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Persuasion

4.12 of 5 stars 4.12 · rating details · 181,591 ratings · 7,288 reviews

Austen's last novel is the crowning achievement of her matchless career. Her heroine, Anne Elliot, a woman of integrity, breeding and great depth of emotion, stands in stark contrast to the brutality and hypocrisy of Regency England. Includes a new Introduction by Margaret Drabble, famed novelist and editor of The Oxford Companion to the English Language.

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Published December 6th 1990 by Oxford University Press, USA (first published December 1817)

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Feb 11, 2008 Elizabeth rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: in-by-of-england, reviewed, virginia-woolf-recommends, boston-janeites, romance-with-a-capital-r, jane-austen-made-me-do-it

This is my favorite Jane Austen work. I love Elizabeth Bennett as I love a sister, but I love Anne Elliot as a woman I would want to be. She is highly principled, smart, kind, and moderate. Persuasion also shows more emotion than Jane Austen's other books. There is a great deal of walking and sighing and reciting lines of romantic poetry to oneself. It’s charming and comic and true all at once.

My favorite part is that Anne Elliot and Frederick Wentworth are adults. They have enough experience t...more

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Feb 11, 2013 Steve aka Sckenda rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Those Coping With Rejection and Those Having Unwisely Rejected

Shelves: women, flexibility, britain, british-authors, classics, great-books, 19th-century, romance, love, manners, marriage, social-class, pov-partially-omniscient, movie, television

Could you be persuaded to return to the person who jilted you 8 years earlier? Conversely, could you be persuaded to risk rejection yourself by reaching out to the person whom you mistakenly discarded? To me, this novel was about rejection: how to persuade yourself to be at peace with yourself after you unwisely rejected your true love; and, how to persuade yourself to find happiness and dignity after you have been speared by your true love.

Eight years have passed since Anne Elliot rejected Went...more Could you be persuaded to return to the person who jilted you 8 years earlier? Conversely, could you be persuaded to risk rejection yourself by reaching out to the person whom you mistakenly discarded? To me, this novel was about rejection: how to persuade yourself to be at peace with yourself after you unwisely rejected your true love; and, how to persuade yourself to find happiness and dignity after you have been speared by your true love.

Eight years have passed since Anne Elliot rejected Wentworth. She did so, despite her love for him and despite his sterling character, because her aristocratic family persuaded her that Frederick Wentworth was socially beneath her. With nobody to advocate his merits, Wentworth sails away to serve Queen and Country in the Royal Navy.

As the novel opens, Captain Wentworth returns (Gatsby-like), a rich naval hero, whereas the profligate Elliot family must “retrench” (rent out their estate) to stave off bankruptcy. As coincidence would have it, Wentworth and Anne must awkwardly coexist in the same small social circle.

Wentworth resents Anne, and the modern reader, at first, does not blame him. (We despise caste systems and all who slander true love.) Wentworth proclaims he is looking for a resolute woman but that Anne is the last woman whom he would consider. She is disqualified. She was irresolute, persuadable.

Anne, mysteriously, neither begrudges Wentworth his attitude nor beats herself up. She wonders:

whether it ever occurred to him to question the justness of his own previous opinion as to the universal felicity and advantage of firmness of character; and whether like all other qualities of the mind, it should have its proportions and limits. She thought it could scarcely escape him to feel, that a persuadable temper might sometimes be as much in favor of happiness as a very resolute character.

Anne is complex: strong; dignified; quiet; eloquent; self-reliant; and self-assured. Perhaps as an act of self-preservation, she quietly resigns herself to life without Wentworth. She failed to speak up for Wentworth 8 years ago; she fails to speak up for herself now. She indulges not in hope; hope risks failure. She neither manipulates events nor attempts to persuade. She offers neither excuses nor explanations. She just exists and observes. She yearns but does not give voice to the desire.

Anne Elliots are rare, but they exist—resigned, poised, and observant. Anne says little and thinks much. The modern reader desires for her to just reach out and talk to Wentworth. Plead your case, Anne. Tell him that you were young; that you were misadvised; that you were wrong; and that you are sorry. Tell him that you are not the same person; that you are older, wiser; that you are ready. Speak, Anne. But that’s not the way heroines act in Austen’s universe.

Wentworth himself does not say much, but he undergoes a process of self-persuasion, and the valiant naval officer begins a long slow retreat from his resolution. He is bombarded not with a barrage of word-- but with Anne’s quiet dignity. Somehow Anne and Wentworth manage to communicate without words, through glances. Perceptions. Omissions. Observations.

One day Anne finally expresses herself, albeit indirectly. She claims that women and men are both capable of love and fidelity but that men are more capable of moving on with their lives once their woman is either dead or gone. Wentworth hears her, and, in response, he writes to Anne. The letter starts:

I can listen no more in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late that such precious feelings are gone forever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more you won, than when you almost broke it eight years and a half ago.

Austen is renowned for happy weddings and endings. Yet, this story left me with sadness. Does this novel hit close to home? It was written by a woman who died at 41, and I don’t know whether Jane Austen ever loved. If she did, I wonder whether she ever unleashed her magnificent words or whether she remained forever silent, like Anne was apparently ready to do.

Can you persuade yourself or do you delegate that role to others? Can you be persuaded to speak after a lifetime of silence? Can you be persuaded to be patient with your lover? Can you be persuaded to abandon resentment? Or are you unpersuadable? I remember St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians:

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it is does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.

Can you be persuaded to self-sacrificial love like this? Can you be persuaded to proclaim such love not just with your lips but also with your life?

February 11, 2013(less)

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Sep 27, 2012 Nataliya rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2012-reads

Dear Miss Austen,

Ummm... Anne Elliot is past her youth and bloom??? Heh? She is MY AGE! Scratch that - she is younger than me.

..........Basically, get off my lawn, kids. I mean it..............

