The Bookstore / Books
Title:
Persuasion
Author: Jane Austen
First Published in: 1818
Sir Walter Elliot, a spendthrift baronet and widower,
with a swollen sense of his social importance and
personal elegance, is obliged to retrench and let his
seat, Kellynch Hall. His eldest daughter. Elizabeth,
haughty and unmarried, is now twenty-nine; the second,
Anne, who is pretty, intelligent, and amiable, had some
years before been engaged to a young naval officer,
Frederick Wentworth, but had been persuaded by her
trusted friend Lady Russell to break off the engagement,
because of his lack of fortune and a misunderstanding of
his easy nature. The breach had brought great unhappiness
to Anne, and caused indignation in Went-worth. When the
story opens Anne is twenty-seven, and the bloom of her
youth is gone. Captain Wentworth, who has had a
successful career and is now prosperous, is thrown again
into Anne's society by the letting of Kellynch to Admiral
and Mrs Croft, his sister and brother-in-law. Sir
Walter's youngest daughter, Mary, is married to Charles
Musgrove, the heir of a neighbouring landowner. Wentworth
is attracted by Charles's sisters, Louisa and Henrietta,
and in time becomes involved with Louisa. During a visit
of the party to Lyme Regis, Louisa, being 'jumped down'
from the Cobb by Went-worth, falls and is badly injured.
Wentworth's partial responsibility for the accident makes
him feel an increased obligation to Louisa at the very
time that his feelings are being drawn back to Anne.
However, during her convalescence Louisa becomes engaged
to Captain Benwick, another naval officer, and Wentworth
is free to proceed with his courtship. He goes to Bath,
where Sir Walter is now established with his two elder
daughters and Elizabeth's companion. Mrs Clay, an artful
woman with matrimonial designs on Sir Walter. There
Wentworth finds another suitor for Anne's hand, her
cousin William Elliot, the heir to the Kellynch estate,
who is also indulging in an intrigue with Mrs Clay, in
order to detach her from Sir Walter, Anne has remained
unshaken in her love for Wentworth and moreover learns
about the duplicity of William Elliot. Accidentally made
aware of Anne's constancy, Wentworth renews his offer of
marriage and is accepted. In this, Jane Austen's last
completed work, satire and ridicule take a milder form,
and the tone is more grave and tender.
Text file provided by:
Project Gutenberg
[?kB Zip file]