Sense and Sensibility

By. Jane Austen
Context

In 1811, Sense and Sensibility became the first published novel of the English author Jane Austen (1775-1817). The first version of the novel was probably written in 1795 as an epistolary novel (novel in letters) entitled "Elinor and Marianne." At this point, Austen was still living in the home of her father, George Austen, a local Anglican rector and the father of eight children. She rewrote the early manuscript in 1797-98 as a narrated novel and then further revised it in 1809-10, shortly after she moved with her mother and sister Cassandra to a small house in Chawton on her brother Edward's estate. In 1811, Thomas Egerton of the Military Library in Whitehall accepted the manuscript for publication in three volumes. Austen published on commission, meaning she paid the expenses of printing the book and took the receipts, subject to a commission paid to the publisher. The cost of publication was more than a third of her household's 460-pound annual income, so the risk was substantial. Nonetheless, the novel received two favorable reviews upon its publication, and Austen made a profit of 140 pounds off the first edition.

When the first edition of Sense and Sensibility was published, it sold out all 750 copies by July 1813, and a second edition was advertised in October 1813. The first edition was said only to be "by a lady." The second edition, also anonymous, contained on the title page the inscription "by the author of Pride and Prejudice," which had been issued in January 1813 (though Austen had not been credited on the title page of this novel either). Only Austen's immediate family knew of her authorship of these novels. And although publishing anonymously prevented her from acquiring an authorial reputation, it also enabled her to preserve her privacy at a time when entering the public sphere was associated with a reprehensible loss of femininity. Indeed, Austen used to write at Chawton behind a door that creaked when visitors approached; she would avail herself of this warning to hide her manuscript before they entered. Austen may have wanted anonymity not only because of her gender and a desire for privacy, but because of the more general atmosphere of repression pervading her era: her early writing of Sense and Sensibility coincided with the treason trial of Thomas Hardy and the proliferation of government censors as the Napoleonic War progressed. Whatever the reasons behind it, Austen's anonymity would persist until her death until 1817.

Contemporary critics of Austen's novels tended to overlook Sense and Sensibility in favor of the author's later works. Mansfield Park was read for moral edification; Pride and Prejudice was read for its irony and humor; and Emma was read for its subtle craft as a novel. Sense and Sensibility did not fall neatly into any of these categories, and critics approached it less eagerly. However, although the novel did not attract much critical attention, it sold well, and helped to establish "the author of Pride and Prejudice" as a respected writer.

Only in the twentieth century have scholars and critics come to address Sense and Sensibility's great passion, its ethics, and its social vision. In recent years, the book has been adapted into feature films. Today, the three-volume novel by an anonymous lady has become a famed and timeless favorite.

Summary and charecters of Sense and Sensibility

summary

When Mr. Henry Dashwood dies, leaving all his money to his first wife's son John Dashwood, his second wife and her three daughters are left with no permanent home and very little income. Mrs. Dashwood and her daughters (Elinor, Marianne, and Margaret) are invited to stay with their distant relations, the Middletons, at Barton Park. Elinor is sad to leave their home at Norland because she has become closely attached to Edward Ferrars, the brother-in-law of her half-brother John. However, once at Barton Park, Elinor and Marianne discover many new acquaintances, including the retired officer and bachelor Colonel Brandon, and the gallant and impetuous John Willoughby, who rescues Marianne after she twists her ankle running down the hills of Barton in the rain. Willoughby openly and unabashedly courts Marianne, and together the two flaunt their attachment to one another, until Willoughby suddenly announces that he must depart for London on business, leaving Marianne lovesick and miserable. Meanwhile, Anne and Lucy Steele, two recently discovered relations of Lady Middleton's mother, Mrs. Jennings, arrive at Barton Park as guests of the Middletons. Lucy ingratiates herself to Elinor and informs her that she (Lucy) has been secretly engaged to Mr. Ferrars for a whole year. Elinor initially assumes that Lucy is referring to Edward's younger brother, Robert, but is shocked and pained to learn that Lucy is actually referring to her own beloved Edward.

In Volume II of the novel, Elinor and Marianne travel to London with Mrs. Jennings. Colonel Brandon informs Elinor that everyone in London is talking of an engagement between Willoughby and Marianne, though Marianne has not told her family of any such attachment. Marianne is anxious to be reunited with her beloved Willoughby, but when she sees him at a party in town, he cruelly rebuffs her and then sends her a letter denying that he ever had feelings for her. Colonel Brandon tells Elinor of Willoughby's history of callousness and debauchery, and Mrs. Jennings confirms that Willoughby, having squandered his fortune, has become engaged to the wealthy heiress Miss Grey.

In Volume III, Lucy's older sister inadvertently reveals the news of Lucy's secret engagement to Edward Ferrars. Edward's mother is outraged at the information and disinherits him, promising his fortune to Robert instead. Meanwhile, the Dashwood sisters visit family friends at Cleveland on their way home from London. At Cleveland, Marianne develops a severe cold while taking long walks in the rain, and she falls deathly ill. Upon hearing of her illness, Willoughby comes to visit, attempting to explain his misconduct and seek forgiveness. Elinor pities him and ultimately shares his story with Marianne, who finally realizes that she behaved imprudently with Willoughby and could never have been happy with him anyway. Mrs. Dashwood and Colonel Brandon arrive at Cleveland and are relieved to learn that Marianne has begun to recover.

When the Dashwoods return to Barton, they learn from their manservant that Lucy Steele and Mr. Ferrars are engaged. They assume that he means Edward Ferrars, and are thus unsurprised, but Edward himself soon arrives and corrects their misconception: it was Robert, not himself, whom the money-grubbing Lucy ultimately decided to marry. Thus,x Edward is finally free to propose to his beloved Elinor, and not long after, Marianne and Colonel Brandon become engaged as well. The couples live together at Delaford and remain in close touch with their mother and younger sister at Barton Cottage.

Characters

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

Mrs. Dashwood - The kind and loving mother of Elinor, Marianne, and Margaret and second wife to Henry Dashwood. She has inherited no fortune of her own but wants the best for her daughters and shares Marianne's romantic sensibilities.

Elinor Dashwood - The nineteen-year-old eldest daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Dashwood and the heroine of Austen's novel. Elinor is composed but affectionate, both when she falls in love with Edward Ferrars and when she comforts and supports her younger sister Marianne.

Henry Dashwood - The father of John Dashwood and, by a second marriage, of Elinor, Marianne, and Margaret Dashwood. He dies in the opening chapter of the novel and bequeaths his estate at Norland to his son, leaving his wife and daughters impoverished.

Fanny Dashwood - The selfish, snobbish, and manipulative wife of John Dashwood and the sister of Edward and Robert Ferrars.

John Dashwood - The weak-minded and money-grubbing heir to the Norland estate. At his wife Fanny's suggestion, he leaves his mother and sisters with very little money and remains largely unconcerned for their welfare.

Margaret Dashwood - The thirteen-year-old, good-humored youngest daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Dashwood, Margaret shares her sister Marianne's romantic tendencies.

Marianne Dashwood - The seventeen-year-old second daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Dashwood. Marianne's spontaneity, excessive sensibility, and romantic idealism lead her to fall in love with the debaucherous John Willoughby, though he painfully spurns her, causing her to finally recognize her misjudgment of him. After this turn of heart, she ultimately marries her long-standing admirer, Colonel Brandon.

Mrs. Ferrars - The wealthy, manipulative mother of Edward and Robert who disinherits her first son when he refuses to marry a rich heiress.

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.

Robert Ferrars - A conceited coxcomb and the younger brother of Edward and Fanny. Robert inherits his mother's fortune after she disinherits Edward. Ironically, he ultimately marries Lucy Steele, even though it was Edward's engagement to this same woman that caused his mother to disinherit him.

Miss Sophia Grey - The wealthy heiress whom Willoughby marries after abandoning Marianne.

Mrs. Jennings - Lady Middleton's gossipy but well-intentioned mother who invites the Dashwood sisters to stay with her in London and makes it her "project" to marry them off as soon as possible.

Lady Middleton - A distant relation of the Dashwoods who lives at Barton Cottage with her husband Sir John Middleton and their four spoiled children

Sir John Middleton - The jovial but vulgar distant relation of the Dashwoods who invites Mrs. Dashwood and her three daughters to stay at Barton Cottage after Mr. and Mrs. John Dashwood inherit Norland, leaving the women homeless.

Mr. Thomas Palmer - Mrs. Palmer's gruff, unemotional husband.

Mrs. Charlotte Palmer - Mrs. Jennings' talkative and foolish daughter who invites the Dashwood sisters to stay at her home in Cleveland on their way from London to Barton.

Anne Steele - Lucy Steele's older, unmarried sister who accidentally reveals her sister's secret engagement to Edward Ferrars.

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.

Chapters 1-5 of Sense and Sensibility

Summary

Old Mr. Dashwood is the owner of a large estate in Sussex called Norland Park. Following the death of his sister, Mr. Dashwood invites his nephew Mr. Henry Dashwood to come live with him at Norland. The younger Mr. Dashwood brings John Dashwood, his son from a previous marriage, as well as the three daughters born to his present wife. John Dashwood is grown and married, and has a four-year-old son, Harry. When Old Mr. Dashwood dies, he leaves his estate to John and little Harry, who had much endeared himself to the old man. But now John's father, Henry Dashwood, is left with no way of supporting his wife and three daughters, and he too dies one year later, leaving only ten thousand pounds for his family. Just before his death, he makes his son John promise to care for his stepmother and three half-sisters.

Mr. John Dashwood initially intends to keep his promise and treat his female relatives generously, but his wife Fanny, a narrow-minded and selfish woman, convinces him to leave them only five hundred pounds apiece. Fanny moves into Norland immediately following Mr. Henry Dashwood's death and becomes mistress of the estate, relegating John's stepmother Mrs. Dashwood and half-sisters Elinor, Marianne, and Margaret to the status of mere visitors.

Fanny's brother, Edward Ferrars, visits Norland for several weeks and develops a strong attachment to Elinor Dashwood. Edward is the eldest son of a man who died very rich; now his entire fate depends upon his mother's will. Although he is shy and not particularly handsome, he has an open, affectionate heart. His mother and sister want him to distinguish himself and earn prestige, but Edward is a simple man, who longs only for domestic comfort.

In her discussions with her mother and her older sister, Marianne Dashwood expresses her disappointment that Edward is not a more striking, artistic, poetic man. She can tell that Elinor has feelings for Edward but becomes frustrated when Elinor concedes only that she "likes" and "esteems" him; Marianne longs to hear her sister profess her passionate devotion. However, Elinor remains timid because she is still unsure that Edward reciprocates her affection; such things are not usually openly expressed until after the engagement.

