Jane Austen Midterm

Elinor Dashwood

Sense!! Oldest daughter, heroine of novel. Seems composed but also affectionate. Falls in love with Edward Ferrars

Fanny Dashwood

Snobby, selfish wife of John Dashwood. Sister of Edward and Robert Ferrars.

John Dashwood

Heir to Norland estate - money hungry. Leaves mother and sister's with very little money.

Margaret Dashwood

13-year-old, youngest Dashwood sister.

Marianne Dashwood

Sensibility!! The seventeen-year-old second daughter of the Dashwood's. Marianne's spontaneity, excessive sensibility, and romantic idealism lead her to fall in love with John Willoughby, though he hurts her, causing her to finally recognize her misjudgment of him. Later, she marries her true love: Colonel Brandon.

Edward Ferrars

The sensible and friendly older brother of Fanny Dashwood and Robert Ferrars. Edward develops a close relationship with Elinor while staying at Norland and ultimately marries her, after he is freed from a four-year secret engagement to Lucy Steele.

Lucy Steele

Mrs. Jennings' cousin and a sly, selfish, and insecure young woman. She has been secretly engaged to Edward Ferrars for four years but she ultimately marries his brother, Robert, once Edward is disinherited.

John Willoughby

An attractive but deceitful young man who wins Marianne Dashwood's heart but then abandons her (greedily) in favor of the wealthy Miss Sophia Grey.

Colonel Brandon

A retired officer and friend of Sir John Middleton who falls in love with Marianne Dashwood and acts kindly, honorably, and graciously towards the Dashwoods throughout the novel

Sense vs. Sensibility

Sense: approved in novel, reason, restraint, responsible
Sensibility: disapproved in novel, emotion, spontaneity, impulsiveness, devotion

Conservative vs. Progressive

Conservative: stance against important social and political revolutions taking place by consciously ignoring them
Progressive: Austen's depiction of secondary characters shows their feelings in order to highlight widespread problems in British society

Pride and Prejudice

"It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."

Elizabeth Bennet

Pride and Prejudice protagonist. Most intelligent and sensible of 5 sisters. Quick witted, sharp tongue. Her realization of Darcy's essential goodness eventually triumphs over her initial prejudice against him.

Fitzwilliam Darcy

A wealthy gentleman, the master of Pemberley, and the nephew of Lady Catherine de Bourgh. Though intelligent and honest, his excess of pride causes him to look down on his social inferiors. Over the course of the novel, he tempers his class-consciousness and learns to admire and love Elizabeth for her strong character.

Jane Bennet

Oldest and most beautiful Bennet sister. Reserved and gentle. Easy relation with Bingely as opposed to Darcy and Elizabeth.

Charles Bingley

Darcy's wealthy best friend. He is a genial, well-intentioned gentleman, whose easygoing nature contrasts with Darcy's initially discourteous demeanor. He is blissfully uncaring about class differences.

Mr. Bennet

The patriarch of the Bennet family, a gentleman of modest income with five unmarried daughters. Mr. Bennet has a sarcastic, cynical sense of humor that he uses to purposefully irritate his wife. Though he loves his daughters, he often fails as a parent, preferring to withdraw from the never-ending marriage concerns of the women around him rather than offer help.

Mrs. Bennet

A foolish, noisy woman whose only goal in life is to see her daughters married. Because of her low breeding and often unbecoming behavior, she often repels the very suitors whom she tries to attract for her daughters.

George Wickham

A handsome, fortune-hunting militia officer. His good looks and charm attract Elizabeth initially, but Darcy's revelation about his disreputable past clues her in to his true nature and simultaneously draws her closer to Darcy.

Lydia Bennet

The youngest Bennet sister, she is gossipy, immature, and self-involved. Unlike Elizabeth, she flings herself headlong into romance and ends up running off with Wickham.

Mr. Collins

A pompous, generally idiotic clergyman who stands to inherit Mr. Bennet's property. Not the greatest social status. Snobby.

Miss Bingley

Charles' snobby sister. Bears inordinate disdain for Elizabeth's middle-class background. Her vain attempts to garner Darcy's attention cause Darcy to admire Elizabeth's self-possessed character even more.

Lady Catherine de Bourgh

A rich, bossy noblewoman; Mr. Collins's patron and Darcy's aunt. Epitomizes class snobbery, especially in her attempts to order the middle-class Elizabeth away from her well-bred nephew.

