Eng 211-Term Paper

8/4/2019 Eng 211-Term Paper

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PASSION AND PRUDENCE IN JANE AUSTENSPERSUASION

There has been some confusion surrounding the title of Austens final novel,

Persuasion. Popular opinion claims that Henry Austen bestowed the title on the novel

after his sisters death, and that it places undo emphasis on certain parts of the plot,

against what Austen would have desired if she had lived to see the novel published.

However, P. J. M. Scott notes that the title in its current form was actually found in some

of Austens papers. Thus, it was Jane and not Henry that named it, and any emphasis it

creates was the authors intention (205). According to Kenneth Moler the term

persuasion was used in Austens day to refer to an attempt by a parent to influence a

childs choice of spouse (193). Her contemporaries believed that a child should not marry

when their parents disapproved, but need not marry against their own inclination,

regardless of their parents desire. This definition places all emphasis on Annes original

rejection of Wentworth, seven years prior to the start of the novel, at the behest of Lady

Russell. It raises a question that is never answered in the book: Was Anne right in

breaking off her engagement to Wentworth? Ultimately, the answer to this question

depends on which virtue the reader believes the novel to endorse: prudence or passion.

Charlotte Bront certainly believed it to be the former. Ina letter she onceremarked, on Austen generally, that her business is not half so much with the human

heart as with the human eyes, mouth, hands and feet (Shorter, 128). In her mind, Austen

was not capable of writing about passion, and her characters were all careful calculation

and cultivated manners. Virginia Woolf saw something quite different. In The Common

Reader, she writes that inPersuasion Austen is beginning to discover that the world is


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larger, more mysterious and more romantic than she had supposed (143). To her,

Austens final work was a surrender to passion, quite unlike the other five novels.

However, I would argue thatPersuasion is not a capitulation to either romance or reason,

but a reconciliation of the two, as embodied in the character of Anne Elliot.

Within the novel, Frederick Wentworth can be seen as the quintessential

romantic. He undoubtedly believes that Anne was wrong in breaking off their

engagement, regardless of what her friends and family thought. He views her refusal as a

sign of feebleness of character. Of course she did have her reasonsnot only had she

been acting on the advice of a woman whom she considered almost a mother, but had

she not imagined herself consulting his good, even more than her own, she could hardly

have given him up (Austen, 20)but he does not understand them or recognize their

legitimacy. He seems to truly believe that love should overcome all. Standing opposed to

Wentworth is Lady Russell, the woman who had originally encouraged Anne to end her

engagement, a woman who believes in the dictates of prudence. She has no doubt in the

necessity of some fortune to ensure a successful marriage. This she values over love, and

she is not willing to see her beloved Goddaughter dependent on someone elses

prospects. Thus she advises an end to the engagement and Anne takes that advice.

Between these two polar opposites stands Anne. Some readings of the novel

suggest that seven years ago, she was convinced to act out of prudencemuch to her

later regretand so, by the time of the novel, she is a converted romantic. I would

suggest otherwise. Indeed, it is Anne who is the moral center of the novel, perhaps a little

unsure of herself at nineteen, but by twenty-seven she combines both passion and

prudence, an attitude to which both Lady Russell, and more importantly, Captain


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Wentworth will have to reform. She is not a convert, but a combination of these two

ideas. According to Howard Babb, the essential drama of the story arises from Captain

Wentworths slowly altering feelings toward AnneHe is, in fact, the only character in

the novel who undergoes any change (204). I would argue that this is true, with perhaps

the most minor of exceptions made for Lady Russell. Thus, it is not that Anne is

transformed from prude to romantic, but that Wentworth gradually takes on her way of

thinking.

When Wentworth first reenters Annes life he is still smarting from her refusal.

Ready and willing to marry he attaches himself to Louisa Musgrove, who seems to

possess the strength of character that he believes Anne lacks. It is not until the

conversation near Winthrop, when Wentworth learns that Charles Musgrove proposed to

Anne and was refused, that his perspective begins to change. Louisa surmises that Lady

Russell intervened and convinced Anne not to marry her brother, but Wentworth knows

that Charles is just the kind of suitor Lady Russell would consider appropriate for Anne.