Six months after Fanny installs herself as mistress at Norland, Mrs. Dashwood receives a letter from her cousin Sir John Middleton, inviting her and her daughters to reside at Barton Cottage on his property in Devonshire. Eager to distance herself from Fanny's rudeness and insensitivity, Mrs. Dashwood immediately accepts the invitation and sends three servants ahead to Barton to prepare the house for their arrival. She informs John and Fanny of their imminent departure and encourages Edward Ferrars to come visit them at Barton. Following Marianne's tearful goodbye to their home at Norland, the family sets out for Barton Cottage.

Commentary

The opening pages of Sense and Sensibility are concerned with the laws of inheritance and succession that govern the fate of the Dashwood family property. According to the laws of male primogeniture effective in the mid-nineteenth century, estates went to the closest male descendant of the original owner. Since Old Mr. Dashwood has no sons, his estate is bequeathed to his nephew, Henry Dashwood. Henry, in turn, leaves the estate to his eldest son, John. However, as Austen notes, Henry Dashwood's money was far more vital to his daughters than to his son, because John was already provided for both by his mother's fortune--which he inherited as eldest son--and by the money he received by marrying his own wife. (In general, a man inherited all of his wife's money upon marriage, though the wife usually entered into the marriage with a "settlement," a legal document ensuring that some of her property would revert to her or her children following her husband's death.) In this case, the money that Mr. Henry Dashwood's late first wife brought to the marriage was settled on their son John, and therefore could not be used to help his second wife or his daughters by that second wife. Since Henry's second wife and their three daughters could not inherit any of the money from that first marriage, they are in much greater need of the money from Old Mr. Dashwood's estate.

The opening discussion of money and marriage immediately establishes the important role that ordinary economic concerns will play in Austen's novel. Unlike the authors of Gothic and sentimental novels fashionable in her day, Austen refuses to romanticize; she recognizes that material realities constrain love and marriage. Nonetheless, she allows some of this sentimentality to seep into the novel, and the tension between reasonable economic concerns and overly romantic dreaming will constitute an important theme in the novel.

Indeed, this tension is already apparent in the characters of Elinor and Marianne, between the older sister's "sense" and the younger sister's "sensibility," the duality which the novel's title refers to. Elinor, age nineteen, is described as having a "strength of understanding" and "coolness of judgment", as well as the ability to govern and control her feelings. She modestly states that she "greatly esteems" Edward Ferrars, a remark typical of her rational, sensible attitude. In contrast, her younger sister Marianne, who more closely resembles their mother, is "everything but prudent." She longs for a man with taste, grace, spirit, and fire in his eyes, and considers her sister cold-hearted in her calm and tempered regard for Edward Ferrars. Their younger sister Margaret, age thirteen, also shares Marianne's excessive romanticism. Elinor thus stands out in her family as the only sensible and rational woman.

The sensibility of Marianne and Mrs. Dashwood manifests itself in their excessive mourning over the deaths of the two men, in contrast to Elinor's more silent grief. Not only are they overcome by sadness at the loss of first Old Mr. Dashwood and then Henry, but they then carry on dramatically about having to leave Norland and move to the smaller cottage. Before departing, Marianne wanders the grounds of Norland uttering a histrionic elegy: "Dear, dear Norland... Oh! happy house... And you, ye well-known trees!" Elinor, however, experiences a far more subdued depression--though she is leaving behind not just her home but also a man she has grown to deeply care for and admire.

The early chapters also display the wry irony for which Austen is so famous as a novelist. She is unsparingly critical of the characters she dislikes, but conveys her criticism with a pointed subtlety, which makes it all the more forceful. For example, in the opening chapter, Austen sketches the character of John Dashwood in three masterful sentences, achieving a biting acerbity: the author begins elliptically with a double negative, only slyly to refute it: "He was not an ill-disposed young man, unless to be rather cold-hearted and rather selfish is to be ill-disposed..." She then ends the paragraph by explicitly skewering both John and his wife: "Mrs. John Dashwood was a strong caricature of himself; more narrow-minded and selfish." Austen thus relies on understatement and irony to reveal her feelings towards her more disagreeable characters.

Chapters 6-10 of Sense and Sensibility

Summary

In early September, Mrs. Dashwood, Elinor, Marianne, and Margaret journey to Barton Cottage, their new home. They are welcomed by Sir John Middleton, who is their landlord and Mrs. Dashwood's cousin. Sir John is a friendly, generous man of about forty, but his wife, Lady Middleton, is more cold and reserved. The Middletons live with four children at Barton Park, just half a mile away from the Dashwoods' new cottage.

Sir John and Lady Middleton invite the Dashwoods to their home for dinner. Two additional guests arrive at the party: Mrs. Jennings, Lady Middleton's mother and a merry busybody with rather vulgar tastes; and Colonel Brandon, Sir John's friend and a kind, quiet bachelor in his late thirties. After dinner, Marianne entertains the guests by playing on the pianoforte, and Colonel Brandon seems particularly taken by her performance.

A few days later, Mrs. Jennings announces to the Dashwoods that she believes Colonel Brandon is quite in love with Marianne. Marianne tells her mother that the Colonel is far too old and infirm to fall in love, but Elinor immediately rushes to his defense. Elinor, however, argues that his complaint of slight rheumatism should render him ineligible for marriage. When Elinor leaves the room, Marianne remarks to her mother how strange it is that Edward has not yet come to visit them at Barton and that his farewell to Elinor was so calm and cordial.

One morning, Marianne and Margaret set off to explore the hills near Barton, leaving their mother and elder sister reading and writing in the cottage. Suddenly, it begins pouring rain, and the girls have no choice but to run down the steep hill that leads back to the cottage. While running, Marianne falls and twists her ankle. Fortunately, a dashing gentleman comes along and carries Marianne home. When they reach Barton Cottage, he tells all the women that his name is Willoughby and that he hails from Allenham, about a mile and a half away. Willoughby promises to call on them the next day.

Later, in answer to Marianne's persistent questions, Sir John informs the Dashwoods that Willoughby is an amiable gentleman and an excellent shot who is likely to inherit the fortune of an elderly female relative, whom he lives with at Allenham Court. The next day, when Willoughby visits, Marianne discovers that they share a love for music and dancing as well as all the same favorite authors. When Willoughby leaves, Elinor teases her sister that she and Willoughby have discussed every matter of consequence at their first meeting and will have little to say to each other the next time they meet. Nonetheless, Willoughby continues to visit Marianne every day.

Mrs. Dashwood admires Willoughby, but Elinor fears that he sometimes displays little caution or good judgment. Elinor also becomes increasingly aware of Colonel Brandon's affections for Marianne. She is distressed when Willoughby remarks to the sisters that Colonel Brandon strikes him as rather boring and unremarkable, in spite of his good sense and irreproachable character.

Commentary

Clearly evident in these chapters are Austen's satiric voice and her keen understanding of human nature, particularly when she comments on the role of Lady Middleton's son as a conversation piece between the Dashwoods and the Middletons. She writes that:
Conversation... [was not lacking], for Sir John was very chatty, and Lady Middleton had taken the wise precaution of bringing with her their eldest child, a fine little boy about six years old; by which means there was one subject always to be recurred to by the ladies in case of extremity, for they had to enquire his name and age, admire his beauty, and ask him questions which his mother answered for him... On every formal visit a child ought to be of the party, by way of provision for discourse. In the present case it took up ten minutes to determine whether the boy were most like his father or mother, and in what particular he resembled either, for of course every body differed, and every body was astonished at the opinion of the others.
Here, Austen's use of the overarching, gnomic statements establishes a piercing irony. She writes that on every formal visit a child ought to be of the party, but knows, of course, that no one really cares which parent a child more closely resembles; Austen mocks all the ludicrous and rather irrelevant conversations devoted to this question.

Austen explains that Sir John tried to invite other guests to his home to greet the Dashwoods, but it was moonlight so everyone was already engaged. (Since moonlight made it easier to travel at night, social events were frequently scheduled on days around a full moon.) During this busy social period, Sir John was unable to invite any guests beyond his mother-in-law and his good friend Brandon; this is another subtle way of telling the reader that this family is not the most interesting or agreeable company.

Austen's opinion of her characters nearly always coincides with that of her heroine, Elinor Dashwood. Like the omniscient Austen, Elinor can appreciate the nobility of Colonel Brandon's gravity and reserve. Unlike Marianne, appearances do not dazzle the oldest sister: even though Willoughby at first seems like a considerate and kind gentleman, she immediately detects and becomes suspicious of his impulsivity and lack of prudence. In these chapters, as well as throughout the book, one can ascertain Austen's opinions of her characters by examining those of Elinor Dashwood.

As Elinor comes to appreciate Colonel Brandon as a man of good sense, Willoughby is increasingly characterized by excessive sensibility. Brandon, like herself, is well-read and wise, whereas Willoughby is overly romantic and headstrong like Marianne. Ironically, both of these men are attracted to Marianne, though Willoughby has much more in common with her. Marianne's own preference for Willoughby, and its disastrous consequences, reveal the danger of excessive sensibility and the importance of looking beyond appearances when judging human character.

Chapters 11-15 of Sense and Sensibility

Summary

The Dashwoods are surprised by the many invitations they receive in Devonshire, including several private balls at Barton Park. Marianne spends almost all of her time with Sir John Willoughby, who seems to have eyes for her alone. Elinor, however, is concerned by how open her sister is in her affections. She, unlike her sister, has no one whose company she truly enjoys, with the exception of Colonel Brandon. He, disappointed by Marianne's ardor for Willoughby, asks Elinor if her sister believes in "second attachments." Elinor must confess that Marianne's romantic sensibility seems bent on the ideal of love at first sight.

One morning, while Elinor and Marianne are out walking, the younger sister reveals that Willoughby offered her a horse, as a gift. The offer thrills Marianne, but Elinor gently reminds her sister how inconvenient and expensive the horse would be to maintain. She also tells Marianne that she doubts the propriety of receiving such a generous gift from a man she has known so briefly. Marianne insists that it does not necessarily take a long time for people to get to know each other well, though she ultimately concedes that owning a horse would be too much of a burden on their mother, who manages the household.

The next day, Margaret reports to Elinor that she saw Willoughby cut off a lock of Marianne's hair and kiss it, a sure sign of the pair's engagement. Elinor, nonetheless, warns her little sister not to jump to any conclusions.

Mrs. Jennings somehow learns that Elinor had affections for someone back at Norland. The old busybody tries to get Elinor to reveal the name of this "favourite," but Elinor insists that she had no such attachment. Finally, however, Margaret confirms that there was such a man, he was of no particular profession, and his name began with an 'F'. Elinor is extremely embarrassed by her sister's indiscretion.

The Dashwoods, Colonel Brandon, Willoughby, and the Middletons plan an excursion to Whitwell, an estate twelve miles from Barton belonging to Colonel Brandon's brother-in-law. However, just as they are about to set off, the Colonel receives an urgent letter calling him to town immediately. This disappoints the other members of the party; they encourage Brandon to postpone his trip, but he insists on leaving right away. He refuses to reveal the reason for his sudden departure, though Mrs. Jennings whispers to Elinor that she suspects he must attend to Miss Williams, whom she identifies as his natural daughter.