Charlotte Lucas

Elizabeth's dear friend. Pragmatic where Elizabeth is romantic, and also six years older than Elizabeth, does not view love as the most vital component of a marriage. She is more interested in having a comfortable home. Thus, when Mr. Collins proposes, she accepts.

Georgiana Darcy

Darcy's sister. She is immensely pretty and just as shy. She has great skill at playing the pianoforte.

Mary Bennet

Middle Bennet sister. Bookworm.

Catherine Bennet

4th Bennet sister. Girlishly enthralled in soldiers.

Marriage

Theme in Pride and Prejudice. Not all about love - love is the least of many character's concern. In 18th century women could not own property, so marriage was important. Bennet daughters must marry men in order to live well.

Historical Context of Pride and Prejudice

1796-1797. Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice focuses on the changes the two main characters, Elizabeth and Darcy, undergo. Specifically, the novel shows how Darcy moves beyond his prejudice and Elizabeth beyond her pride so that they can fall in love and marry.

Historical Context of Sense and Sensibility

Drafted around 1795. Published 1811. Exists on the cusp between the cultural moments of the Enlightenment and the Romantic period. Proponents of the Enlightenment emphasized logical, scientific ways of engaging with the world.

Fanny Price

Protagonist of Mansfield Park. Daughter of a drunken sailor - moves to live with Aunt and Uncle. Mistreated. Modest, always proper, and beautiful. Secretly in love with Edmund.

Sir Thomas Bertram

Fanny's uncle. Hard on children until he sees his errors. Owns slaves.

Lady Bertram

Fanny's aunt. Neurotic, hypochondriac, and lazy. Values beauty more than anything.

Edmund Bertram

Bertram's younger son. Not heir to Mansfield, will become a clergyman. Good head and heart. Fanny's closest companion, but blindly falls in love with Mary Crawford.

Maria Bertram

Bertram's older daughter. She is equally vain but slightly less cocky, since she is younger and less beautiful than Maria. She follows Maria around, and, upon Maria's elopement, she runs away with Yates, her brother Tom's friend.

Tom Bertram

The Bertrams' older son and the heir to Mansfield. He lives to party and has gotten into debt, for which Edmund will suffer. Eventually, his lifestyle catches up to him, as he nearly dies from an illness caused by too much drinking.

Julia Bertram

Quick-temper. Always in second to Maria.

Mrs. Norris

Fanny's other aunt. Wife of first parson at Mansfield Parsonage. Horribly cruel to Fanny.

Mary Crawford

Sister of Mrs. Grant. Beautiful and charming but also shallow and evil. Becomes friends with Fanny.

Henry Crawford

Mary's brother. Even worse than Mary. Ends up with Maria and relationship ends badly.

William Price

Fanny's brother. Sir Thomas has gotten him a commission in the Navy, and Henry gets him a promotion as part of his effort to seduce Fanny.

Rushworth

Maria's fiance and then husband. Stupid and boring, but wealthy.

Susan Price

Fanny's younger sister. Smart girl with good manners.

Historical Context of Mansfield Park

1815, after Pride and Prejudice. It seems to be especially complicated in its reasoning as to why certain characters are bad and others are good. Many readers believe that Mansfield Park is Austen's most socially conscious novel, depicting poignantly the suffering of someone from the lower class at the hands of the upper class.

Quote from Sense and Sensibility

Elinor, this eldest daughter whose advice was so effectual, possessed a strength of understanding, and coolness of judgment, which qualified her, though only nineteen, to be the counsellor of her mother, and enabled her frequently to counteract, to the advantage of them all, that eagerness of mind in Mrs. Dashwood which must generally have led to imprudence. She had an excellent heart;—her disposition was affectionate, and her feelings were strong; but she knew how to govern them: it was a knowledge which her mother had yet to learn, and which one of her sisters had resolved never to be taught. (Chapter 1)

Quote from Sense and Sensibility

Marianne would have thought herself very inexcusable had she been able to sleep at all the first night after parting from Willoughby. She would have been ashamed to look her family in the face the next morning, had she not risen from her bed in more need of repose than when she lay down in it. But the feelings which made such composure a disgrace, left her in no danger of incurring it. She was awake the whole night, and she wept the greatest part of it. She got up with an headache, was unable to talk, and unwilling to take any nourishment; giving pain every moment to her mother and sisters, and forbidding all attempt at consolation from either. Her sensibility was potent enough! (Chapter 16)