In all seriousness, this is the first Jane Austen book that does not feature a pretty and charming teenager looking for a perfect match in a cultured and rich gentleman. Instead, her protagonist Anne Elliot is well into the respectable age of seven-and-twenty, equipped with composure and maturity that only age can bring. (Hey, maybe advanced age is not so bad, after all! But I happily maintain that mentally I'm still eleven. Oh, and as I said, get off my lawn!)

Anne finds herself in a quite uncomfortable situation. Years ago, she was engaged to a dashing young sailor whom she subsequently rejected on the well-meaning but ultimately flawed advice of a trusted friend. Now that sailor, having transformed into a respectable and well-to-do, and still dashing Captain Wentworth, reenters Anne's circle of acquaintances, clearly still resenting Anne, and appears to be actively looking for a younger prettier future spouse. All that while Anne, ruined by age (just kidding, she is still quite pretty, as it turns out) realizes she still harbors her old affection for him but needs (of course!) to maintain all the necessary societal proprieties.

On top of all of that, Anne has the most rotten family! Her father is a pathetic handsome gentleman unhealthily obsessed with his own good looks (I mean, the man has a bedroom full of mirrors! Puh-lease.) Her younger sister will claw your eyes out if she were to think you'd eclipse her as a center of attention even for a minute (this is a woman who feels slighted if her dying son gets more attention than she does), and will spend hours sending little verbal put-downs in Anne's direction while shamelessly using her help for anything imaginable. And yet, this pathetic creature is still "not so repulsive and unsisterly as Elizabeth", the older sister.

"To be claimed as a good, though in an improper style, is at least better than being rejected as no good at all."

And all of Anne's family members seem to compete with each other in how to best put down Anne - the treatment that she easily sees but tolerates without complaining and in good spirits. Oh, and they have to downsize because all the vain and shallow family members are quite rotten at preserving the family fortune.

Basically, to sum up:

.

Anne Elliot is a well-mannered, reasonable, proper, and sensible heroine. Good thing she is NOT the one narrating this story, or it would have been quite bland. Instead, we are treated to a quite snarky (albeit within strict early-19th-century British sensibilities) narrative voice, picking apart all of our characters and their environment with a lovely and a bit sarcastic commentary. Ah, Miss Austen, you were really getting fed up with your well-mannered society, weren't you? And I love it.

I love how delightfully drama-free this story is. No huge events, no shocking twists, nothing except for reasonable behavior and not-too-exciting provincial life (well, in all honesty, excepting two near-fatal falls, at least one of which was getting me all worried about epidural vs. subdural hematoma, which is no joke). The only hint of strong passion is in a short letter from Wentworth to Anne, and even then the declaration of love is done in a subdued epistolary form. And it is precisely this quiet flow of the story that creates an enjoyable atmosphere, strangely.
...........................

"But I hate to hear you talking so like a fine gentleman, and as if women were all fine ladies, instead of rational creatures. We none of us expect to be in smooth water all our days."

And another thing that I came to appreciate is the attempt to decry the classism of English society. The most admirable people in this book are not the gentlemen by birth, unlike the proverbial Mr. Darcy (ughh) but the naval officers and their circles - Wentworth and the Crofts especially. It's like Austen was finally acknowledging that it's not only the birth into the gentry class that makes you a decent person. Way to go, Miss Austen! Congratulations on succeeding in making all your hypocritical gentlemen with overblown feeling of self-importance appear to be total idiots like they should be:

"A man is in greater danger in the navy of being insulted by the rise of one whose father, his father might have disdained to speak to, and of becoming prematurely an object of disgust himself, than in any other line."

A lovely 3.5-star book. It does not quite reach the 4-star enjoyment of Jane Eyre, but it is a delightful book with which to spend an overcast day filled with bronchitis cough.

"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. She thought it could scarcely escape him to feel that a persuadable temper might sometimes be as much in favour of happiness as a very resolute character."

(less)

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Apr 23, 2012 Elizabeth rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: grown ups

Shelves: reviewed, 2012, boston-janeites, in-by-of-england, romance-with-a-capital-r, virginia-woolf-recommends, jane-austen-made-me-do-it

I'm a romantic. I am. I admit it. It's probably why I am constantly frustrated and unhappy with romance novels; there is very little that is romantic about them. Somehow, the modern romance book (and rom-com movies) industry has equated being a romantic with post-lobotomy recovery. That's not me. It doesn't have anything to do with me. It doesn't feel like me.

I feel like Anne Eliot. I understand Anne. I've been where Anne has been. She speaks to me. Anne is not only everything I want to be when...more I'm a romantic. I am. I admit it. It's probably why I am constantly frustrated and unhappy with romance novels; there is very little that is romantic about them. Somehow, the modern romance book (and rom-com movies) industry has equated being a romantic with post-lobotomy recovery. That's not me. It doesn't have anything to do with me. It doesn't feel like me.

I feel like Anne Eliot. I understand Anne. I've been where Anne has been. She speaks to me. Anne is not only everything I want to be when it comes to how one should treat other people, especially the unkind ones, but also how she handles herself and her feelings. I turned back to this book (yes, for the seventh time) because I wanted to be reminded of that. Here is Anne, she's older, she's experienced, she's lived eight years with disappointment and a feeling of sorrow in her heart, and she is suddenly forced into the biggest, most awkward, most difficult, and heart-breaking situation I can imagine.