Since they cannot go to Whitwell without Colonel Brandon, the party instead decides to drive about the country in carriages. Marianne later confesses that during this excursion, Willoughby took her to his home at Allenham while his elderly relative, Mrs. Smith, was out. Elinor is appalled by the impropriety of such a visit, and she chastises her sister accordingly.

One day while visiting Barton Cottage, Willoughby proclaims his utter fondness for the little house and makes Mrs. Dashwood promise that she will never change a single inch of stone in the structure. The Dashwood women invite him to come to dinner the next day, and he agrees. However, when Elinor and Mrs. Dashwood return home that afternoon, they discover Marianne in tears and Willoughby on his way out the door. Willoughby informs them that he has been sent to London on business and will probably not return to Devonshire for the rest of the year. Mrs. Dashwood, suspecting that he and Marianne are secretly engaged, tries to convince herself that Willoughby had to leave so that Mrs. Smith would not learn of the attachment, but Elinor remains more skeptical and reminds her mother that they do not know if there is any such understanding between the two. Marianne, meanwhile, remains overcome by grief and cannot speak or eat.

Commentary

Elinor and Colonel Brandon's discussion of "second attachments" is ironic in light of the eventual developments of the novel, for nearly every character except Elinor will ultimately fall in love more than once: Marianne has fallen for John Willoughby but will grow to love the more sensible and constant Colonel; the Colonel loves Marianne because, as we will soon learn, she reminds him of a woman he loved before; Edward Ferrars will marry Elinor only after a long engagement to Lucy Steele; John Willoughby professes his devotion to Marianne but then marries the wealthy Miss Sophia Grey; and even Mr. Henry Dashwood had two wives. In her discussion with the Colonel, Elinor seems to have no problem with second attachments, yet it is only she who marries the very first man she knows and loves.

When Marianne uses the term "attachment," she is referring to the deeply individualized, subjective feeling of falling in love, a term closely linked to the novel's notion of "sensibility." The counterpart of this term is "connection," which refers to a public bond that also entails an emotional "attachment," and is closely linked to the notion of "sense." Marianne's relationship with Willoughby is described as an "attachment," whereas, when Elinor speaks of her relationship to Edward, she points out the lack of any formal "connection" between them.

As in all of Austen's novels, marriage here is closely bound up with financial considerations. When reflecting on her sister's relationship with Willoughby, Elinor realizes that "marriage might not be immediately in [the pair's] power." This preoccupation with money in relation to marriage was highly warranted in Austen's day; marriage was for life, and insurance and social security did not exist; a couple needed a guaranteed source of income before they could settle down together. Jane Austen understood this problem personally. Her older sister Cassandra's engagement stretched on for several years because the marriage was postponed for lack of money.

Although Willoughby ultimately marries for money, he seems oblivious to all practical concerns in the early days of his relationship with Marianne. He offers her the gift of a horse even though, as Elinor reminds her sister, there is no way the Dashwoods can afford its upkeep. The horse is named Queen Mab, a reference to the fanciful "fairies' midwife" from Romeo and Juliet (Act I Scene 4), who supposedly rides her chariot across lovers' brains to create their magical dreams. These dreams, however, according to Shakespeare's Mercutio, are "begot of nothing but fantasy" and are "more inconstant than the wind," just as Marianne's dream of owning the horse can never come true and her Willoughby will prove a mercurial and inconstant lover. Given Willoughby's unfaithfulness, it is ironic that he insists that Mrs. Dashwood promise never to alter a single stone in Barton Cottage; a man who abandons one lover for another has hardly the right to demand that a building remain unchanged.

These chapters serve as a lens through which to study one of the most important themes in the novel, the role of appearances in the assessment and judgment of character. Elinor consistently and fiercely refrains from judging other characters on the basis of appearances alone. Although Mrs. Jennings claims early on that Colonel Brandon is interested in Marianne, Elinor is not convinced of this fact until Brandon approaches her directly to discuss Marianne's romantic proclivities. Similarly, although Mrs. Dashwood and Margaret conclude that Marianne and Willoughby are engaged, Elinor remains skeptical so long as the two refrain from formally announcing their engagement. Her discussion with her mother about Marianne's relationship to Willoughby in Chapter 15 reveals that while Mrs. Dashwood readily bases her faith on looks and gestures, Elinor requires that feelings be explicitly articulated. Mrs. Dashwood draws conclusions based on appearances alone, while Elinor suspends judgment until these appearances are confirmed by words. This is yet another example of the dichotomy in the novel's title.

Chapters 16-19 of Sense and Sensibility

Summary

Marianne finds herself unable to eat or sleep following Willoughby's sudden departure, yet to her mother's surprise, she also does not appear to be expecting a letter from him. However, when Mrs. Jennings remarks that they have stopped their communal reading of Hamlet since Willoughby's departure, Marianne assures her that she expects Willoughby back within a few weeks.

One morning, about a week after Willoughby's departure, the three sisters are out walking when they see a man approach on horseback. Marianne at first thinks it is Willoughby, but the rider turns out to be Edward Ferrars, who is on his way to visit them at Barton. Marianne greets him warmly, but Elinor waits to see how he will act toward them. To both girls' surprise, Edward, though cordial, is much more distant and reserved than they expect a lover to behave. However, Marianne is assured of his affection for Elinor when she notices that he is wearing a locket-like ring that contains a lock of hair; although Edward claims it is Fanny's hair, Marianne remains convinced that it is actually her sister's. Elinor, however, has no recollection of allowing Edward to remove this token of affection.

One day during his week-long visit, Edward discusses his prospects with the Dashwoods. He tells them that he has no intention of finding a profession for himself; he prefers to remain an "idle, helpless being" in spite of his mother's high expectations of him. Marianne assures him that he does not need wealth or grandeur to be happy, but Elinor protests that wealth has much to do with happiness. The daughters then begin to fantasize about what they would do if each were granted a large fortune: Marianne would purchase all her favorite music and books. However, she hints that she would spend the majority of her fortune on facilitating her marriage to Willoughby. Elinor assures Edward that her sister has remained steadfast in her conviction that a person can only be in love once. This leads to a discussion of character and human nature in which Elinor reminds her sister that it is important to treat all people with civility, but that one should not necessarily adopt their sentiments.

After a week of walks, dances, and visits to Sir John's estate at Barton Park, Edward ruefully explains that he must leave them. Elinor tries to account for the brevity of his visit by assuring herself that he must have some task to fulfill for his demanding mother. After he leaves, she tries to occupy herself by working diligently at her drawing table, though she still finds herself thinking frequently of Edward.

The arrival of a large party at Barton Cottage interrupts one of her drawing table reveries. Sir John knocks on the casement and announces that along with Lady Middleton and Mrs. Jennings, he has brought his wife's sister and her husband, the Palmers. Mrs. Charlotte Palmer is a lively woman, expecting a child, but her husband sits reading the newspaper throughout the entire visit. Sir John encourages the Dashwood girls to join them for dinner the next day, and they find themselves unfortunately unable to decline his invitation.

Commentary

At the beginning of the chapter, Marianne behaves as she believes a disappointed lover ought to act. She cultivates her own grief by reading only what she and Willoughby read together and by singing only their songs at the piano. She makes sure that she does not sleep at all on the first night after his departure and draws her mother and sister into her own gloom. Marianne makes herself and those around her as miserable as possible, unlike Elinor, who conceals her grief from her family; when she believes Edward no longer cares for her, she sits alone at her drawing table in silent thought.

One of the governing themes of these chapters is the value of privacy, but also the confusions that result from secrecy and concealment. Since Marianne conceals any sort of understanding that may exist between herself and Willoughby about their status as a couple, Mrs. Dashwood and Elinor can only speculate about their status based on her misery and her remark to Mrs. Jennings about his expected return in a few weeks. Likewise, Elinor does not greet Edward with the warm and open regard of a lover but instead awaits his reactio; but as he is not forthcoming with his own emotions, this tactic leaves her to wonder if his feelings have changed. Marianne finds Edward's reserve puzzling as well.

In a further instance of willful concealment, Edward clearly dissembles when he claims that the lock of hair in his ring once belonged to his sister, an echo of Margaret's eager whisper to Elinor that she saw Willoughby remove a lock of Marianne's hair. This preoccupation with secrets is evident also in the behavior of the Palmers: Mrs. Jennings leans towards Elinor and speaks in a low voice to inform her that Mrs. Palmer is pregnant, and Mr. Palmer hides his face behind a newspaper for the duration of their visit. Everyone in these chapters seems bent on concealing their own situation from the eyes of others; the ensuing misunderstandings and ambiguities fuel the plot the novel.

The earlier Shakespearean reference to Queen Mab receives a second mention when the Dashwood sisters see a man approaching on horseback during their walk, and Marianne is convinced that it must be her beloved Willoughby. "Queen Mab" was the name of the horse that Willoughby was to give her, yet the horse was never more than a dream, for the Dashwoods could not afford such a gift. In this chapter, Marianne's identification of the horse's rider proves to be yet another vain fantasy like Queen Mab's dreams, for it is not Willoughby but Edward Ferrars who rides up to greet them.

When Edward first rides up to the Dashwood sisters, he comments on the dirty lanes he had to traverse to reach Barton Cottage. Roads are essential to the action of the novel because they facilitate the connections among characters. Austen structures the novel according to journeys, including the Dashwoods' journey from Norland to Barton, Willoughby's and Edward's journeys to Barton, and Elinor and Marianne's journey to London with Mrs. Jennings. Although Mrs. Dashwood sells their carriage when they leave Norland, the Dashwood sisters are still able to maintain a lively social life because of the journeys that Brandon, Willoughby, Edward, the Palmers, and the Steeles undertake to visit Barton. This prevalence of journeys is significant: in Austen's day, improved roads linked parishes and towns to one another and to the nexus of all connections, London. Austen was thus highly aware of the changes roads could bring to people's lives. In a novel built around attachments and connections, dirty lanes are a feature of the landscape as well as a plot device.

Chapters 20-22 of Sense and Sensibility

Summary

Mrs. Palmer informs the Dashwood sisters that she and her husband will be leaving shortly to entertain guests at their own home at Cleveland. She tries to persuade Elinor and Marianne to go to town with them that winter or to join them at Cleveland for Christmas. She enlists the support of her husband, who rarely joins in his wife's discussions except to offer a cynical comment about the weather. Mrs. Palmer enjoys joking about her husband's droll humor and dry wit, though Elinor realizes that, with such a foolish wife, Mr. Palmer has no choice but to act this way.