He begins to realize that perhaps she is not so weak as he had presumed. He realizes that

although Anne bowed to her Godmothers desire when it came to whom she should not

marry, she could not be convinced to marry someone she did not love. She shows a sort

of quiet strength here that Wentworth had not believed her to possess. At Lyme,

Wentworth comes to see just how wrong he had been. He becomes aware of the contrast

between Annes prudence and Louisas reckless refusal to accept persuasion (Pinion,

126). He realizes that what he took for firmness of mind was merely obstinacy. Not only

is Louisa demoted in his view, but Anne reacts with such coolness and sense that

Wentworth is forced to reconsider her. From there, once he has detangled himself from


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Louisa, it takes only a very short time before he falls back in love with Anne. According

to Moler, it is incorrect, then, to see Wentworth as the novels moral ideal and Anne as a

character who changes and adopts Wentworths views in the course of the story (217).

Anne remains constant; it is Wentworth that must come to realize that, although he

disagrees with her decision, her motives were just, and that he had been unjust to her

merits, because he had been a sufferer from them (Austen, 172).

Lady Russells transformation is much less pronounced than Wentworths. In her

case, it is merely noted at the end of the novel that she was a very good woman, and if

her second object was to be sensible and well judging, her first was to see Anne happy

(Austen, 178). She always had Annes best interests at heart, and when she sees that

Anne is determinedand that Wentworth is now rather more established then he was

eight years agoshe is happy for them. Indeed, her character is rather more interesting in

connection to Mr. Elliot, for on this point she must be converted to Annes view. Lady

Russell is most approving of Mr. Elliot, particularly when he begins to display an interest

in Anne. It becomes her dear wish that Anne will one day become Lady Elliot, as her

mother was. Anne very quickly finds something unlikeable in Mr. Elliot, a lack of

openness. Her intuition proves to be correct, and it turns out that he has acted very badly

towards a number of people. Lady Russell does not sense this until Anne confides in her.

She trusts too much in money and title, expecting them to be coupled with respectability,

which they certainly are not always.

If the novel is in fact a surrender to romance, then there must be a great deal of

character development on Annes part. However, I see no such thing. At the beginning of

the novel it is said She did not blame Lady Russell, she did not blame herself for having


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been guided by her (Austen, 21). At the end her opinion is much the same. She says to

Wentworth, I have been thinking over the pastand I must believe that I was right,

much as I suffered, that I was perfectly right being guided by my friend (Austen, 175).

That is not to say that she would not have acted differently if she could relive the

situation, but that she did what she thought was right at the time, and with that she has

long been at peace. She is the only character able to remove herself from the situation,

and see it as it really is. However, she is still a romantic:

She was persuaded that under every disadvantage of disapprobation at home, and

every anxiety attending his profession, all their probable fear, delays and

disappointments, she should yet have been a happier woman in maintaining the

engagement than she had been in the sacrifice of it (Austen, 21).

Thus, there can be no doubt that Anne is the moral center of the novel, and that it is

around her all other characters orbit. She shows a strength of character not even displayed

by Captain Wentworth, when she is unaffected by Mr. Elliots attentions. Even the

possibility of inheriting her mothers place and Kellynch Hall cannot tempt her to accept

a man whom she does not quite like. Wentworth cannot even withstand the attentions of

the pleasant, but penniless, Musgrove girls. Anne also shows a wisdom that he lacks. He

may have been willing to go to great lengths for love, but he was equally determined to

keep his resentment for Anne alive, going so far as to form an attachment with a girl he

does not love. Anne is never so foolish. She will not marry anyone for anything other

than love.

To be fair, Wentworth is not so very inconsistent. He has been, as Scott points

out, unable to marry another, despite his willingness. Both he and Anne are too aptly


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discriminative to find such a person with any ease, or to forget the quality of their own

attitudes to one another (185). Other than a few naval couples, they are the only two

characters to form a prudent romantic attachment. Prudent in the fact that their

temperaments are very much alike and they are likely to have a happy marriage. As R. S.

Crane observes, It is the happinessnot simply of lovers but of moral individualsa

happiness which can be achieved only be persons of superior minds and characters (81).

Captain Wentworth is not nearly as inconsistent as Captain Benwick, who appears to be

practically inconsolable over the loss of his fianc, but then quickly and inexplicably

attaches himself to a girl with whom he seems to have little in common. And on the other

end of the spectrum, sits Mrs. Smith whom Austen portrays favorably, but is self-

interested enough to praise Mr. Elliot when she believes Annes union with him will be

helpful to her, despite the fact that she knows what he really is. At the center of these

many characters, we find Anneprudent enough to recommend a larger allowance of

prose in [Captain Benwicks] daily study (Austen, 72) in an effort to counteract his

sentimentality, and romantic enough to forgive Mrs. Smith and imagine what she must be

going through, having just lost her husband and suffered a long illnessand by Annes

side stands Captain Wentworth, disapproving no longer.