I've got to believe that this is the way to behave under pressure, with grace, and not with panic and craziness. I read this book to look into the inner life of Anne, which isn't something you'd normally think of with Austen. There's a great subtlety in this portrayal of a woman. It's a minimalist approach to character development. We have a scene of Anne walking in the garden after a difficult meeting and all we are told is that she had to take a walk and because she had no book of poetry on hand to comfort her, she must recite (from memory) all the great poems describing autumn. That's it. And in that we get a flood of the images of the Romantic poets and the symbols and themes of autumn. Not just how the landscape looks, with the quenching fires, and the dampening of spirits after the bountiful harvest, but we get the themes of loss, the final joys, tainted with melancholy and nostalgia already coming on, of life as winter approaches.*

There's also the knowledge, somewhere, underneath a long dark stretch, that there is still a hope for spring. Anne has that, as does this book. Austen is forever optimistic, hopeful, that if one is true to oneself, there is a reward for it at the end. I love the hope in this book. For me, that's the part of the romance of it. Often when I read books about love and relationships (chick lit or otherwise), I am amazed that these people managed to get together at all because they just don't seem to know what they want. They're all over the place. There is no consistency of thought or action.

And I think that's what I mean about this being a book about grown-ups. Anne Eliot and Frederick Wentworth are grown-ups. They know themselves, or come to know themselves, in these pages, and that is what brings them together. They know what they want and that is each other. They are ready to stand up for themselves -- something they didn't have the confidence to do when they first met -- and that creates both the beauty and tension in the plot. There is only so much flittering first loves of insecure, undereducated girls and their boys who haven't learned how to do their own laundry yet, that anyone should have to read.

Anne Eliot is twenty-seven, so from the modern perspective, she is still on the young side, but she doesn't read that way. Anne is a mature woman. She's been through some things. She has survived. The key here is that she's survived intact. She didn't lose herself in disappointment. She didn't change herself or compromise her principles. She doesn't get the nineteenth century equivalent of a bikini-wax and new wardrobe and suddenly all her problems disappear. This is an inward journey with her; a complex, thoughtful one that at times is very funny and others full of sadness and disappointment. It all works out at the end because it is, in fact, a romance, and one of the very best kind.

---------------------
* Keats' To Autumn, written two years after Persuasion was published.

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drows'd with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.
Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,-
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
(less)

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Mar 31, 2008 Ted rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: great-books

One of the major sources of contention and strife in my marriage is the disagreement between my wife and me over what is the best Jane Austen novel (yes, we are both more than a bit geekish in our love of words and literature--our second biggest ongoing quarrel is about the merits of the serial comma).

For my money, there are three of Austen's six finished novels that one can make a good argument for being her "best":

"Pride and Prejudice" (the popular choice, and my wife's)
"Emma" (the educated...more

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Jan 03, 2011 Mariel rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Do I have any peers to pressure?

Recommended to Mariel by: they twisted my arm

This photo of Jimmy Buffett enjoying a buffett of women is not here for vote pandering. It's here for a good reason.

Persuasion is about pressure from family and society. I told myself (read Persuasion in my teens and again when I was twenty-two) that I'd have told them all to fuck off. (I would've given up on Captain Wentworth when it appeared that he wanted another.) I get it now.

I was shocked and shamed to discover that I'm somewhat distantly related to butt-rocker Jimmy Buffett (and born in the same town too *sob*). I've resisted wearing hawaiian shirts and margaritas (Margaritaville must be the WORST job in the world. I bet it's the lowest caste possible in India). I've resisted making music out of my butt (Jim Carrey can sleep tonight).

I have so! "What's that your singing as you mentally toil over another Jane Austen review?" Tori of the lavatory, flushed all the way to Timbuktu. Supposing what's that suppository to you. But is the butt is the but of what butt. The butt crack is the crack of the butt is the butt of the crack. Won't you share with me, it's all gonna be hunky dory. Tori don't wanna be no whorey. Jimmy Buffett gets more ass than a toilet seat. I'm afraid he's venarial diseased. Er, it's the new Jack Johnson song. I'm not making the Butt of Rock music, or anything. (I'm not hiding my doodle of a toilet with a bow on its top.)

True story: Jimmy Buffett threatened to sue my favorite uncle when he posted a campaign online that the fight for manatees was a ruse to take away boater's rights. I'm TRYING to fight the family pressure to kill manatees. It's hard.

Hagar the Horrible gets drunk on Sammy Hagar's special blend of Cabo Wabo every night and pillages villages for groupies... It is tough to resist pressure, tough to go it on your own when you let yourself be tied down to what your family wants, and inherited personality. I really liked that Austen's book is relateable even if you would just tell everybody to fuck off. Not everything that is easy for me is easy for other people, and vice versa. I think it is good to be reminded of that. Real growing pains stuff. (Um, not making a good enough case for that Buffett photo yet, Mariel...)

ME LOVE YOU LONG TIME! A little loooong time. Tell him five dollar! Give him a great big flush! (Butt punk rock. It could be adapted to a '60s girl group. Mariel and the Whirl Pools.)(less)

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Jan 06, 2013 Duchess Nicole rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: e-pcs, ebooks-bn, genre-historical-romance, genre-historical-fiction, genre-classics, read-in-2013, favorites

This is one of those books...you know, one of those that sits on your shelf, looking pretty and making you feel a bit less of the uncultured swine that you really are. At least, it eased my guilt a little bit just to look at my bookshelves and see it nestled in with all of my other unread classics.

What's funny is that this was considered to be silly old romance back in the day of Austen. The fact that a woman wrote it was nearly a guarantee that it was rubbish. And then there's me....when I sta...more

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Jan 24, 2012 Margaret rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: british-literature, favorites, austen, authors-ab

Pride and Prejudice has long been my favorite Austen, but after several rereadings, I think that Persuasion may have overtaken it at the top of the list (or at least equaled it). The heroine, Anne Elliot, is quiet and unassuming and the story of her romance with Captain Wentworth could hardly be more different from that between Elizabeth and Darcy, yet it is perhaps more deeply felt and written.

