Thursday, June 26, 2008

WWJD? (What Would Jane Do?)

Isn't that the question for all time?

What would she do? We don't know what Jane Austen would have done, unfortunately.

However, I can picture her being a hopeful young woman possibly putting all her hopes and dreams into her books. While I don't think she was ever persuaded to refuse someone's love because of his rank in society, I can't help but think that she may have loved someone as deeply as Anne Elliot loved Captain Wentworth in Persuasion.

In this novel, and I assume in her other novels too, her characters are all about self-control and delayed gratification, especially the women. The women have opinions they don't share out loud. They may no share them with their husbands either. The men could inherit their father's estate, but the women had a dowry to entice an appropriate suitor. I loved how Anne tries to explain the difference between men and women towards the end of the book...

"...We certainly do not forget you, so soon as you forget us. It is perhaps, our fate rather than our merit. We cannot help ourselves. We live at home, quiet, confined, and our feelings prey upon us. You are forced on exertion. You have always a profession, pursuits, business of some sort or other, to take you back into the world immediately, and continual occupation and change soon weaken impressions."

Although it may be Anne speaking, it's Jane Austen's mind putting those words on paper. I find it rather courageous of her to say such things at a time when women were no more than decorative delicate china.

If you're looking to start reading Jane Austen, I would begin with Persuasion. It's not too long and it's a story we all know. Boy meets girl. Boy breaks up with girl and they spend quite some time apart. Boy comes back to girl. Boy marries girl. Enjoy!

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