Mrs. Palmer tells Elinor that her home is right near Willoughby's estate in Combe, though he is rarely there. She also relates that she saw Colonel Brandon in town earlier that week, and he confirmed her suspicion that Willoughby and Marianne are "attached" to one another. Mrs. Palmer adds that Colonel Brandon would have liked to marry Mrs. Palmer if only her parents had not had such high standards. Of course, the prudent Elinor knows to take Mrs. Palmer's observations and claims with a grain of salt.

When the Palmers return to Cleveland, Sir John Middleton invites Anne and Lucy Steele, two young ladies from Exeter, to visit at Barton. In an attempt to foster ties of friendship between the Steeles and the Dashwoods, Sir John praises each pair of sisters to the other. However, when they actually meet, Elinor and Marianne are annoyed by the way in which the Steele sisters indulge Lady Middleton's children and discuss where the greatest population of genteel young men can be found. Elinor accepts that Lucy is clever, but she finds her ill-read and sorely lacking in education. However, for their part, the Steele sisters are fond of the Dashwood girls, and Lucy Steele makes a considerable effort to become close with Elinor.

Sir John mentions the name of Edward Ferrars in one of his numerous attempts to gently tease Elinor. Upon hearing his name, Anne remarks that she knows him very well. One day soon after, while they are walking together from the park to the cottage, Lucy asks Elinor if she has ever met Edward's mother, Mrs. Ferrars. This question mildly surprises Elinor; she assumes that Lucy must be somehow connected to Robert Ferrars. She is utterly incredulous when Lucy confesses to her that she has been secretly engaged to Edward for four years! Edward was a pupil of Lucy's uncle in Plymouth, and that is where their relationship began. Lucy says that they have been forced to conceal their engagement because Lucy has no fortune. However, as she informs Elinor, Edward wears a ring with a lock of her hair in it as a constant reminder of their attachment. Elinor, astonished and sick with grief, can hardly believe Lucy's confession.

Commentary

In contrast to the Dashwood sisters, the Steeles lack education, refinement, and integrity. Anne Steele is nearly thirty, plain-looking, and rather simple-minded, whereas the Dashwood girls are in their late teens, beautiful, and insightful. Twenty-three-year-old Lucy Steele, although shrewd, smart, and pretty, lacks any real elegance and grace and never received the benefits of a good education. In their shameless obsequiousness toward Lady Middleton, the Steele sisters provide a definite contrast with the polite yet always honest Dashwood girls.

When Elinor comments on Lucy's lack of education, she is not referring to formal education in "public" schools such as Eton or universities such as Oxford; these were reserved solely for genteel men. In Austen's day, few people perceived the need for higher education for women. Austen herself studied briefly under the private tutelage of a Mrs. Cawley, the sister of one of her uncles, and spent a short period of time at a boarding school in Reading; this was her only education outside of her family. Within her family, however, she studied drawing, painting, and piano. Women of the genteel classes were expected to acquire these skills, or "accomplishments." In this novel, Elinor is accomplished in drawing while Marianne is an accomplished pianist. But the Steeles have no such skills to recommend them. Since the main purpose of these accomplishments was to help a woman acquire a husband, Elinor had even further reason to be surprised when the unaccomplished Lucy Steele announced her secret engagement to Edward Ferrars.

Austen ends Part I of the novel with Elinor's disappointment and astonishment upon learning of Lucy's secret engagement to Edward. Although this chapter (22) links directly to the next (23), Austen interrupts the plot at this point to focus on her central character. Lucy's revelation is a critical turning point in Elinor's thinking even if not in the development of the story because the eldest Miss Dashwood's slim hopes of eventually marrying Edward are now completely dashed. Only in the next chapter will she begin to digest this news with her characteristic sense and rationality: she reasons that Edward's engagement to Lucy must have been the product of a youthful infatuation rather than a lasting, genuine affection.

Chapters 23-27 of Sense and Sensibility

Summary

Elinor reflects on Lucy's news and reasons that her engagement to Edward must have been the product of youthful infatuation. She is certain that Edward could not possibly still love Lucy after four years of getting to know this frivolous and ignorant woman. She is also relieved that she does not have to share Lucy's news with her mother and sister, since she has been sworn to secrecy. She and Lucy converse at length about Edward Ferrars during a dinner party at Barton Park shortly thereafter. While Marianne is playing the piano and everyone else is absorbed in a card game, Elinor and Lucy sit rolling papers for a filigree basket for Lady Middleton's daughter, Annamaria.

Lucy confesses to Elinor that she is a very jealous woman, but that she has no reason to suspect Edward of unfaithfulness. She states that it would be madness for her and Edward to marry while he has only two thousand pounds; they must wait until they inherit Mrs. Ferrars's wealth. If they were to announce their engagement while Mrs. Ferrars was still living, the headstrong woman would disinherit Edward and give all her money to her younger son Robert; thus, they must be patient and secretive. Following this conversation, Lucy loses no opportunity to speak to Elinor about her secret engagement, much to the latter's consternation.

Lucy expresses disappointment that Elinor has no plans to come to London in the winter, but soon after this Mrs. Jennings invites the Dashwood sisters to join her at her home in town near Portman Square. At first, the girls decline her offer on the grounds that they cannot leave their mother alone at Barton, but Mrs. Dashwood assures them that it would give her great pleasure to allow her daughters to enjoy themselves in London. Marianne is overjoyed that she will get to see Willoughby at long last, but Elinor is apprehensive about the journey because she does not want to find herself in the company of both Lucy and Edward together.

After a journey lasting three days in Mrs. Jennings' carriage, the Dashwood sisters arrive in London. Elinor immediately writes a letter to their mother, while Marianne composes a brief note announcing their arrival to John Willoughby. Marianne eagerly awaits Willoughby's visit, and is exceedingly disappointed that evening when Colonel Brandon shows up instead. Marianne leaves the room in frustration and Colonel Brandon delivers the message that Mrs. Palmer plans to arrive the next day.

When Mrs. Palmer arrives, she goes shopping in town with the Dashwood sisters and Mrs. Jennings. Immediately upon their return home, Marianne rushes to see if she has received mail from Willoughby, but there are no letters for her. When Mrs. Jennings comments on the rainy weather, Marianne reasons that Willoughby must be stuck in the country on account of the rain.

Sir John and Lady Middleton arrive in town and host a ball at their home for about twenty young people, including the Palmers and the Dashwoods. Because Willoughby is not in attendance, Marianne is dejected and withdrawn. When they return from the party, Mrs. Jennings informs them that Willoughby had been invited to the ball but declined the invitation. Marianne is astonished and miserable, and Elinor concludes that she must ask her mother to inquire into Marianne and Willoughby's status once and for all.

Colonel Brandon arrives at Mrs. Jennings's London home to speak with Elinor. He asks her if it is true, as everyone claims, that Marianne and Willoughby are engaged. Elinor is surprised that so many people are discussing an engagement that has not been officially announced. She diplomatically informs Colonel Brandon that though she knows nothing of her sister's engagement, she has no doubt of their mutual affection. Brandon leaves after expressing his wish that Marianne be happy--and that Willoughby endeavor to deserve her.

Commentary

Even when Lucy Steele is revealing her greatest secret to Elinor, she must do so in hushed tones and with an atmosphere of concealment. As the rest of the dinner party plays cards, Lucy whispers to Elinor the story of her long and secret engagement to Edward. Although Lucy describes the history of their relationship accurately, her claims about Edward's steadfast faithfulness and their mutual affection are as fabricated as the basket in her hands; Edward, as Elinor assures herself, has eyes for her alone.

Marianne's name suits her well: like the Mariana of Shakespeare's Measure for Measure, who waits by the moated grange for her lover, Austen's heroine pines away for Willoughby and awaits his visit from the moment she first arrives in town with Mrs. Jennings and Elinor. Marianne's name is also a mirror image of Annamaria, Lady Middleton's spoiled young daughter, who will be "miserable" if her filigree basket is not completed before she goes to bed. By this close kinship of names, Austen suggests that Marianne's excessive sensibility and romanticism resembles the eagerness and impatience of a spoiled little girl.

Willoughby does not appear in any of these chapters, yet he figures prominently in the thoughts of those characters who do. Mrs. Jennings implies that Marianne would welcome the opportunity to travel to town with her in the hope of seeing Willoughby, and Marianne is enthusiastic about the prospect for this very reason. When they arrive in town, she is increasingly wretched with each passing day that he does not visit. Elinor, too, thinks of Willoughby at length because she is concerned about her sister's welfare. Even Colonel Brandon calls on Elinor in order to discuss Marianne's relationship with Willoughby and to inform Elinor that everyone in town is discussing their engagement. These frequent references to Willoughby heighten our anxiety concerning the true nature of his commitment to Marianne, and enable us as readers to experience some of Marianne's longing for that which is never present.

Though Willoughby does not appear, Marianne mistakes Colonel Brandon for him when the latter comes to visit the Dashwood sisters in London. This is one of many suggestions in the novel that people may be substituted for one another: Marianne had earlier mistaken Edward Ferrars on horseback for John Willoughby; Elinor mistakes Lucy's hair for her own in Edward's ring; and Elinor initially mistakes Robert for Edward as the object of Lucy's affections. These scenes in which some characters fail to recognize others provide subtext for a novel in which one young woman (Marianne) thinks she is in love with one man but ends up loving someone else, and another young woman (Lucy) becomes engaged to one brother but then decides to marry the other.

Chapters 28-32 of Sense and Sensibility

Summary

Elinor and Marianne are obliged to accompany Lady Middleton to a party in town, even though Marianne is far too melancholic to enjoy dancing or card games. Suddenly, Marianne catches sight of Willoughby among the crowd and rushes forth to greet him. She is astonished and deeply distressed when he avoids her eye and appears absorbed in conversation with another young lady. When she finally approaches him directly, he coldly remarks that he indeed received her letters but never found her at home when he attempted to visit her in reply. Marianne must leave the party immediately with her sisters, for she is too overcome by grief to do anything but climb into bed.

The next day, after breakfast, Marianne shares with Elinor a letter she has just received from Willoughby. In his letter, Willoughby apologizes for anything in his conduct at the party that might have offended her. He expresses his esteem for the entire Dashwood family and regrets if he ever gave Marianne any reason to believe that he felt differently for her. Finally, he informs her of his upcoming engagement to another woman and encloses in his letter the three notes that she sent him in London.

To Elinor's dismay, all of Marianne's notes were urgent pleas for Willoughby to come visit her at Mrs. Jennings's home, even though, as Marianne confesses, they were never formally engaged to one another. Elinor can hardly believe that Marianne could be so forward in her affections when she and Willoughby were not even engaged, but she nevertheless tries to comfort her sister with gentle words, wine, and lavender drops. Marianne tells her sister that she wants to leave London immediately, but Elinor reminds her that it would be rude to leave Mrs. Jennings after such a short visit.

