View source for Sense and Sensibility

Novel written by Jane Austen and published in 1811. It is the author´s first novel to be published.

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The story is about two sisters, Elinor and Marianne Dashwood, who couldn´t be more different – Elinor, the older, more reserved sister, and Marianne, with her seventeen years two years younger than Elinor and hopelessly romantic and emotional. When their father dies, the inheritance doesn´t go to his second wife Mrs Dashwood and their three daughters, but to his son John from his first marriage, and the four women are left without money and have to leave the estate to John and his wife Fanny. Before leaving the estate, Elinor gets to meet Edward Ferrars, Fanny´s brother, whom she immediately is attracted to, but as he´s being reserved about his intentions and as Fanny talks about him having to marry a rich woman, Elinor doesn´t dare to act on her feelings.
After moving into a small cottage in Barton Park, the Dashwoods are welcomed by Sir John Middleton, who offered them the cottage, and while dining with them they meet Colonel Brandon, an old friend of Sir John. Colonel Brandon seems to be attracted to Marianne immediately, who, on the other hand, finds him too old and serious. She rather falls in love with a young man called Willoughby, and everyone expects them to marry. Then one day, Willoughby leaves Marianne and the village without real explanation, breaking her heart in the progress. Elinor gets her heart broken as well when hearing from Lucy Steele that she and Edward Ferrars have been secretly engaged for some time. While Marianne suffers to everyone´s notice, Elinor keeps her misery to herself.
When the two sisters spend the winter in London, Marianne seeks to get into contact with Willoughby by sending him letters, which all remain unanswered. When she meets him on a ball one evening, he rejects her coldly and we get to know that he got engaged to some wealthy lady in the meantime. Marianne is devastated once again, while in Elinor´s case new circumstances arise. Lucy Steele, meeting Edward´s mother and being welcomed warmly, seeks the opportunity to tell her about the secret engagement to her son, with the result of being thrown out rather harshly. Mrs Ferrars threatens Edward to disinherit him if he doesn´t end the engagement, but Edward, being true to his word, refuses to end it although he doesn´t love Lucy. His mother disinherits him and gives the inheritance to his brother Robert. Elinor and Marianne, hearing of the marriage of Mr Ferrars and Lucy Steele, believe Edward to be the groom, and learn only later that it was Edward´s brother Robert who married Lucy. Lucy, not wanting to marry the now-poor Edward, broke the engagement and took his brother. Marianne and Elinor, not knowing this, start their journey back home. While having a stop, Marianne, still feeling miserable because of Willoughby, acts rather unreasonably and becomes dangerously ill. Colonel Brandon rides off to bring their mother there, and thankfully Marianne survives. Back at home, Edward makes his appearance and Elinor (and also the others) has to see that it´s not him who married Lucy and that he has been in love with her for some time. Edward proposes to her and they marry. Marianne, who seems to have learned from her nearly death experience, settles to marry Colonel Brandon, a man she, although she found him too old at first, has learned to love after some time. 

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The theme of the novel is the contrast between sense and sensibility, portrayed by the two sisters Elinor and Marianne. Elinor, the thoughtful and restrained sister, stands for sense, while Marianne, being impulsive, emotional and self-centred, stands for sensibility. Both have to learn, during the course of the book, that tending too much to one side (especially concerning the emotional part) causes a lot of problems. The story is also about what was accepted in society those times, as being too passionate in public – as Marianne does – was not always approved of. While we today find Marianne´s emotionality comprehensible, back then feelings had to be acted out moderately. Another important topic is money, how it can restrain your life and how it influences and often manipulates marriage wishes. While Edward keeps to his promise of marrying Lucy, although he doesn´t love her anymore and will lose his whole inheritance, he is true to his word, only to find Lucy abandoning him the minute he´s penniless and eloping with the now-rich brother. The similar thing happens with Willoughby, who, although he loves Marianne, leaves her to marry a wealthy lady as he fears to be left penniless (as we find out from Colonel Brandon, Willoughby fell in disgrace when he seduced a fifteen year-old girl, Brandon´s ward, and left her when she got pregnant, that being reason he got disinherited by his patroness). Both sisters end up in happy marriages, while Elinor, the restrained one, marries her first love, Marianne, the emotional one, settles with the rational love. 

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Literature

Austen, Jane. ''Sense and Sensibility''. London: Penguin Books, 1994.

Bush, Douglas. ''Jane Austen''. London: Macmillan, 1975.

Lidell, Robert. ''The Novels of Jane Austen''. London: Longmans, 1969.

Williams, Michael. ''Jane Austen: Six Novels and Their Methods''. New York: St. Martin´s Press, 1986.