The story begins eight years after Anne, on the advice of her friend Lady Russell, broke off her engag...more

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Sep 12, 2012 Sarah marked it as unfinished · review of another edition

I just...
I can't...
*sigh*

See, it's like this: I'm a third of the way through this book. I already know I don't like it. If finish it, review it, and rate it as I see fit, you'll all get mad. You'll say that I just didn't understand the book. Or, you'll express bewilderment at my "strange" reaction and then show concern. We'll compare Austen to the Brontës. I'll drag Rebecca into this, and then someone will drag Virginia Woolf into it too. I'll say something like, "This isn't prose. It's an instr...more

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Jul 09, 2008 Trevor rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: literature

What can I possibly tell you about Jane Austen? I really enjoyed this. I really like that by the end you get to move a bit out of the head of the main character, away from her self-deprecations and almost masochistic lacerations and get to see what Captain Wentworth actually did think of her – rather than her-less-than-self-congratulatory version.

Okay, it is all very romantic – but what I found most interesting in this book was how I felt compelled to consider how much of the world we learn by h...more

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May 07, 2012 Greg rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, girls-girls-girls

Every time I shelve the Barnes and Noble classic version of this book (and sometimes when I shelve other versions), this song runs through my head (or technically the one line in the chorus), "Pretty Persuasion". This version of it by Jawbreaker, not the original REM version (which is embarrassing, why you may ask? I could have just stated the song and moved on with the review, or I could be honest about some failing on my part that no one probably needs to know (would I be a more better awesome...more Every time I shelve the Barnes and Noble classic version of this book (and sometimes when I shelve other versions), this song runs through my head (or technically the one line in the chorus), "Pretty Persuasion". This version of it by Jawbreaker, not the original REM version (which is embarrassing, why you may ask? I could have just stated the song and moved on with the review, or I could be honest about some failing on my part that no one probably needs to know (would I be a more better awesomest top reviewer full of win if I just stopped with all of this 'honesty' painting myself as some hapless moron nonsense, what if I used product in my hair? I dream of being more like Mr. Elliot (father or cousin, now that I think of it, but cousin was in my mind when I said that))(still in a parentheses in case your wondering). For years, like five of them or so, I've misattributed this song to being a Psychedelic Furs song, not just as originally done by them and then covered by Jawbreaker, but as in the version I was hearing in my head as by the Psychedelic Furs and not a cover version performed by my favorite band ever. What an awful fan I am. Although I've never been that big on the Etc., collection where this can be found, nor ever interested in REM enough to purchase more than two or three of their albums, nevermind a tribute CD to them (and yes, "Pretty Persuasion" is on one of the REM records I own (although thinking about REM now I realize that I only ever bought one REM record, the other two I owned were given to me as Christmas gifts (you needed to know this information, seriously)))). If I had ever gone through with tattooing the four F's on to my arm or leg like I really meant to have done I would be right now burning the tattoo off of my body with the cooking flame throwing thing my sister gave me for Christmas in 2009 instead of writing this review). So this book has the soundtrack of Blake rasping, "Goddamn Pretty Persuasion" in my head pretty much anytime that I see or think about the book. I think this is an ok thing, I could totally see Anne as listening to Jawbreaker if the story had been set in the 1990's or 2000's instead of the early nineteenth century.*

Part of me wants to just write a review calling this a romance novel, just to incite some of my goodreads friends, but I won't do that. If this were a romance novel I think it would be fairly unsatisfying. The ending felt sort of like a foregone conclusion from the first couple of chapters (although I'm not the target audience for romances, and my guess is that most readers of romance novels can kind of guess the ending to just about any romance novel, and I guess it's the route taken or something that makes them interesting, I don't know. I am not someone to ask anything related to romance about (most un-romantic thing I've ever done? Told my sophomore year college girlfriend (maybe I will relate more tales from this relationship some other time when I'm at a loss for personal shit to divulge instead of actually writing about the book I'm supposed to be reviewing) soon after returning to school in January how I wasn't going to get her anything for Valentines Day because it was just a consumer holiday designed to sell crap to people. Unromantic? I then made sure to harp on my refusing to take part in Valentines Day almost daily up until the actual day), see? What do I know about romance).

Instead I was surprised (I guess, I don't know what I was expecting from Jane Austen actually) to find the book a lot like the fun parts of Proust. Her characters were as comically stuffy, delusional and as interesting as the various people who populated the drawing rooms of Marcel's social world. But unlike Proust's Marcel, Anne is sort of the rational calm in the middle of the storm of personalities and not a borderline sociopath who is critical but really right at home with all of the other psychological malcontents populating the novel.

I really liked the book and this is a very strong four star rating. My only complaint with the book, and what probably kept it from getting the fifth star, is the style of writing, which is more the conventions of the time than the actual content.

But I would proudly bring this book or maybe even another Jane Austen novel with me to a future UFC event and maybe even sit and read a few pages in between fights while some remix of Rage Against the Machine with extra hip-hop beats was played at teeth rattling volumes, and I would have no problem asking some passing MMA personality for an autograph and open up Jane Austen to the title page to get their John Hancock. Like Anne and her feelings about her broken engagement to Captain Wentworth I'll be regretting not getting Skyscrape** from TapOut or trainer Greg Jackson to sign and make my copy of Jane Austen the most badass on the planet until I can rectify this situation. I only hope it doesn't take eight years of pining before I get the chance to set things right.

*Another band I could see the modern day Anne listening to (yes, she's been projected to being some kind of cool but unnoticed indie girl in my reimagining) would be the other band that supplies a soundtrack to the shelving of a Jane Austen book. That would be (obviously) Belle and Sebastian's "Just a Modern Rock Song" for Emma ("Emma tried to run away, I followed her across the city").

**Greg Jackson looks like a normal person, so I'm not going to share a picture of him, but this is what Skyscrape looks like:

Doesn't he look like the type of guy who just needs have his signature saved in a Jane Austen book?(less)

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Jun 05, 2008 Abigail rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Mature Jane Austen Fans/ 19th-Century Novel Readers

Shelves: literature-classics

Review Temporarily Removed.