Mrs. Jennings tries to comfort Marianne but says all the wrong things. She remarks to Elinor that her sister looks "very bad" and that she should realize that Willoughby "is not the only young man in the world worth having." She also invites guests to dinner in order to amuse Marianne, but even her sweetmeats and olives cannot lift the girl's spirits. Marianne leaves the table early, but Elinor remains to hear Mrs. Jennings and her friends discuss how Willoughby squandered all his fortune and therefore abruptly proposed to Miss Sophia Grey, a wealthy heiress. Mrs. Jennings tells Elinor that now it will only be a matter of time before Marianne marries Colonel Brandon.

While the party takes after-dinner tea, Colonel Brandon arrives to speak with Elinor. He fears that the rumor he heard in town about Willoughby's engagement to Miss Grey might be true, and Elinor confirms his fears. The next day, he visits once again to share with Elinor the sad story of his own romantic history, in the interest of shedding light on Marianne's predicament: he explains that he was once deeply in love with a woman named Eliza, but she was married against his inclination to his brother so as to ensure her fortune for the family. Brandon's brother treated her very unkindly, and she deceived him; ultimately, the couple divorced, and she disappeared. Colonel Brandon, formerly her lover and then her brother-in-law, at last found her dying of consumption in a sponging house (a "bath," or spa) in London. He cared for her until her death and promised to take care of her three-year-old daughter. Willoughby placed the young girl in school, and she visited him periodically. Then, about a year earlier, she suddenly disappeared. The following October--the day of the intended picnic to Whitwell, which takes place earlier in the book--he received the news that she had been seduced and abandoned by none other than John Willoughby! He explains that this is why he had to rush off to London on the day of their planned outing.

Elinor shares Colonel Brandon's story with Marianne and Marianne mourns the loss of Willoughby's "good" character just as she mourned the loss of him to another woman. The sisters also receive a note from their mother expressing her shock and pain at the news of Willoughby's betrayal. Nonetheless, Mrs. Dashwood urges her daughters to stay in town, especially since their half-brother John Dashwood and his wife Fanny will be arriving there shortly. Meanwhile, Mrs. Jennings, Mrs. Palmer, Lady Middleton, and the Steele sisters also offer words of sympathy to the Dashwood sisters, though their concern is more for themselves than for Marianne: Lady Middleton, for example, expresses outrage at Willoughby's behavior but then arranges to leave her card with Miss Grey since she will be an elegant and wealthy woman when she marries John Willoughby. Only the sympathy of Elinor, Mrs. Dashwood, and Colonel Brandon is entirely genuine and well-intentioned.

Commentary

Although Austen makes reference throughout the novel to letters sent from one character to another, Chapter 29 is exceptional because it includes the full text of four letters sent between Willoughby and Marianne. Chapter 29 perhaps most closely resembles Austen's original 1795 manuscript for the book, which was conceived as an epistolary novel entitled Elinor and Marianne. It wasn't until at least four years later that Austen rewrote these letters with narration.

Elinor feels that Willoughby's letter proclaims him to be "deep in hardened villainy." Indeed, Willoughby is only one in a long line of Austen's male villains, including George Wickham (of Pride and Prejudice), Henry Crawford (of Mansfield Park, and Frank Churchill (ofEmma). All of Austen's villains are tricksters, who initially seem charming, attractive, and witty. Some, like Frank Churchill, turn out to be fibbers and play-actors while others, like George Wickham, are downright frauds. However, Willoughby is both: he is a glamorous seducer as well as a corrupt philanderer. He is not just impetuous but also callous; he is not just insensitive but also vicious. As a result, it is not difficult to see how he can capture Marianne's heart without ever fully winning Elinor's confidence.

The contrast between Elinor and Marianne is perhaps made most explicit in their reactions to their lovers' seemingly insensitive treatment. Whereas Elinor is relieved that she does not have to share Lucy's news about Edward with her mother and sister, Marianne insists through her grief that "I care not who knows that I am wretched." Her attempt to claim intimacy with Willoughby at the party dramatizes the dangers of showing one's feelings publicly and contrasts strikingly with Elinor's more cautious restraint.

Colonel Brandon's own personal story of his relationship with Eliza Williams and her daughter elaborately echoes Marianne's relationship with Willoughby. The details of Brandon's story parallel all of the plots of the novel, including that of the insensitive parent's commitment to primogeniture, of brothers who cannot see eye-to-eye, and of women whose hearts are broken by the men they love. However, Brandon's dramatic story also includes divorce, seduction, illegitimate birth, and even a duel, all of which are extreme consequences of the emotions and situations that Marianne Dashwood must confront. Though Brandon comments that he is a "very awkward narrator," his story-within-a-story actually sheds light on many of the most important themes of the novel.

Chapters 33-36 of Sense and Sensibility

Summary

Elinor and Marianne go on an errand to Gray's, the jeweler in town. They are annoyed by the presence of an impertinent coxcomb who stands before them in line and orders an elaborate toothpick case. As Elinor at last conducts her business, her brother enters the shop. John Dashwood confesses that he has been in town for two days but has not had time to visit his sisters. The next day, John pays a visit to his sisters at Mrs. Jennings's home. He takes a long walk with Elinor, during which he informs her that he would be very glad if she married Colonel Brandon. Elinor assures him that she has no intentions of doing so, but John insists on the desirability of the match. He also comments that Mrs. Ferrars expects her son, Edward, to marry the wealthy daughter of Miss Morton. Finally, Edward notes that Marianne's appearance has declined considerably in her time of misery, and thus she will no longer be able to find quite so wealthy a husband.

Fanny Dashwood is initially reluctant to visit the Dashwoods because she is unsure if Mrs. Jennings is sophisticated enough for her, but she consents upon hearing her husband's favorable report. Fanny enjoys the company of Mrs. Jennings, and especially enjoys the company of Lady Middleton. She decides to host a dinner party at her home on Harley Street. She invites the Dashwood sisters, Mrs. Jennings, the Middletons, Colonel Brandon, and Mrs. Ferrars. Elinor is very worried about meeting Edward at the dinner party, and is relieved to learn that he is unable to attend. She strongly dislikes Mrs. Ferrars, a sour and sallow woman who seems to care only about seeing her son Edward marry rich.

After dinner, the ladies withdraw into the drawing room. Much to Elinor's dismay, the subject of conversation is Harry Dashwood and Lady Middleton's second son, William, and whether one is taller than the other. When the gentlemen guests enter the room, John Dashwood shows off to Colonel Brandon a pair of screens that Elinor painted as a gift for her brother's family. Mrs. Ferrars insults Elinor's artwork and Marianne, furious at Mrs. Ferrars's rudeness, rushes to her sister's public defense. Colonel Brandon admires the "affectionate heart" of this girl, who cannot bear to witness her sister slighted.

Mrs. Jennings is called away urgently by her daughter Mrs. Charlotte Palmer, who is expecting the birth of a child. Meanwhile, Lucy Steele visits the Dashwoods to tell (brag to) Elinor how pleasantly surprised she was by Mrs. Ferrars's favorable behavior toward her (Lucy) at the party. In the middle of their conversation, the servant suddenly announces the arrival of Mr. Ferrars, and Edward walks into the room. He looks immediately uncomfortable upon realizing that both Lucy and Elinor are in attendance. Marianne, who does not know anything about Lucy's claims of an attachment to Edward, expresses her tremendous joy at his arrival. Marianne is surprised when Edward leaves so soon after, and remarks to Elinor that she cannot understand why Lucy calls so frequently (Lucy has also departed). Elinor, bound by her pledge of secrecy to Lucy, cannot offer a single word of explanation.

Mrs. Palmer gives birth to a son and heir, to the great pride and joy of Mrs. Jennings. Mr. Palmer, however, seems unaffected by the birth of his son and insists that the baby looks like all the other babies he has ever seen.

Fanny's friend, Mrs. Dennison, invites her and John to a musical party and extends the invitation to the Dashwood girls, under the mistaken assumption that the girls are living with their half-brother's family. There, Elinor is introduced to Mr. Robert Ferrars and discovers that he is the very same coxcomb who stood before her in line at the jewelers. At the party, it occurs to John to invite his sisters to stay at his house in London, but Fanny objects on the grounds that she had just been planning to invite Anne and Lucy Steele to visit. Elinor worries that perhaps this invitation is a sign that Fanny has decided to support Lucy's engagement to her brother, Edward.

Commentary

Austen's biting wit is quite evident here: as the omniscient narrator, she makes direct comments about her characters, and, within the story, she has some of her characters commment on other, less favorable figures. The first, more direct display of her wit is exemplified by her comments about the dinner party, hosted by Mr. and Mrs. John Dashwood:John Dashwood had not much to say for himself that was worth hearing, and his wife still less. But there was no peculiar disgrace in this, for it was very much the case with the chief of their visitors, who almost all laboured under one or other of these disqualifications for being agreeable: want of sense, either natural or improved; want of elegance, want of spirits, or want of temper.She passes judgment on her characters by pretending to cast their most negative attributes in a positive light: John Dashwood has nothing to say for himself, but there is "no particular disgrace" in this because his company is just as insipid as he. Usually, these acerbic observations are presented through Elinor's eyes, but here Austen, at her cruelest, satirizes her characters directly.

The more indirect display of Austen's wit is exemplified by the personality and behavior of Mr. Palmer. Just after the lengthy and elaborate debate between doting mothers about the relative heights of their children, Austen informs her readers that Mr. Palmer, the father of a newborn son, did not find his child to be different from any other newborn infant, "nor could he [Mr. Palmer] even be brought to acknowledge the simple proposition of its being the finest child in the world." Rather than informing her readers directly that Fanny Dashwood and Lady Middleton are irrational in their motherly affections, she accomplishes this through the character of Mr. Palmer, whose objectivity and indifference enable her to indirectly mock the mothers' excessive sentimentality.

From Fanny's dinner party to Mrs. Dennison's musical party, these chapters underscore the extent to which a seemingly endless series of invitations governs the lives of the women in Austen's novel. The Dashwood women travel to Barton at the invitation of Sir John; Elinor and Marianne travel to London at the invitation of Mrs. Jennings; Marianne visits Willoughby's estate at Allenham at his invitation. Indeed, formal invitations to others' homes structure the social lives of all of Austen's heroines, and thus, although they travel frequently and widely, the wills of others circumscribe their mobility. In contrast, the men of the novel have agency in addition to mobility. They can come and go as they wish regardless of the invitations and expectations of others: Willoughby proclaims unexpectedly that he must go to Devonshire on business; Colonel Brandon suddenly interrupts the outing to Whitwell because he has urgent business in London; Edward comes and goes in no particular pattern. While the plot of the entire novel is structured around the physical movement of characters, only the male characters fully control their travels.

Chapters 37-41 of Sense and Sensibility

Summary

Mrs. Jennings returns home from a visit to Mrs. Palmer with the shocking news that Lucy Steele and Edward Ferrars have been engaged to one another for over a year. Elinor, upon hearing that their engagement has at last become public, shares the news with her sister. Marianne cannot believe that Elinor has known of Edward's secret engagement for four months, for her sister has remained calm and composed throughout the entire period.