None of this, however, answers the original question: was Anne right in her

original decision to break off her engagement with Wentworth? As Austen does not offer

her own opinion, it is a question on which many critics have offered theirs. Julia Brown

sees Annes decision to forgive both Lady Russell and herself as a sort of moral failure:

Anne Elliot cannot take the final step in self-awareness by admitting that she was weak

to take Lady Russells advice (149). She seems to see this as a failure on Austens part,


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writing in Jane Austen, social and personal changes are never absolute (149). For her,

the absence of an answer creates a tone of despair. Conversely, Scott claims that there is

no need to get bogged down with the vexed question, whether the heroine should not

have broken off her engagement to her lover eight years and more ago; the point is that

matrimony did not then betide, yet both parties were of a caliber of outlook and feeling to

recognize each others worth and the depth and import of each others mutual response

(183). I would go even further, and suggest that the absence on an answer adds a shade of

complexity and realism to the novel. Fiction may deal in absolutes, but life rarely does

and Annes ability to regret and yet not torment herself with the events of eight years ago

is perhaps one of the most admirable points of the novel. She sees the past not in black

and white, but shades of greywhich is what Wentworth must learn to do. Many critics

point out the similarity between the values championed here and in another Austen

novelpassion and prudence versus sense and sensibility. However,Persuasion is a

more accomplished novel precisely because Austen does not draw a strict dichotomy

between these two values, as she does in Sense and Sensibility. That which Brown deems

its failure is actually its greatest success.

The desire to viewPersuasion as a capitulation to romance seems to spring from

our love of Jane Austen, more than anything else. According to Mary Lascelles,

Persuasion contains Jane Austens first sympathetic use of the word romantic (183). I

can, however, find only one use of the word in the entire work, and it is in reference to

some rocks in Lyme. People are too eager to find romance in the book, and too eager to

link that romance to Jane Austen herself. Virginia Woolf claims that there is an

expressed emotion in the scene at the concert and in the famous talk about womans


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constancy which provesthe biographical fact that Jane Austen had loved (Woolf,

143). However, this is vastly underestimating Austens ability as a writer, and the

possibility that she could derive inspiration from anything other than real life. For

example, Richard Simpson points out the great similarities between Twelfth Nightand

Persuasion (Southam, 137). Is it not possible that she received her inspiration from that

quarter, or better yet her own imagination, rather than some long lost love? It seems that

here, in Austens last complete novel before her untimely death, we seek to find proof of

some melancholy romance, that may or may not have existed, rather than reading the

brilliant love story about a woman, no longer young who had been forced into prudence

in her youth, [and]learned romance as she grew olderthe natural sequence to an

unnatural beginning (Austen, 22). In desiring this same fate for our beloved author we

ignore the text before usan unfortunate occurrence and one that would have

undoubtedly vexed Austen.

Word Count: 2465

Works Consulted

Austen, Jane. Persuasion. Ware: Wordsworth Classics, 1993

Babb, Howard S. Jane Austens Novels: The Fabric of Dialogue. Columbus: Archon

Books, 1967

Bloom, Harold, ed. Modern Critical Views Jane Austen. New York: Chelsea House

Publishers, 1986

Brown, Julia Prewitt. Jane Austens Novels. Cambridge: Harvard University Press,

1979


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Copeland, Edward, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen. Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 1997

Crane, R. S. The idea of the humanities, and other essays critical and historical.

Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967

Lascelles, Mary. Jane Austen and her Art. London: Oxford University Press, 1939

Moller, Kenneth. Jane Austens Art of Allusion. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press,

1968

Pinion, F.B. A Jane Austen Companion. London: The MacMillan Press Ltd., 1973

Scott, P.J.M. Jane Austen: A Reassessment. Totowa: Barnes and Noble Books, 1982

Shorter, Clement K., ed. The Bronts: Life and Letters. London: Hodder and Stoughton,

1908

Southam, B.C., ed. Jane Austen: Northange Abbey and Persuasion. London: The

MacMillan Press Ltd., 1976

Woolf, Virginia. The Common Reader. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., 1925

Wright, Andrew H. Jane Austens Novels: A Study in Structure. London: Chatto &

Windus, 1967

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Eng 211-Term Paper