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Abigail Sherri: you're right, of course... I was being somewhat lazy in my review, calling Anne's willingness to be persuaded her "one" flaw. It would perhaps...more
updated Jun 05, 2008 01:45pm

Abigail Sherri: once again, your excellent points force me to acknowledge that I am being rather lazy - cut that out! :)

I too find myself in sympathy with the...more
updated Jun 06, 2008 10:13am

Feb 08, 2010 Chandra rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: jane-austen, classics, love-romance, nerdy-girl-bookclub, 2010_reads, anglophilia, favorites

This was my first 'grown up' foray into the world of Jane Austen. What I mean to say is that I read Emma and Pride and Prejudice long enough ago to have mostly forgotten the experience (something I hope to rectify soon!). I think this was a perfect choice for my return. What's interesting about Anne is that she's in a relatively good situation at the start of the book. She is well set up (financially and socially) as the daughter of a Baronet and she is generally well liked and respected. She is...more This was my first 'grown up' foray into the world of Jane Austen. What I mean to say is that I read Emma and Pride and Prejudice long enough ago to have mostly forgotten the experience (something I hope to rectify soon!). I think this was a perfect choice for my return. What's interesting about Anne is that she's in a relatively good situation at the start of the book. She is well set up (financially and socially) as the daughter of a Baronet and she is generally well liked and respected. She is teetering dangerously at the edge of spinsterhood, but she did have several respectable chances at romance in years past. Though not a martyr she seems to have accepted her current lot in life – namely that of being alternately ignored completely or used shamelessly by her own family.

And then we see Anne’s safe internal world turned upside down and inside out when Captain Frederick Wentworth, a former suitor, arrives on the scene. He has not come to rekindle the romance – far from it. He is still deeply hurt and resentful at how Anne discarded him. Anne has long since seen her error and has deep regrets. How these two navigate this complicated terrain within the confines of society and gender is a spectacle to behold! Of course we know how it will go, but we still feel deeply Anne’s anxiety the entire way. And, oh that letter!

Persuasion is a beautiful and unforgettable story that speaks timeless truths about life and love. It helps that Anne is one of the most likeable heroines of all time. She is clever and kind, but not so much so that we feel inferior. She is long suffering at the hands of her selfish family, but not so much that we feel inordinate pity. But the real saving grace is that Anne is not above observing all the foibles around her. In her quiet and contemplative way Anne gives us almost unlimited access to her world – the intricate web of manners and mores of the landed gentry. And if one comes away with a quaint and rosy picture of tea and crumpets and balls then one has missed the point entirely. (less)

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Apr 01, 2012 Jeannette rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: classics, austen, favorites, 2011-read, books-i-own, buddy-read, hannah, september-2013, tim

Persuasion is Austen's best work, in my opinion, because while Austen wrote primarily about the social customs of her time, with regard to women marrying well, or not, in Persuasion the heroine is 27, and considered almost too old to find a husband. She rejected her first love, because she was persuaded he was not a suitable match for a 19 year old woman from a good family. They are thrown together eight years later, and it is a bittersweet story of regret and lost chances, with just a bit of ho...more

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Aug 18, 2007 Vicki rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Austen fans, and the generally discouraged in love.

This book is not for everybody. If you're one of those people who hates Jane Austen because she wasn't bold enough, well, then you've got your own set of problems, and I won't attempt to unpick them. If you simply don't go in for her, then I can respect that. But if you dig her, or what she writes about, then keep reading.

This is my favorite Austen book. I originally read it in grad school, in an Austen scholarship class. I'd tried reading it before, when I was a bit younger, but couldn't get in...more

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Jan 19, 2013 Jenny rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: read2013, location-uk, read-long-ago

(Somehow I never marked any Jane Austen novels as read, when I've read most of them multiple times. Trying to remedy this by summarizing my feelings on each one.)

This is my absolute favorite of Jane Austen's world. This is a love story about two people who find each other again despite time, age difference, different station, and societal expectations. I have read it ~~three~~four times and still feel it is her best work. The last few chapters make me teary every single time. Okay I guess I can some...more

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May 28, 2012 Sherwood Smith added it · review of another edition

Captain Harville: "But let me observe that all histories are against
you, all stories, prose and verse... Songs and proverbs, all talk of
woman's fickleness. But perhaps you will say, these were all written by
men."
Anne Elliot: "Yes, yes, if you please, no reference to examples in
books. Men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story.
Education has been theirs in so much higher a degree; the pen has been in
their hands."

I would venture to guess that of all Jane Austen’s novels, P...more

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Rosamund Hodge I'm running off, like, five-year-old memories here--but I think that one of the reasons Fanny is such an unfavorite (besides her love interest, and I...more
May 31, 2012 01:10am

Sherwood Smith Fanny is indeed powerless--she's only got her brains and integrity. With the last, she ends up being crucial to nearly everyone.

Read it again. I do th...more
May 31, 2012 05:51am

Apr 15, 2008 Idle Hippo rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Those who believe in second chance and Amang Suramang (?) Ha!