John Dashwood visits his sisters at Mrs. Jennings's home and informs them that Fanny is in hysterics on account of the news. He also relates that Mrs. Ferrars has insisted that Edward must extricate himself from the attachment, or she will disown and disinherit him. The following Sunday, during a visit with Mrs. Jennings to Kensington Gardens, Elinor learns from Miss Anne Steele that Edward has refused to break off his engagement with Lucy. His mother has therefore transferred her estate to Edward's younger brother, Robert. As Miss Steele relates, Edward has informed Lucy that without his mother's inheritance, he will have to obtain a curacy and live modestly, but Lucy has proclaimed her devotion to him regardless of his economic situation. This information is confirmed in a letter from Lucy expressing to Elinor her commitment to Edward.

Elinor and Marianne, anxious to leave London and return home, arrange to depart with the Palmers and visit them in Cleveland before heading back to Barton. Before they leave, Colonel Brandon visits Elinor and tells her that he has decided to offer his living at the Delaford rectory to Edward as a means of supporting himself. The Colonel asks Elinor to inform Edward of his offer, and Elinor finds herself in the rather uncomfortable position of facilitating the marriage of the man she loves to another woman. She begins writing a letter to Edward when Mrs. Jennings suddenly welcomes him into her home and she is afforded the opportunity to speak with him directly. Edward is astonished and deeply moved by the Colonel's generosity.

Elinor goes off to visit Fanny Dashwood, who has not been feeling well since the news of Edward and Lucy's engagement. She is greeted at the door by John Dashwood, who shares the news that Robert Ferrars will inherit his mother's estate in place of his brother. Just then, Robert Ferrars arrives and expresses his pity for his older brother. John leaves them to inform his wife of Elinor's presence, and Fanny Dashwood, upon receiving Elinor, expresses her regret that the Dashwood sisters will be leaving town so soon.

Commentary

When Miss Steele accidentally lets slip the secret of her sister's engagement to Edward Ferrars, their relationship becomes no longer an "attachment" but a "connection." An attachment is an emotional association between two people; to form an attachment is to fall in love. In contrast, a connection is the public bond involving a range of associations between individuals and their families. When Lucy and Edward were attached to one another, they were simply secretly in love with one another; once Miss Steele makes their engagement public, their families become heavily involved in an ever-widening circle of legal and economic implications. For example, Mrs. Ferrars announces that she will disinherit her son if he marries Lucy instead of the wealthy heiress Miss Morton, and Colonel Brandon offers Edward a living to support his wife. Thus, when the attachment becomes a connection, the number of individuals involved in the relationship increases considerably.

Connections link family members to one another in concern for their mutual welfare. These bonds are so strong that it is unusual to find people behaving warmly and generously toward those they are not related to. Thus, John Dashwood cannot understand why Colonel Brandon offers Edward a living ("Really!" he says upon hearing the news; "Well this is very astonishing!--no relationship--no connection between them!") Brandon, we know, is acting solely on the basis of voluntary fellow-feeling. He empathizes with Edward because he, too, has known the pain of love accompanied by tremendous emotional distress. Furthermore, he respects Edward because he knows that Edward has Elinor's admiration. Therefore, he offers Edward a means of supporting a wife in spite of his disinheritance. But for John Dashwood, only family ties could provide the grounds for such a kind and generous gesture.

Chapters 42-45 of Sense and Sensibility

Summary

In early April, Elinor and Marianne leave London with Mrs. Jennings and Mr. and Mrs. Palmer to spend some time at the Palmers' house at Cleveland before returning home to Barton. Elinor is glad to be on her way home, but Marianne finds it painful to leave the place where her confidence in Willoughby was shattered.

When they arrive at Cleveland, Marianne, still melancholy, takes several, long walks in the evenings and catches a violent cold. Elinor and Mrs. Jennings try to nurse Marianne back to health, but her condition continues to deteriorate. Marianne becomes feverish and delirious and calls out for her mother in the middle of the night. Colonel Brandon volunteers to travel to Barton and bring Mrs. Dashwood back with him in his carriage.

After several anxious days, Mr. Harris, the Palmers' apothecary, at last announces that Marianne will be all right. Later that evening, just before the expected arrival time of Mrs. Dashwood and Colonel Brandon, Marianne hears a carriage approaching. She is astonished to see that the man emerging from the carriage is none other than John Willoughby! Willoughby states that he wishes to offer Elinor an explanation and apology for his behavior toward Marianne. He tells her that although he always knew that he could never afford to marry Marianne, he did not really appreciate what love was when he first became attached to her. He confesses to marrying Miss Grey for her money; thus, he does not love his wife and will forever hold Marianne in the highest regard. Willoughby asks Elinor to communicate his confession to Marianne and request her forgiveness. Elinor pities Willoughby after hearing his story and agrees to share his confession with Marianne once her health is restored.

Mrs. Dashwood and Colonel Brandon arrive at Cleveland and are relieved to learn of Marianne's improved state. Mrs. Dashwood tells Elinor that on the long carriage ride from Barton to Cleveland, Colonel Brandon confessed his love for Marianne. She assures Elinor that she will do everything in her power to encourage this match.

Commentary

Marianne's illness is a product both of excessive romantic sensibility and of a sequence of physically plausible reactions. On the one hand, her illness begins as a "nervous illness" induced by Willoughby's rejection and her disappointed romantic hopes and dreams. On the other hand, she catches a cold after wandering about the wet grounds of Cleveland. Austen's detailed description of Marianne's physical deterioration prevents readers from dismissing her ailment as a mere case of Victorian female hysteria: she charts the course of Marianne's illness, from a day spent shivering by the fire, to a restless and feverish night, to her feeling that she is "materially better" about a week later. Then, a few hours afterward her fever returns, accompanied by delirium. Although the scene in which Marianne cries out for her mother seems Gothic in its melodrama, delirious outcries were a common symptom of fever in Austen's day according to the most commonly consulted medical handbooks. Thus, Marianne's illness is an affliction of both the soul and the physical body.

While Marianne lies sick in bed, Elinor must deal not only with her sister's illness but also with the individual who was in part responsible for her condition, John Willoughby. While they were in London, Elinor concluded that Willoughby was "deep in hardened villainy." However, in these chapters, she comes to pity and sympathize with him. Softened by his honesty and passion, Elinor comes to understand, along with the reader, what had seemed a purely cruel change of heart in London. Although Willoughby's behavior is still inexcusable, his confession at least supplies the motivation for his actions. Perhaps Elinor finds it easier to forgive him because she knows that ultimately he has suffered--and will continue to suffer--for his misconduct: he has entered into a loveless marriage with a woman who will never be able to make him happy. Elinor may also have an easier time forgiving Willoughby because she now knows that his love for Marianne was genuine, in spite of his inappropriate behavior. Thus, even the rational and restrained Elinor is moved to forgive Willoughby after hearing his passionate confession.

By reintroducing Willoughby at the end of her novel, Austen grants him more depth than an ordinary villain enjoys. Since he is able to speak for himself, Willoughby emerges as a more complicated and nuanced character than George Wickham, who simply carries off Lydia Bennett in Pride and Prejudice and never redeems himself again. Moreover, the reintroduction of Willoughby provides a long-awaited explanation of his mercurial behavior and a confirmation of Marianne's conviction that he loved her very much. Thus, Austen ties up her loose ends before entering her novel's finale.

Chapters 46-50 of Sense and Sensibility

Summary

The Dashwoods return to Barton Cottage, and Marianne continues to recover from her illness. While she and Elinor are taking a walk one day, the subject of Willoughby is broached once again. Marianne admits that she behaved imprudently in her relations with him, but Elinor consoles her by relating Willoughby's confession. Marianne feels much better knowing that his abandonment of her was not the final revelation of a long-standing deceit, but rather the result of his financial straits, and was thus not entirely willed. Marianne also acknowledges that she would never have been happy with him anyway; he has proved himself rather lacking in integrity. Elinor shares Willoughby's confession with Mrs. Dashwood as well, who pities the man but cannot fully forgive him for his treatment of Marianne.

Thomas, the Dashwoods' manservant, arrives from town with the news that "Mr. Ferrars" has married Lucy Steele. This news distresses both Elinor and Marianne: Marianne falls into a fit of hysterics, and Elinor appears deeply disappointed. Witnessing her eldest daughter's grief, Mrs. Dashwood wonders whether she ought to have paid closer attention to Elinor's feelings over the past several months.

Not long after, Elinor thinks she sees Colonel Brandon approaching Barton Cottage on horseback, but upon closer look, she realizes that the visitor is actually Edward Ferrars. When he enters the house, and she and Marianne inquire about his recent marriage, he realizes the misunderstanding and assures them that it was Robert who married Lucy Steele. (Now that Robert is the heir to Mrs. Ferrars's money, Lucy has shifted her affections.) Elinor is so overcome by relief that she runs out of the room, unable to contain her tears of joy. Within the next three hours, Edward proposes to Elinor and she accepts, of course, with great happiness. Over dinner that evening, he explains the unfortunate circumstances that first led to his engagement to Lucy. Edward also shares with the Dashwood sisters a note from Lucy in which she informed him of her engagement to Robert and severed all romantic ties with him. When Colonel Brandon arrives at Barton and hears the news of their engagement, he graciously offers to improve the parsonage at Delaford (which he had first offered to Edward when Edward planned to marry Lucy) to accommodate the couple comfortably.

Mrs. Ferrars ultimately reconciles herself to Edward's new situation, though she continues to favor Robert as if he were her eldest son. Elinor and Edward live together at Delaford and frequently invite both Marianne and Colonel Brandon to visit, in the hope that the two will form an attachment with one another. Their plan is successful, for the Colonel and the younger sister become engaged and move in with Elinor and Edward at Delaford. The sisters continue to maintain close ties with their mother and Margaret at Barton Cottage, and the families live happily ever after.

Commentary

When the servant Thomas first announces the news of "Mr. Ferrars's" marriage to Lucy Steele, Marianne bursts out in hysterics while Elinor maintains her composure in spite of her deep disappointment. Their reactions are ironic on two levels. First, Elinor was the sister with a close attachment to Edward, and thus, she has far more cause to break down in tears. Second, not only do the sisters' reactions seem reversed from what they should be, but the reactions of the men under discussion are reversed as well (though we do not yet know it): it is actually Robert, not Edward, who is engaged to Lucy Steele.

Several critics have objected to the implausibility of the match between Marianne and Colonel Brandon. Brandon is characterized as a clear-headed, dependable, practical man--the total opposite of the romantic and impetuous Marianne. Thus, Marianne's final acceptance of him seems completely out of character, since the marriage requires her to abandon her romantic ideals entirely. Moreover, Marianne and Colonel Brandon barely interact in the novel, especially in the concluding chapters. Thus, it seems unlikely that Marianne would come to love Brandon as she had loved Willoughby; she hardly knows him. Nonetheless, by closing the novel with their marriage, Austen shows the extent of Marianne's transformation: she writes, "She was born to discover the falsehood of her own opinions, and to counteract by her conduct her most favourite maxims." If Marianne's ability to love Brandon is unconvincing, it is because of Austen's great faith in the ability of the individual to remake herself in light of shifting circumstances.

