osprey_archer (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
osprey_archer) wrote2022-09-05 09:45 am
osprey_archer) wrote2022-09-05 09:45 am
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Book Review: Sense & Sensibility
Back in the late aughts, when I was first reading Jane Austen’s novels, there was some internet chatter about whether Jane Austen wrote romances. As many of the commentators involved were using “romance novels” as a synonym for “sentimental dreck” these conversations were not very productive, but it’s worth revisiting the question with the definition of romance novel as “a love story with a happy ending.”
Working from that definition, I think it varies from book to book. Northanger Abbey, for instance, is a satisfying romance novel. Not only does it end with a happily ever after between the two romantic leads, but a significant proportion of the book is devoted to developing Henry and Catherine’s relationship. They dance, they go for walks, they have witty banter.
Sense and Sensibility, on the other hand, is not. Sense and Sensibility is so uninterested in developing Elinor and Edward’s relationship that it sums up their entire process of falling in love in about a sentence. Sense and Sensibility is, in fact, an anti-romantic novel, an argument against the capital-R notions of Romance to which Marianne is attached. As Elinor says:
”And after all, Marianne, after all that is bewitching in the idea of a single and constant attachment, and all that can be said of one’s happiness depending entirely on any particular person, it is not meant—it is not fit—it is not possible that it should be so.”
Ironically, Elinor is the only person in the book who does marry her first love, but her happiness clearly does not depend entirely on Edward: it depends also on her mother and her sisters, and on her own efforts, which is the point she’s trying to get across to Marianne here. If you won’t even try to pull yourself together for your own sake, Marianne, how about you do it because it hurts us so much to see you in agony?
During that aforementioned early-aughts Austen read, Sense and Sensibility was my least favorite Austen novel. I found Marianne’s heartbreak over Willoughby an absolute slog to read, and it annoyed me that (as I thought) Elinor was taken in by Willoughby’s excuses at the end.
Upon reread, though, I have a lot more appreciation for the book. I think I’m more willing now to follow a book where it wants me to go rather than demanding it conform to my wishes, so when Jane Austen decided to spend a few chapters on a deep-dive into heartbreak, I went along with it rather than muttering “I’m tired of all this WALLOWING, when is something going to HAPPEN?”
And Elinor is at least as annoyed as I was to find herself swayed by Willoughby’s excuses: she feels “a tenderness, a regret, rather in proportion, as she soon acknowledged within herself—to his wishes than to his merits.” Her reason still condemns his actions, but his personal charm has swayed her to feel sorry for his suffering at losing Marianne. Of course it’s not perfectly rational to be swayed by that charm, but who among us is perfectly rational, especially under the intensely emotional circumstance of watching day and night by the bedside of a potentially dying sister? Elinor has barely slept for three days. Of course she’s in a mood to be swayed.
And after the influence of Willoughby’s magnetism fades, Elinor’s judgment of him remains unchanged: “The whole of his behavior, from the beginning to the end of the affair, has been grounded on selfishness.”
Another characteristic of early-aughts criticism was the tendency to demand that characters should be perfectly rational actors at all times - as defined by the critic, who may not make allowance for the fact that the character, say, does not know she’s in a horror movie, and therefore has no reason to believe going into the basement is a terrible idea. I’ve come to see this as an invidious kind of criticism: it locks readers into their own narrow viewpoint, instead of approaching books with openness and curiosity.
If a character - particularly a character in a beloved classic like Jane Austen - behaves in a way that the reader doesn’t understand, it’s often a sign that “there is more in heaven and earth, Horatio, than is dreamt of in your philosophy.” It’s an opportunity to expand your understanding to encompass these compelling yet baffling characters.
Working from that definition, I think it varies from book to book. Northanger Abbey, for instance, is a satisfying romance novel. Not only does it end with a happily ever after between the two romantic leads, but a significant proportion of the book is devoted to developing Henry and Catherine’s relationship. They dance, they go for walks, they have witty banter.
Sense and Sensibility, on the other hand, is not. Sense and Sensibility is so uninterested in developing Elinor and Edward’s relationship that it sums up their entire process of falling in love in about a sentence. Sense and Sensibility is, in fact, an anti-romantic novel, an argument against the capital-R notions of Romance to which Marianne is attached. As Elinor says:
”And after all, Marianne, after all that is bewitching in the idea of a single and constant attachment, and all that can be said of one’s happiness depending entirely on any particular person, it is not meant—it is not fit—it is not possible that it should be so.”
Ironically, Elinor is the only person in the book who does marry her first love, but her happiness clearly does not depend entirely on Edward: it depends also on her mother and her sisters, and on her own efforts, which is the point she’s trying to get across to Marianne here. If you won’t even try to pull yourself together for your own sake, Marianne, how about you do it because it hurts us so much to see you in agony?
During that aforementioned early-aughts Austen read, Sense and Sensibility was my least favorite Austen novel. I found Marianne’s heartbreak over Willoughby an absolute slog to read, and it annoyed me that (as I thought) Elinor was taken in by Willoughby’s excuses at the end.
Upon reread, though, I have a lot more appreciation for the book. I think I’m more willing now to follow a book where it wants me to go rather than demanding it conform to my wishes, so when Jane Austen decided to spend a few chapters on a deep-dive into heartbreak, I went along with it rather than muttering “I’m tired of all this WALLOWING, when is something going to HAPPEN?”