Shelves: classic

This is my second Jane Austen's works after Pride and Prejudice. Patience, is the keyword for me to finished this book. Frankly, it takes me a while to get into the language. And after reading this book I daresay that all of her book contains happy ending and marriages :)
Bottom line, it's about mistakes and second chances. The story about Anne Elliot and Captain Wentworth who used to love each other but Anne was persuaded (for a certain reason) to break off their engagement. And their effort to...more

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Apr 28, 2011 Kathryn rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: classics

I love Austen's works, but one just seemed pale when I first read it as a teenager. I have to sigh now that at the time I thought Anne was "too old" to really relate to (since she is now two years younger than I am, ha!) but I really think that, upon rereading this, it was the "romance" that seemed impossibly difficult to appreciate at the age of sixteen-ish. I wanted that delicious first meeting, a budding attachment basking in the radiance of youthful emotion, blossoming into an early and stea...more I love Austen's works, but one just seemed pale when I first read it as a teenager. I have to sigh now that at the time I thought Anne was "too old" to really relate to (since she is now two years younger than I am, ha!) but I really think that, upon rereading this, it was the "romance" that seemed impossibly difficult to appreciate at the age of sixteen-ish. I wanted that delicious first meeting, a budding attachment basking in the radiance of youthful emotion, blossoming into an early and steadfast and utterly romantic happy ever after. But here is a story that begins eight years after our heroine last saw the man she loves—after giving him up at the persuasion of her trusted adviser!!! We have a love story in retrospect, with at first very little hope of anything beyond reading over warm memories and perhaps the chance that Anne will find a new man who will be kind and good and not mind that Anne is past her first bloom. I was frustrated by the restraint, by the lack of faithfulness to their true feelings, and by all the waltzes of societal pressure that keep them out of pace with one another and unable even to fully communicate when at last they are thrown into the same circle once more.

Well, here I am, "all grown up," and I quite enjoyed my foray into "Persuasion" this time around. I related with nods of understanding, recognition and humor at the various characters that make up Anne's social network. I could more fully appreciate the world of early 1800s England and the necessary restraints placed upon Anne. And while perhaps part of me still wishes for a more impetuous and rule-breaking heroine, ala Elizabeth Bennett, I could truly admire Anne and all she endured with grace and kindness and I could understand if not quite empathize with the circumstances that persuaded her to follow the guidance of others rather than her own heart in the beginning. And while the "romance" in the story is still less ostentatious compared to, say, "Pride and Prejudice" it is none the less vibrant and the final two chapters are utterly scrumptious!

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May 22, 2012 Lisa Vegan rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, novel, bookclub, reviewed, altta

I’m embarrassed to admit that this is my first Austen, at least I don’t remember reading any of her books, although I have seen many of the movies based on her books. I’ve wanted to read all her novels. It’s all the more astounding that I’ve managed to not do so given that in high school and through my first two years of college I majored in English/English literature. I’ve always known that there are gaps (an abyss) in my education, yet this particular one does surprise me.

I suggested this part...more I’m embarrassed to admit that this is my first Austen, at least I don’t remember reading any of her books, although I have seen many of the movies based on her books. I’ve wanted to read all her novels. It’s all the more astounding that I’ve managed to not do so given that in high school and through my first two years of college I majored in English/English literature. I’ve always known that there are gaps (an abyss) in my education, yet this particular one does surprise me.

I suggested this particular Austen to my book group, partly because it’s the favorite of so many I know, and partly because I knew a bit about it, but except for Northanger Abbey I knew less than I knew about her other novels.

This edition of the book has an introduction by Amy Bloom and she tells the entire plot, but atypically I didn’t care at all knowing the book’s story before I read it. I pretty much knew it, and I guess I feel I should have read it long ago. The edition also has the originally written final two chapters, inserted after the rest of the book's text.

But, if not for needing to read it for my real world book club, I’d have put it down and picked it up another time. Actually, I think I’d like to read Austen’s books on the order she penned them. But the main problem is that I’m in a reading slump and this is a case of a good book at the wrong time. It didn’t help that while reading I was often listening to the (very modern) college guys upstairs and other modern and annoying sounds. I should have probably made a point of reading this in the park or some other more suitably atmospheric place. The most ideal years for me to have read this was probably 25-35; that doesn’t mean I won’t have other ideal timea in the future. I can see giving this book 5 stars but I don’t think it’s destined to be one of my favorites.

Apt title. Beautifully written. Wicked wit! It’s also funny and bright and poignant. But mostly waiting waiting waiting waiting waiting waiting waiting…and I kind of got impatient with everybody. So, I really like and admire Anne, a lot, and I love how Austen skewers the society that was familiar to her. Nobody really escaped my periodic irritation though, nor did the situation. I don’t have patience for certain types of plots, and I’m not big on romance stories, although this one wasn’t as “romantic” as I’d expected. Despite the ending, I did find this story a sad one, most likely because of my own current frame of mind: wrong timing for me. Also, I am aware of Austen’s condition when she wrote this novel.

I do hope to pick it up again someday, along with all of Austen’s books.

As I was reading I felt sometimes as though I was reading a play. It read that way to me. I could “see” it all. I can see why Austen’s novels translate so well to film.(less)

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Jul 10, 2007 Christian rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Riding a recent Brit Lit kick, and recalling fond memories of Pride and Prejudice in college, I picked up Persuasion at a used book shop in a convenient size for subway reading.

Perhaps the atmosphere affected me--dim lighting on stuffy summer DC metro platforms--perhaps it was the biography of Abraham Lincoln I was reading in the evenings had me meditating upon a certain greatness of character that seemed absent amidst the Elliots and company, but I was largely unimpressed by Persuasion.

Yes, "un...more Riding a recent Brit Lit kick, and recalling fond memories of Pride and Prejudice in college, I picked up Persuasion at a used book shop in a convenient size for subway reading.

Perhaps the atmosphere affected me--dim lighting on stuffy summer DC metro platforms--perhaps it was the biography of Abraham Lincoln I was reading in the evenings had me meditating upon a certain greatness of character that seemed absent amidst the Elliots and company, but I was largely unimpressed by Persuasion.

Yes, "unimpressed" is the right word. Simply as a matter of craft, the book felt clunky. The revelation about Mr. Elliot's true diabolical nature, for example, drops from nowhere: the scattered (though coincidentally saved) letter of a friend whose connection is the very prior moment's discovery and who herself is a very late addition to the cast. Or take Lady Russell: we are given to understand is a towering personality; but the only reason we have for knowing this is the narrator's continual assertions. We never really get to meet her, never get the opportunity to understand how a matron who makes such errors as a judge of character still commands the devotion and respect of someone as clear-sighted as Anne.