The novel closes with a reminder that the most important attachment in the novel is not that between any man and woman, but between the two sisters. The sisters decide to live side-by-side together with their husbands at Delaford, thereby affirming the mutual respect and affection, which has kept them close throughout the entire novel.

Ultimately, both sisters end up married to the novel's only second sons. Edward Ferrars, although strictly speaking the firstborn, is disinherited by his mother; as John Dashwood remarks, "Robert will now to all intents and purposes be considered as the eldest son." We know that Colonel Brandon is a second son because he has an older brother who married his old sweetheart, Eliza, many years before the novel's plot begins. Whereas these characters are the heroes of the novel, all the eldest sons, including John Dashwood, Robert Ferrars, and Colonel Brandon's older brother, are cast in a negative light. In Austen's day, the eldest sons were the ones who inherited all the family property according to the laws of male primogeniture. However, in spite of these inheritance laws, it is the second sons who ultimately find contentment in the novel; thus, they make happy lives for themselves despite societal and financial constraints.

Overall Analysis and Themes of Sense and Sensibility

The dichotomy between "sense" and "sensibility" is one of the lenses through which this novel is most commonly analyzed. The distinction is most clearly symbolized by the psychological contrast between the novel's two chief characters, Elinor and Marianne Dashwood. According to this understanding, Elinor, the older sister, represents qualities of "sense": reason, restraint, social responsibility, and a clear-headed concern for the welfare of others. In contrast, Marianne, her younger sister, represents qualities of "sensibility": emotion, spontaneity, impulsiveness, and rapturous devotion. Whereas Elinor conceals her regard for Edward Ferrars, Marianne openly and unashamedly proclaims her passion for John Willoughby. Their different attitudes toward the men they love, and how to express that love, reflect their opposite temperaments.

This dichotomy between "sense" and "sensibility" has cultural and historical resonances as well. Austen wrote this novel around the turn of the eighteenth century, on the cusp between two cultural movements: Classicism and Romanticism. Elinor represents the characteristics associated with eighteenth-century neo-classicism, including rationality, insight, judgment, moderation, and balance. She never loses sight of propriety, economic practicalities, and perspective, as when she reminds Marianne that their mother would not be able to afford a pet horse or that it is indecorous for her to go alone with Willoughby to Allenham. It was during the Classical period and its accompanying cultural Enlightenment that the novel first developed as a literary genre: thus, with the character of Elinor, Austen gestures toward her predecessors and acknowledges the influence of their legacy on her generation. In contrast, Marianne represents the qualities associated with the emerging "cult of sensibility," embracing romance, imagination, idealism, excess, and a dedication to the beauty of nature: Marianne weeps dramatically when her family must depart from "dear, dear Norland" and willingly offers a lock of her hair to her lover. Austen's characterization of Marianne reminds us that she was the contemporary of Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Walter Scott, the luminaries of the English Romantic literary scene. Austen's depiction of Elinor and Marianne thus reflects the changing literary landscape that served as a backdrop for her life as a writer.

However, this novel cannot simply be understood as a straightforward study in contrast. Elinor, though representing sense, does not lack passion, and Marianne, though representing sensibility, is not always foolish and headstrong. Austen's antitheses do not represent epigrammatic conclusions but a starting- point for dialogue. Although Austen is famous for satirizing the "cult of sensibility," in this novel she seems to argue not for the dismissal of sensibility but for the creation of a balance between reason and passion. Fanny Dashwood's violent outbreak of feeling towards the end of the novel reveals that too little feeling is as dangerous as too much. Both Elinor and Marianne achieve happiness at the end of the novel, but they do so only by learning from one another: together they discover how to feel and express their sentiments fully while also retaining their dignity and self-control. The novel's success is not a result of the triumph of sense over sensibility or of their division; rather, we remember Sense and Sensibility as a conjunction of terms that serve together as the compound subject of Austen's novel.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

By. Mark Twain

Plot Overview

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn opens by familiarizing us with the events of the novel that preceded it, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Both novels are set in the town of St. Petersburg, Missouri, which lies on the banks of the Mississippi River. At the end of Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn, a poor boy with a drunken bum for a father, and his friend Tom Sawyer, a middle-class boy with an imagination too active for his own good, found a robber's stash of gold. As a result of his adventure, Huck gained quite a bit of money, which the bank held for him in trust. Huck was adopted by the Widow Douglas, a kind but stifling woman who lives with her sister, the self-righteous Miss Watson.

As Huckleberry Finn opens, Huck is none too thrilled with his new life of cleanliness, manners, church, and school. However, he sticks it out at the bequest of Tom Sawyer, who tells him that in order to take part in Tom's new “robbers' gang,” Huck must stay “respectable.” All is well and good until Huck's brutish, drunken father, Pap, reappears in town and demands Huck's money. The local judge, Judge Thatcher, and the Widow try to get legal custody of Huck, but another well-intentioned new judge in town believes in the rights of Huck's natural father and even takes the old drunk into his own home in an attempt to reform him. This effort fails miserably, and Pap soon returns to his old ways. He hangs around town for several months, harassing his son, who in the meantime has learned to read and to tolerate the Widow's attempts to improve him. Finally, outraged when the Widow Douglas warns him to stay away from her house, Pap kidnaps Huck and holds him in a cabin across the river from St. Petersburg.

Whenever Pap goes out, he locks Huck in the cabin, and when he returns home drunk, he beats the boy. Tired of his confinement and fearing the beatings will worsen, Huck escapes from Pap by faking his own death, killing a pig and spreading its blood all over the cabin. Hiding on Jackson's Island in the middle of the Mississippi River, Huck watches the townspeople search the river for his body. After a few days on the island, he encounters Jim, one of Miss Watson's slaves. Jim has run away from Miss Watson after hearing her talk about selling him to a plantation down the river, where he would be treated horribly and separated from his wife and children. Huck and Jim team up, despite Huck's uncertainty about the legality or morality of helping a runaway slave. While they camp out on the island, a great storm causes the Mississippi to flood. Huck and Jim spy a log raft and a house floating past the island. They capture the raft and loot the house, finding in it the body of a man who has been shot. Jim refuses to let Huck see the dead man's face.

Although the island is blissful, Huck and Jim are forced to leave after Huck learns from a woman onshore that her husband has seen smoke coming from the island and believes that Jim is hiding out there. Huck also learns that a reward has been offered for Jim's capture. Huck and Jim start downriver on the raft, intending to leave it at the mouth of the Ohio River and proceed up that river by steamboat to the free states, where slavery is prohibited. Several days' travel takes them past St. Louis, and they have a close encounter with a gang of robbers on a wrecked steamboat. They manage to escape with the robbers' loot.

During a night of thick fog, Huck and Jim miss the mouth of the Ohio and encounter a group of men looking for escaped slaves. Huck has a brief moral crisis about concealing stolen “property”—Jim, after all, belongs to Miss Watson—but then lies to the men and tells them that his father is on the raft suffering from smallpox. Terrified of the disease, the men give Huck money and hurry away. Unable to backtrack to the mouth of the Ohio, Huck and Jim continue downriver. The next night, a steamboat slams into their raft, and Huck and Jim are separated.

Huck ends up in the home of the kindly Grangerfords, a family of Southern aristocrats locked in a bitter and silly feud with a neighboring clan, the Shepherdsons. The elopement of a Grangerford daughter with a Shepherdson son leads to a gun battle in which many in the families are killed. While Huck is caught up in the feud, Jim shows up with the repaired raft. Huck hurries to Jim's hiding place, and they take off down the river.

A few days later, Huck and Jim rescue a pair of men who are being pursued by armed bandits. The men, clearly con artists, claim to be a displaced English duke (the duke) and the long-lost heir to the French throne (the dauphin). Powerless to tell two white adults to leave, Huck and Jim continue down the river with the pair of “aristocrats.” The duke and the dauphin pull several scams in the small towns along the river. Coming into one town, they hear the story of a man, Peter Wilks, who has recently died and left much of his inheritance to his two brothers, who should be arriving from England any day. The duke and the dauphin enter the town pretending to be Wilks's brothers. Wilks's three nieces welcome the con men and quickly set about liquidating the estate. A few townspeople become skeptical, and Huck, who grows to admire the Wilks sisters, decides to thwart the scam. He steals the dead Peter Wilks's gold from the duke and the dauphin but is forced to stash it in Wilks's coffin. Huck then reveals all to the eldest Wilks sister, Mary Jane. Huck's plan for exposing the duke and the dauphin is about to unfold when Wilks's real brothers arrive from England. The angry townspeople hold both sets of Wilks claimants, and the duke and the dauphin just barely escape in the ensuing confusion. Fortunately for the sisters, the gold is found. Unfortunately for Huck and Jim, the duke and the dauphin make it back to the raft just as Huck and Jim are pushing off.

After a few more small scams, the duke and dauphin commit their worst crime yet: they sell Jim to a local farmer, telling him Jim is a runaway for whom a large reward is being offered. Huck finds out where Jim is being held and resolves to free him. At the house where Jim is a prisoner, a woman greets Huck excitedly and calls him “Tom.” As Huck quickly discovers, the people holding Jim are none other than Tom Sawyer's aunt and uncle, Silas and Sally Phelps. The Phelpses mistake Huck for Tom, who is due to arrive for a visit, and Huck goes along with their mistake. He intercepts Tom between the Phelps house and the steamboat dock, and Tom pretends to be his own younger brother, Sid.

Tom hatches a wild plan to free Jim, adding all sorts of unnecessary obstacles even though Jim is only lightly secured. Huck is sure Tom's plan will get them all killed, but he complies nonetheless. After a seeming eternity of pointless preparation, during which the boys ransack the Phelps's house and make Aunt Sally miserable, they put the plan into action. Jim is freed, but a pursuer shoots Tom in the leg. Huck is forced to get a doctor, and Jim sacrifices his freedom to nurse Tom. All are returned to the Phelps's house, where Jim ends up back in chains.

When Tom wakes the next morning, he reveals that Jim has actually been a free man all along, as Miss Watson, who made a provision in her will to free Jim, died two months earlier. Tom had planned the entire escape idea all as a game and had intended to pay Jim for his troubles. Tom's Aunt Polly then shows up, identifying “Tom” and “Sid” as Huck and Tom. Jim tells Huck, who fears for his future—particularly that his father might reappear—that the body they found on the floating house off Jackson's Island had been Pap's. Aunt Sally then steps in and offers to adopt Huck, but Huck, who has had enough “sivilizing,” announces his plan to set out for the West.