Quote from Sense and Sensibility

When the dessert and the wine were arranged, and Mrs. Dashwood and Elinor were left by themselves, they remained long together in a similarity of thoughtfulness and silence. Mrs. Dashwood feared to hazard any remark, and ventured not to offer consolation. She now found that she had erred in relying on Elinor's representation of herself; and justly concluded that everything had been expressly softened at the time, to spare her from an increase of unhappiness, suffering as she then had suffered for Marianne. She found that she had been misled by the careful, the considerate attention of her daughter, to think the attachment, which once she had so well understood, much slighter in reality, than she had been wont to believe, or than it was now proved to be. She feared that under this persuasion she had been unjust, inattentive, nay, almost unkind, to her Elinor;—that Marianne's affliction, because more acknowledged, more immediately before her, had too much engrossed her tenderness, and led her away to forget that in Elinor she might have a daughter suffering almost as much, certainly with less self-provocation, and greater fortitude. (Chapter 47)

Quote from Pride and Prejudice

"In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you."

Elizabeth's astonishment was beyond expression. She stared, coloured, doubted, and was silent. This he considered sufficient encouragement; and the avowal of all that he felt, and had long felt for her, immediately followed. He spoke well; but there were feelings besides those of the heart to be detailed, and he was not more eloquent on the subject of tenderness than of pride. His sense of her inferiority—of its being a degradation—of the family obstacles which judgment had always opposed to inclination, were dwelt on with a warmth which seemed due to the consequence he was wounding, but was very unlikely to recommend his suit. (Chapter 34)

Quote from Pride and Prejudice

[T]he eye was instantly caught by Pemberley House, situated on the opposite side of a valley, into which the road with some abruptness wound. It was a large, handsome stone building, standing well on rising ground, and backed by a ridge of high woody hills; and in front a stream of some natural importance was swelled into greater, but without any artificial appearance. Its banks were neither formal, nor falsely adorned. Elizabeth was delighted. She had never seen a place where nature had done more, or where natural beauty had been so little counteracted by an awkward taste. They were all of them warm in their admiration; and at that moment she felt that to be mistress of Pemberley might be something! (Chapter 43)

Quote from Mansfield Park

Sir Thomas found it expedient to go to Antigua himself, for the better arrangement of his affairs, and he took his eldest son with him, in the hope of detaching him from some bad connexions at home. They left England with the probability of being nearly a twelvemonth absent.

The necessity of the measure in a pecuniary light, and the hope of its utility to his son, reconciled Sir Thomas to the effort of quitting the rest of his family, and of leaving his daughters to the direction of others...He could not think Lady Bertram quite equal to supply his place with them, or rather, to perform what should have been her own; but, in Mrs. Norris's watchful attention, and in Edmund's judgment, he had sufficient confidence to make him go without fears for their conduct.

Lady Bertram did not at all like to have her husband leave her; but she was not disturbed by any alarm for his safety, or solicitude for his comfort, being one of those persons who think nothing can be dangerous, or difficult, or fatiguing to anybody but themselves.

The Miss Bertrams were much to be pitied on the occasion: not for their sorrow, but for their want of it. Their father was no object of love to them...they felt themselves immediately at their own disposal, and to have every indulgence within their reach. Fanny's relief [was] quite equal to her cousins'; but a more tender nature suggested that her feelings were ungrateful, and she really grieved because she could not grieve. (Chapter 3)

Quote from Mansfield Park

Here had been grievous mismanagement; but, bad as it was, he gradually grew to feel that it had not been the most direful mistake in his plan of education. Something must have been wanting within, or time would have worn away much of its ill effect. He feared that principle, active principle, had been wanting; that they had never been properly taught to govern their inclinations and tempers by that sense of duty which can alone suffice...

Bitterly did he deplore a deficiency which now he could scarcely comprehend to have been possible. Wretchedly did he feel, that with all the cost and care of an anxious and expensive education, he had brought up his daughters without their understanding their first duties, or his being acquainted with their character and temper. (Chapter 48)

Quote from Mansfield Park

[...]Sir Thomas saw repeated, and for ever repeated, reason to rejoice in what he had done for them all, and acknowledge the advantages of early hardship and discipline, and the consciousness of being born to struggle and endure. (Chapter 48)