Ah yes, Anne. Another largely unimpressive feature of the book. It is maddening to see her allow herself to be tread upon again and again, and by the end of the novel there is little to make me believe she has learned anything, that her spine is any stiffer. Are we really supposed to believe that she has been following the golden mean between malleablility (persuasion) and boldness all along? It seems rather like she and Mary represent the opposite poles of error, while Louisa is the one hitting a really healthy stride. In fact, the only thing the narrator--and Anne--can hold against Louisa, aside from a girlish giddiness now and then, is her tumble in Lyme. "Propriety or death" may be a stirring oriflamme for some, but I'll choose the girl with a little spirit as my Joan any day, thank you.(less)

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Katharine Kimbriel I think it's possible that she did make changes to please the publisher. It's also possible that this book had more passion in its ending because Aust...more
Sep 20, 2011 02:56pm

deleted user Anne did change! She didn't let herself get persuaded by the end of the novel. She knew what she wanted and I am pretty sure she got what she wanted.....more
Jul 23, 2012 07:33am

May 07, 2012 Stephen M added it · review of another edition

Shelves: textbook, to-plant-for-my-garden, you-can-do-better-than-me, mentions-mitchell

I hope some day in the future, when I'm a more sophisticated reader, with a keen eye for detail and subtly and not nearly so ADD with all story lines—hey just because I can only read books that stay on one idea for less than a few pages *cough*DFW*cough*Pynchon*cough*David Mitchell*cough*, and books that are full of annoying digressions and cut-aways (don't you hate it when a writer can't get his point across?) and just rambles and rambles ad nauseam with those lofty, unwieldy sentences with so...more I hope some day in the future, when I'm a more sophisticated reader, with a keen eye for detail and subtly and not nearly so ADD with all story lines—hey just because I can only read books that stay on one idea for less than a few pages *cough*DFW*cough*Pynchon*cough*David Mitchell*cough*, and books that are full of annoying digressions and cut-aways (don't you hate it when a writer can't get his point across?) and just rambles and rambles ad nauseam with those lofty, unwieldy sentences with so many appositives it would make any grammarian red in the face, doesn't mean that I couldn't read this? well maybe not—and when I can read a book without all those improbable characters who are larger than life and do larger than life things and think about deeply probing philosophical concerns and not, you know, normal every day life stuff, like making money for the family and what sounds good to eat tonight, and when I can finally open up a book and read its contents and not need some pomo-gimmick or genre bending head-swirler to dangle like a carrot on the end of a string that I have to chase throughout the novel in order to ever finish it and actually read a book that has solid, real merits based solely on the writing itself, because the writing is actually what creative writing teachers and authors espouse as the real stuff, you know, the actual good writing, that reveals detail by important detail and the character tensions are only felt, never paraded around in some hyper self-consicous manner to make a self-referential point about the condition of narratives itself, surely just an excuse to skirt the actual hard work of fiction writing, and those characters have actual profound feelings and nuanced interactions with one another, and when I can read a book that doesn't require a suspension of disbelief, no it simply is and is an accurate, realist reflection of reality, an anathema to today's coke-addled ether of narrative deconstruction and splintered morals, no fracturing of time frame, instead following one moment to the next, careful not to digress too heavily into flashblacks but just stays the steady linear course like an actual day, only then maybe, when I'm concerned more about my reading of the book and not how I'm going to review it on goodreads and how my reaction to the book means more than the reading of the book itself, maybe, maybe, maybe I will be able to read Persuasion and it will get the patience and understanding it deserves.

I'm sorry Jane Austen, it's not you it's me.

Maybe George can explain it to you.

description

Or wait, that's a little ahead of your time, isn't it?

And look at me, the post-modern GR reviewer, hardly able to review anything with authenticity and honesty without resorting to cheap pop-culture references.(less)

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Aug 14, 2009 Sandy Tjan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: classics, british-literature, 5-star-reads, 2009, bbc-big-reads, pemberley

Persuasion, Austen's last completed novel, has little in common with her earlier, more celebrated works. There is comparatively little in the way of surprising plot twists, clever witticisms, or amusing comic moments. It even lacks a heroine that we could look up to, or even identify with. It is as if Austen had dispensed with nearly all conventional means that novelists use to hold the reader's interest. Shorn of literary ornamentations, Persuasion is instead a moving story of lost love and reg...more

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Mar 29, 2009 Ceridwen rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: janeites, rule-britannia, capital-r-romantic

I believe it is customary at the beginning of any discussion of Austen's work to line up her books and discuss which ones are the favorites, the most mature, the most critically acclaimed. Such as: Pride and Prejudice is clearly her most liked, but the heroine of Emma really is a better model of someone being confronted by their limitations and learning from them again and again. Fanny Price is the most morally assured, the elder Miss Dashwood the most practical, the best this, the most that, et&c....more I believe it is customary at the beginning of any discussion of Austen's work to line up her books and discuss which ones are the favorites, the most mature, the most critically acclaimed. Such as: Pride and Prejudice is clearly her most liked, but the heroine of Emma really is a better model of someone being confronted by their limitations and learning from them again and again. Fanny Price is the most morally assured, the elder Miss Dashwood the most practical, the best this, the most that, et&c. It's weird. Why we do this? Is it because Austen is a girl, writing about girl-things? Because there are only six books?

Anyway, here goes mine: Persuasion is my favorite Austen novel. I'm not exactly sure why. Of course, I, like everyone, loves me my Lizzie Bennet. But I've never been quite easy with her epiphany at Darcy's estate. Why there, surrounded by her spurned lover's pile of furnishings and stuff, did she understand that she never knew herself? The answers bother me. It's too, I dunno, bourgeois or something. (I know, I know, it really doesn't do to bring up this sort of language when talking about Austen, but there it is.)

