Persuasion [with Biographical Introduction]

by Jane Austen

1817. Completed August 1816 and published posthumously with Northanger Abbey. Bought this edition to have handy (outside my Complete Works) to re-read in November 2025 for the George MacDonald discussion group. Wow, what a conversation! I love Persuasion even more now. As I said at the beginning, it is a difficult novel for me - hilarious, biting, and oh so earnest, yet at times dark, and confusing withal. Your collective enjoyment, insights, and close readings have illuminated much that was missed or obscure on this, my second reading. One detail as the merest example: Austen’s acquaintance with the poetry of both Scott and Byron - and in a positive light! Another: the several moments of what I call “the servants who speak” - a rarity in my recollection of the other novels. Thank you, thank you all. Here’s is an essay that is relevant to our discussion of Byron: “I Have Read the Corsair, Mended My Petticoat, & Have Nothing Else to Do”: Jane Austen and Lord Byron, a New Appraisal By Azar Hussain https://jasna.org/publications-2/persuasions-online/volume-44-no-1/hussain/ And one on the other literary references in the novel: https://reginajeffers.blog/2014/04/11/literary-references-in-jane-austens-persuasion/ For more on the final two novels, see Sarah Emsley’s Youth and Experience: Northanger Abbey and Persuasion, a blog series celebrating 200 years of Jane Austen’s novels Northanger Abbeyand Persuasion: https://sarahemsley.com/celebrating-austen-wharton-and-montgomery/youth-and-experience-northanger-abbey-and-persuasion/ Discussion of the amended ending: https://sarahemsley.com/2018/06/25/jane-austen-at-work-the-revision-of-persuasions-ending/ Faithfully, Yours: Womanhood, Faith, and “A Woman’s Portion” in Persuasion https://jasna.org/publications-2/essay-contest-winning-entries/2018-essay-contest/avery/ The Austen sentence, opening the novel, with some context from Professor Bao Bui: “The British population, particularly its literate elite, would have no difficulty keeping abreast of the latest news, rumors, and gossip—not to mention the casualty lists—resulting from Britain’s generation-long military struggle against Napoleon. Persuasion opens in the summer of 1814, just months after the Allies have forced Napoleon to abdicate the French throne and go into exile on the island of Elba. The downfall of Napoleon would have dominated the news cycle of the time. Elites and commoners alike would have discussed the news with great interest…. “Readers of Austen’s time would have no difficult picking up Austen’s deliberate depiction of Sir Walter as a grotesque caricature of self-absorbed aristocratic vanity. One suspects that Lady Russell, for all her class snobbery, reads the papers and knows of events transpiring beyond England’s shores. “Persuasion makes it clear that Anne Elliot knows not only the names of naval officers and their deployments, but also that the sailors and ships of the Royal Navy have kept Britain and her civilian population safe from revolutionary blood shedding that has swept across Europe from shores of Portugal to the gates of Moscow. Sir Walter’s thoughts, concerns, and dialogue suggest a vast, unrepentant, unapologetic ignorance of the historical, transformative events transpiring in his lifetime, both in his own country and on the Continent….” Don’t be like Walter; be like Anne. https://sarahemsley.com/2018/04/13/sir-walter-elliot-sleeps-through-history/ Kellynch Hall is an estate located in Somersetshire. It is the seat of the Baronets Elliot and is owned by the current baronet, Sir Walter Elliot. There is an entail on the land, thus the current heir of the land is William Elliot, a distant cousin of Sir Walter and the great grandson of the second Sir Walter. https://janeausten.fandom.com/wiki/Kellynch_Hall Uppercross Cottage is the home of Charles and Mary Musgrove (née Elliot) upon their marriage and with their sons Charles and Walter; located in the village of Uppercross in Somersetshire, it is described as an "untidy house" that is three miles from Kellynch Hall. Mary's sister Anne often visits Uppercross Cottage, and she is staying with them when her former fiancé Frederick Wentworth returns to the neighborhood. https://janeausten.fandom.com/wiki/Uppercross_Cottage https://janeausten.fandom.com/wiki/Uppercross Anne is a wonderful protagonist. No self-deception for her: Yes, she followed Lady Russell’s advice not to accept Wentworth, but there were good economic reasons for the advice, and Anne takes full responsibility for the decision. When she errs she knows it and knows how to apply the remedy of solitude and reflection, pp. 57 (“it required a long application of solitude and reflection to recover her”), 168 (“Half an hour's solitude and reflection might have tranquillized her.”) Character flaws: Sir Walter: vanity verging on narcissism ch. 1 and passim Mary: complaints verging on bitchy pp. 113 ff. Elizabeth: self-admiration verging on solipsism; p. 116 “Whoever suffered inconvenience, she must suffer none,” p. 121.