s household. Not just her
looks and dignity, but the family’s.
Jane Austen dubiously tenders Elizabeth a morsel of credit (along with a
chunk of contempt, saying, ‘it was a struggle between propriety and vanity, but
vanity got the better’) in relating how Elizabeth figures out how to save face
when unexpected company arises—company that hopes to be introduced to their
noble kin in Bath. What the Elliots are trying not to make public is that Sir
Walter is presently living under reduced circumstances, with a reduced staff,
and so if Elizabeth offers the customary dinner invite, then they will feel a
certain humiliation at not being properly staffed, their family standing sinking
in the eyes of their aristocratic cousin, Lady Dalrymple. Elizabeth solves the
dilemma. She cleverly invites them over for an informal evening: “that will be
much better, that will be a novelty and a treat,” she decides, to her own
relief. Indeed, the author even
acknowledges that cheery Mary (who wouldn’t have shown up in Bath at all if she
hadn’t once again insisted on joining her husband) is completely satisfied at
this invite.
Jane Austen’s qualms seem to relate to a desire for blatant
honesty about one’s circumstances, an issue she raises in Sense &
Sensibility, too. Apparently few behaviors are
worse, to Jane’s mind, than misrepresenting oneself as richer than one is! I suspect Jane’s pride makes her unwilling to
‘put on pretenses’, as she would see it—and figuring out how to save face is
hardly what an honest, noble, staunch, forthright character does. So beneath
her.
The reader feels sympathetic when Anne’s opinion about the
family’s dire financial straits is not sought. However, when her opinion does
come forth in favor of austerity measures that in no way preserve their social
standing, it should be obvious why Elizabeth and Sir Walter did not initially
seek her opinion. They tolerate Anne,
but the disdain has become mutual, and given Anne’s scorn for so much of what
they do and value, it’s clear that the blame isn’t entirely on their side. Yet,
maybe some of Anne’s intolerance for their uppity ways stems from their
long-ago opposition to her engagement to the then-poor Wentworth; this might
have been a helpful association, but her austerity suggestions were merely
presented as strong morality.
Despite Captain Wentworth’s gripping admission near the end
of the novel, ‘You pierce my soul,’ along with the rest of that beautiful
letter and its touching honesty about his injured pride, there is a dearth of
romantic moments between this central pair of star-crossed lovers. Indeed, from
the beginning, he’s ignoring Anne and courting other women. Aside from reports
of his monetary success and general good conduct, we’re shown little to fall in
love with. Not only that, but for a ship’s captain, he seems remarkably
uncertain when an emergency arises, and he’s more emotionally reactive than one
would expect. Even simply lingering on
some of the distant romantic memories that must have existed could have helped.
Nevertheless, I couldn’t help but smile when she alludes to Wentworth’s having “not understood ‘the perfect excellence of the mind’ with which [another’s] could so ill bear a comparison, or the perfect unrivalled hold it possessed over his own.”
I'm smiling because I assume Jane Austen relates to her protagonist—and while I might critique Jane and hardly regard her as perfect, her high self-esteem was well-deserved, not far off the mark. Isn’t her writing exquisite? And hasn’t she had a near-unrivalled hold on minds, especially compared to other female authors? She well deserves her accolades, even those indirectly delivered by herself at the end of her very last novel, Persuasion. After all, who can write them better?
*
Random points of interest:
- The name Charles shows up repeatedly in this novel, for different characters! There are three Charles Musgroves (I, II, & III); Charles Hayter; and Charles Smith; there’s even a mention of King Charles II. She may not have realized how often she repeated the name, especially since she was likely ill as she wrote this novel. The name Charles did happen to belong to her younger brother Charles, who served in the navy, as did another brother. Her choice of the surname ‘Hayter’ piques the curiosity, too; Charles and his family seem quite nice throughout, though, so there’s no obvious embedded meaning.
- When young Charles Musgrove III has an accident, the apothecary is called. So apothecaries didn’t just stay in their dispensaries and laboratories, working as vendors, but went out making house calls for injured patients, serving as physicians—at least in Austen’s experience.
- Lady Russell has a door-bell! Some Victorian doorbells resemble the round counter chimes rung to bring salesclerks, only they either have an outdoor handle to turn, or a pull knob, with the chime itself mounted inside the house. However, such as these may be too late for Austen’s time. In Europe, some palaces have inside rope pulls that ring bells in other parts of the house, so I imagine the front door-bells of Austen’s time may have had a pull-type rope like these, or perhaps one would simply clang a traditional bell mounted outside the door. (If you are familiar with what sort of doorbell she’d have had, please comment below!)
- Mr. Elliot, a widower, wears ‘crape round his hat’ for mourning. I wonder if there was veiling or if the crepe just wrapped about a diminutive hat itself, as I saw one example of, rather turbanish.
- One wonders if Jane Austen has deduced this about herself: “[She] thought it was the misfortune of poetry to be seldom safely enjoyed by those who enjoyed it completely; and that the strong feelings which alone could estimate it truly were the very feelings which ought to taste it but sparingly.”
- This following quote seems a prescient nod to the English pop band Duran Duran; I don’t believe the Durands are mentioned again in the whole novel!: “The little Durands were there… with their mouths open to catch the music, like unfledged sparrows ready to be fed. They never miss a concert.”
- Anne is impressed by Mrs. Smith’s ability to be happy, despite her troubles. The following quote meshes with my own observations and experience: “A submissive spirit might be patient, a strong understanding would supply resolution, but here was something more; here was that elasticity of mind, that disposition to be comforted, that power of turning readily from evil to good, and of finding employment which carried her out of herself, which was from nature alone. It was the choicest gift of Heaven…”
Read my blogs about Jane Austen's other novels at the links below:
*Northanger Abbey (1818, posthumous)
*Persuasion (1818, posthumous)
No comments:
Post a Comment