And Elinor is at least as annoyed as I was to find herself swayed by Willoughby’s excuses: she feels “a tenderness, a regret, rather in proportion, as she soon acknowledged within herself—to his wishes than to his merits.” Her reason still condemns his actions, but his personal charm has swayed her to feel sorry for his suffering at losing Marianne. Of course it’s not perfectly rational to be swayed by that charm, but who among us is perfectly rational, especially under the intensely emotional circumstance of watching day and night by the bedside of a potentially dying sister? Elinor has barely slept for three days. Of course she’s in a mood to be swayed.
And after the influence of Willoughby’s magnetism fades, Elinor’s judgment of him remains unchanged: “The whole of his behavior, from the beginning to the end of the affair, has been grounded on selfishness.”
Another characteristic of early-aughts criticism was the tendency to demand that characters should be perfectly rational actors at all times - as defined by the critic, who may not make allowance for the fact that the character, say, does not know she’s in a horror movie, and therefore has no reason to believe going into the basement is a terrible idea. I’ve come to see this as an invidious kind of criticism: it locks readers into their own narrow viewpoint, instead of approaching books with openness and curiosity.
If a character - particularly a character in a beloved classic like Jane Austen - behaves in a way that the reader doesn’t understand, it’s often a sign that “there is more in heaven and earth, Horatio, than is dreamt of in your philosophy.” It’s an opportunity to expand your understanding to encompass these compelling yet baffling characters.
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(Hmmm, Dorothea and Casaubon is sort of like a nightmare reflection of Marianne and Col Brandon....)
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But your post reminded me that life is richer, wider, and more surprising with an open mind :-)
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YES. Indeed.
I love the S&S Emma Thompson movie, but one very amusing thing about it is how very capital R-Romantic it is!
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It's been years since I've seen the Emma Thompson S&S. I remember Kate Winslet made an utterly charming Marianne; I really ought to rewatch at some point.
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A friend of mine called the book The Taming of Marianne and she wasn't far wrong. Psychological guessing is always pointless as well as rude, but it's interesting how many young women in Austen are torpedoed by a too-public declaration of affection.
The villains are really what I remember about this novel. Willoughby is every guy you should never fall for and can't help it, and Lucy Steele is a delicious monster (played wonderfully by Imogen Stubbs).
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I get why Lucy mentions her secret engagement to Elinor the first time, but the way she just keeps rubbing it in! So mean. But probably Lucy doesn't understand that Elinor will stop pursuing Edward once she knows that he's engaged: if their positions were exchanged Lucy certainly wouldn't give up. So she has to go on and on about it to neutralize what she sees as the threat of Elinor's interference.
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Poor Marianne is sort of like the flip side to Catherine in NA -- Catherine gets schooled about her Romantic notions too, but the guy she falls in love with actually cares for her (and shares her taste in novel-reading!), and she gets the HEA. I know we're supposed to think Marianne is happy, but she's so subdued and sad after her illness. At least she still has Elinor.
Lucy Steele is one of those great anti-heroines I kind of adore in a terrified way, like Becky Sharpe. ("Mark me down as scared AND horny," lol.) She is just so terrible! But it always amuses Austen to give her villains, if not virtuously happy endings, at least some contentment in this world.
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I kind of love Austen's villain endings (and it WOULD be very characteristic for Isabella in NA to end up with some rich dude, wouldn't it?) because it's so true to life. "Worst Person You Know Has an Okay Life, Actually."
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S&S was actually the first Jane Austen book I read as a teenager - I picked it off my GRanny's bookshelf when I was sleeping there and had nothing to read and had to take it home with me, so I still have this memory of picking up this old, badly made paperback that had pages too heavy for itself and had fallen in half and then finding it was about three sisters. (I am the oldest of three sisters. I projected a lot onto Elinor, lol.)
Btw, as well as the film - which is still wonderful - there's also a really lovely BBC mini-series from 2008 with Hattie Morahan and Charity Wakefield. They both draw out different things and I'm very fond of them both. The film is excellent, and has more of the heightened/comedic stuff, which is of course, very much there, while the BBC series is more naturalistic and with actors more of an age with their characters (which isn't important, but it does, I think add something to this adaptation, especially when it was made in the shadow of the film - I think so much so, it's an adaptation that gets unfairly overlooked - it came after a whole string of excellent adaptations, and not quite long enough after Ang Lee's film to stand without comparison.)
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Yes, I love the 2008 BBC series! The cottage on the seaside cliffs with all the shells strung up on strings... It was startling to realize that in the book the cottage is NOT right by the sea, because I had imprinted so hard on the house in the miniseries.
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I'm not sure, actually! Maybe it's that I just didn't like the characters as much as those in my top-tier Austens (e.g., Pride & Prejudice, Persuasion, and Northanger Abbey)...?
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Except that I don't even remember it well enough to remember what it was I didn't enjoy about it.
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Sense and Sensibility was definitely one of those films where the casting was the message. Alan Rickman as Col Brandon was a very heavy thumb on the scale...
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I am encouraged by your thoughts and the comments from people who enjoyed S&S more on re-read or later in life. I will attempt to meet it on its own terms when I read it again! (Date TBC.)
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