I like the difference between Anne and the narrator. The narrator says terrible things, is prickly and funny, and does all the social mockery that Austen is best at. Her conjuring and dismissal of Dick Musgrove is truly brutal, and hysterical in its brutality. Anne is nothing of this. She is docile, domestic, competent and extremely forgiving. You'd probably want to punch her in the face. But the narrator doesn't lionize her, doesn't set her up as “perfection itself” (as Wentworth says, in the end). Indeed, Anne isn't even mentioned until several pages into the book, but she slowly appears, like someone being unwrapped. A corpse, or a lover. Both at once.

I like Anne and her regret. I like the silences she shares with Captain Wentworth. Reading this time, I noticed how little was actually said by our protagonists, how their silent misunderstanding tips slowly into silent understanding. Even Wentworth's declaration, the mending of the breach, is done in a letter, not with a voice, a rush of declarations. Those silent, speaking words themselves are penned while Wentworth eavesdrops, listening to Anne's quiet demurrings about her gender's capacity for pain and loss. Ah. And again, ah.
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Jul 12, 2010 Kelly rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: fans of Romantic style

Shelves: fiction, brit-lit, regency, owned, 19th-century, its-the-quiet-ones

This is the least Austen like of the Austen novels. Her famed satirical, biting wit in large part takes second place to a growing Romantic sensibility. There is a focus on beautiful imagery, improbable romances and feelings, and heroes that are rather more gothic than realistic. Melancholy emotions rule this novel, even more so than Sense and Sensibility. They're mostly relentless up until the end. Even then, the tone changes in a rather dramatic style that is not at all typical of Austen. My pr...more

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Jul 03, 2009 Christopher H. rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: british-literature, georgian-regency-literature, favorites, romantic-period-literature, historical-fiction, napoleonic-wars, jane-austen, my-western-canon, favorite-rereads

"Persuasion" was Jane Austen's last completed work before her death; and one that I think she'd have continued to work on to make it even more perfect that it already is.

"Persuasion" is an achingly beautiful love story. A short, but incredibly rich novel, that presents the feelings and thoughts of the beautiful Anne Elliot and the man that she has loved for eight years, Royal Navy Captain Frederick Wentworth. Again, Jane Austen develops her plotting and characters in an effort to show that the...more

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Sep 19, 2012 Jason Koivu rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

In Persuasion our hero and heroine are neither interesting nor do they have an obvious magnetic attraction for one another, and as readers we always knew they'd get together in the end, and yet we're still glad they do. I attribute that to Austen's own persuasiveness.

Unlike in some of Austen's better work, there is a twist, but not much of a triangle. And I felt the twist to be more Bronte-esque, as in the revealing of a horrible secret. Persuasion lacks a complicated plot, and what it does have...more

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Mar 17, 2011 Alasse rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: novel-of-manners

3.5 really. I don't know what to make of this one. I know it's usually regarded as Austen's most mature novel. Sure, the main character is 28 and there's lots of autumnal references, as well as political symbolism - but I didn't find it all that deep and full-fleshed.

It's the story of Anne Elliot, a gentleman's daughter who had become engaged to a captain Wentworth 8 years before the novel begins, but broke the engagement due to family pressures. She has never stopped loving him, and now she enc...more

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Jan 21, 2008 Vanessa rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This was only the second Jane Austen novel I have ever read (the other one being "Pride and Prejudice"), but I have seen the films "Sense and Sensibility", "Emma" and "Mansfield Park", and it seemed to confirm my feeling that she tells the same story over and over again. Certainly, so many of her stories have similar elements - the mousy heroine who is full of good sense; the love interest who seems like a class-A jerk to begin with but who she ends up with; the ditzy, self-absorbed mother/siste...more

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Jan 21, 2008 Charity rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 1001books, brit-lit, austen, faves

Poor Anne Elliot. At 27, she's just a step or two shy of becoming a spinster. You see, at age 19, she let herself be persuaded by Lady Russell not to marry Frederick Wentworth, a penniless naval officer. (Anne, afterall, is the daughter of a baronet.) But now a kind fate has thrown Anne one last chance for love.

A wonderful read...full of polite society and second chances. You know that Austen is a masterful story-teller when you already know the outcome of her book, but your heart is still beat...more

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Who is your favourite Austen protagonist and leading man? (Don't have to be from the same book)	35	134	May 18, 2013 07:46pm
Reading the Classics: Persuasion Volume 2 Chapters 7-12	18	93	May 18, 2013 03:35pm
Reading the Classics: Persuasion Volume 1 chapters 7-12	9	70	May 18, 2013 03:28pm
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The Perks Of Bein...: Persuasion by Jane Austin... keep reading or no?	14	79	May 09, 2013 07:30pm
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About Jane Austen

Jane Austen (16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, her realism and biting social commentary cementing her historical importance among scholars and critics.

Austen lived her entire life as part of a close-knit family located on the lower fr...more

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Quotes from Persuasion

“You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope...I have loved none but you.” — 2,130 people liked it

“I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you. Unjust I may have been, weak and resentful I have been, but never inconstant. You alone have brought me to Bath. For you alone, I think and plan. Have you not seen this? Can you fail to have understood my wishes? I had not waited even these ten days, could I have read your feelings, as I think you must have penetrated mine. I can hardly write. I am every instant hearing something which overpowers me. You sink your voice, but I can distinguish the tones of that voice when they would be lost on others. Too good, too excellent creature! You do us justice, indeed. You do believe that there is true attachment and constancy among men. Believe it to be most fervent, most undeviating, in F. W.

I must go, uncertain of my fate; but I shall return hither, or follow your party, as soon as possible. A word, a look, will be enough to decide whether I enter your father's house this evening or never.” — 1,781 people liked it

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