Huckleberry Finn - The protagonist and narrator of the novel. Huck is the thirteen-year-old son of the local drunk of St. Petersburg, Missouri, a town on the Mississippi River. Frequently forced to survive on his own wits and always a bit of an outcast, Huck is thoughtful, intelligent (though formally uneducated), and willing to come to his own conclusions about important matters, even if these conclusions contradict society's norms. Nevertheless, Huck is still a boy, and is influenced by others, particularly by his imaginative friend, Tom.
Huck Finn (In-Depth Analysis)


Tom Sawyer - Huck's friend, and the protagonist of Tom Sawyer, the novel to which Huckleberry Finn is ostensibly the sequel. In Huckleberry Finn, Tom serves as a foil to Huck: imaginative, dominating, and given to wild plans taken from the plots of adventure novels, Tom is everything that Huck is not. Tom's stubborn reliance on the “authorities” of romance novels leads him to acts of incredible stupidity and startling cruelty. His rigid adherence to society's conventions aligns Tom with the “sivilizing” forces that Huck learns to see through and gradually abandons.
Tom Sawyer (In-Depth Analysis)


Widow Douglas and Miss Watson - Two wealthy sisters who live together in a large house in St. Petersburg and who adopt Huck. The gaunt and severe Miss Watson is the most prominent representative of the hypocritical religious and ethical values Twain criticizes in the novel. The Widow Douglas is somewhat gentler in her beliefs and has more patience with the mischievous Huck. When Huck acts in a manner contrary to societal expectations, it is the Widow Douglas whom he fears disappointing.

Jim - One of Miss Watson's household slaves. Jim is superstitious and occasionally sentimental, but he is also intelligent, practical, and ultimately more of an adult than anyone else in the novel. Jim's frequent acts of selflessness, his longing for his family, and his friendship with both Huck and Tom demonstrate to Huck that humanity has nothing to do with race. Because Jim is a black man and a runaway slave, he is at the mercy of almost all the other characters in the novel and is often forced into ridiculous and degrading situations.
Jim (In-Depth Analysis)


Pap - Huck's father, the town drunk and ne'er-do-well. Pap is a wreck when he appears at the beginning of the novel, with disgusting, ghostlike white skin and tattered clothes. The illiterate Pap disapproves of Huck's education and beats him frequently. Pap represents both the general debasement of white society and the failure of family structures in the novel.

The duke and the dauphin - A pair of con men whom Huck and Jim rescue as they are being run out of a river town. The older man, who appears to be about seventy, claims to be the “dauphin,” the son of King Louis XVI and heir to the French throne. The younger man, who is about thirty, claims to be the usurped Duke of Bridgewater. Although Huck quickly realizes the men are frauds, he and Jim remain at their mercy, as Huck is only a child and Jim is a runaway slave. The duke and the dauphin carry out a number of increasingly disturbing swindles as they travel down the river on the raft.

Judge Thatcher - The local judge who shares responsibility for Huck with the Widow Douglas and is in charge of safeguarding the money that Huck and Tom found at the end of Tom Sawyer. When Huck discovers that Pap has returned to town, he wisely signs his fortune over to the Judge, who doesn't really accept the money, but tries to comfort Huck. Judge Thatcher has a daughter, Becky, who was Tom's girlfriend in Tom Sawyer and whom Huck calls “Bessie” in this novel.

The Grangerfords - A family that takes Huck in after a steamboat hits his raft, separating him from Jim. The kindhearted Grangerfords, who offer Huck a place to stay in their tacky country home, are locked in a long-standing feud with another local family, the Shepherdsons. Twain uses the two families to engage in some rollicking humor and to mock a overly romanticizes ideas about family honor. Ultimately, the families' sensationalized feud gets many of them killed.

The Wilks family - At one point during their travels, the duke and the dauphin encounter a man who tells them of the death of a local named Peter Wilks, who has left behind a rich estate. The man inadvertently gives the con men enough information to allow them to pretend to be Wilks's two brothers from England, who are the recipients of much of the inheritance. The duke and the dauphin's subsequent conning of the good-hearted and vulnerable Wilks sisters is the first step in the con men's increasingly cruel series of scams, which culminate in the sale of Jim.

Silas and Sally Phelps - Tom Sawyer's aunt and uncle, whom Huck coincidentally encounters in his search for Jim after the con men have sold him. Sally is the sister of Tom's aunt, Polly. Essentially good people, the Phelpses nevertheless hold Jim in custody and try to return him to his rightful owner. Silas and Sally are the unknowing victims of many of Tom and Huck's “preparations” as they try to free Jim. The Phelpses are the only intact and functional family in this novel, yet they are too much for Huck, who longs to escape their “sivilizing” influence.

Aunt Polly - Tom Sawyer's aunt and guardian and Sally Phelps's sister. Aunt Polly appears at the end of the novel and properly identifies Huck, who has pretended to be Tom, and Tom, who has pretended to be his own younger brother, Sid.

Analysis of Major Characters

Huck Finn

From the beginning of the novel, Twain makes it clear that Huck is a boy who comes from the lowest levels of white society. His father is a drunk and a ruffian who disappears for months on end. Huck himself is dirty and frequently homeless. Although the Widow Douglas attempts to “reform” Huck, he resists her attempts and maintains his independent ways. The community has failed to protect him from his father, and though the Widow finally gives Huck some of the schooling and religious training that he had missed, he has not been indoctrinated with social values in the same way a middle-class boy like Tom Sawyer has been. Huck's distance from mainstream society makes him skeptical of the world around him and the ideas it passes on to him.

Huck's instinctual distrust and his experiences as he travels down the river force him to question the things society has taught him. According to the law, Jim is Miss Watson's property, but according to Huck's sense of logic and fairness, it seems “right” to help Jim. Huck's natural intelligence and his willingness to think through a situation on its own merits lead him to some conclusions that are correct in their context but that would shock white society. For example, Huck discovers, when he and Jim meet a group of slave-hunters, that telling a lie is sometimes the right course of action.Because Huck is a child, the world seems new to him. Everything he encounters is an occasion for thought. Because of his background, however, he does more than just apply the rules that he has been taught—he creates his own rules. Yet Huck is not some kind of independent moral genius. He must still struggle with some of the preconceptions about blacks that society has ingrained in him, and at the end of the novel, he shows himself all too willing to follow Tom Sawyer's lead. But even these failures are part of what makes Huck appealing and sympathetic. He is only a boy, after all, and therefore fallible. Imperfect as he is, Huck represents what anyone is capable of becoming: a thinking, feeling human being rather than a mere cog in the machine of society.

Jim

Jim, Huck's companion as he travels down the river, is a man of remarkable intelligence and compassion. At first glance, Jim seems to be superstitious to the point of idiocy, but a careful reading of the time that Huck and Jim spend on Jackson's Island reveals that Jim's superstitions conceal a deep knowledge of the natural world and represent an alternate form of “truth” or intelligence. Moreover, Jim has one of the few healthy, functioning families in the novel. Although he has been separated from his wife and children, he misses them terribly, and it is only the thought of a permanent separation from them that motivates his criminal act of running away from Miss Watson. On the river, Jim becomes a surrogate father, as well as a friend, to Huck, taking care of him without being intrusive or smothering. He cooks for the boy and shelters him from some of the worst horrors that they encounter, including the sight of Pap's corpse, and, for a time, the news of his father's passing.

Some readers have criticized Jim as being too passive, but it is important to remember that he remains at the mercy of every other character in this novel, including even the poor, thirteen-year-old Huck, as the letter that Huck nearly sends to Miss Watson demonstrates. Like Huck, Jim is realistic about his situation and must find ways of accomplishing his goals without incurring the wrath of those who could turn him in. In this position, he is seldom able to act boldly or speak his mind. Nonetheless, despite these restrictions and constant fear, Jim consistently acts as a noble human being and a loyal friend. In fact, Jim could be described as the only real adult in the novel, and the only one who provides a positive, respectable example for Huck to follow.


Tom Sawyer

Tom is the same age as Huck and his best friend. Whereas Huck's birth and upbringing have left him in poverty and on the margins of society, Tom has been raised in relative comfort. As a result, his beliefs are an unfortunate combination of what he has learned from the adults around him and the fanciful notions he has gleaned from reading romance and adventure novels. Tom believes in sticking strictly to “rules,” most of which have more to do with style than with morality or anyone's welfare. Tom is thus the perfect foil for Huck: his rigid adherence to rules and precepts contrasts with Huck's tendency to question authority and think for himself.

Although Tom's escapades are often funny, they also show just how disturbingly and unthinkingly cruel society can be. Tom knows all along that Miss Watson has died and that Jim is now a free man, yet he is willing to allow Jim to remain a captive while he entertains himself with fantastic escape plans. Tom's plotting tortures not only Jim, but Aunt Sally and Uncle Silas as well. In the end, although he is just a boy like Huck and is appealing in his zest for adventure and his unconscious wittiness, Tom embodies what a young, well-to-do white man is raised to become in the society of his time: self-centered with dominion over all.

Themes, Motifs & Symbols

Themes

Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work.
Racism and Slavery

Although Twain wrote Huckleberry Finn two decades after the Emancipation Proclamation and the end of the Civil War, America—and especially the South—was still struggling with racism and the aftereffects of slavery. By the early 1880s, Reconstruction, the plan to put the United States back together after the war and integrate freed slaves into society, had hit shaky ground, although it had not yet failed outright. As Twain worked on his novel, race relations, which seemed to be on a positive path in the years following the Civil War, once again became strained. The imposition of Jim Crow laws, designed to limit the power of blacks in the South in a variety of indirect ways, brought the beginning of a new, insidious effort to oppress. The new racism of the South, less institutionalized and monolithic, was also more difficult to combat. Slavery could be outlawed, but when white Southerners enacted racist laws or policies under a professed motive of self-defense against newly freed blacks, far fewer people, Northern or Southern, saw the act as immoral and rushed to combat it.

Although Twain wrote the novel after slavery was abolished, he set it several decades earlier, when slavery was still a fact of life. But even by Twain's time, things had not necessarily gotten much better for blacks in the South. In this light, we might read Twain's depiction of slavery as an allegorical representation of the condition of blacks in the United States even after the abolition of slavery. Just as slavery places the noble and moral Jim under the control of white society, no matter how degraded that white society may be, so too did the insidious racism that arose near the end of Reconstruction oppress black men for illogical and hypocritical reasons. In Huckleberry Finn, Twain, by exposing the hypocrisy of slavery, demonstrates how racism distorts the oppressors as much as it does those who are oppressed. The result is a world of moral confusion, in which seemingly “good” white people such as Miss Watson and Sally Phelps express no concern about the injustice of slavery or the cruelty of separating Jim from his family.

Intellectual and Moral Education

By focusing on Huck's education, Huckleberry Finn fits into the tradition of the bildungsroman: a novel depicting an individual's maturation and development. As a poor, uneducated boy, for all intents and purposes an orphan, Huck distrusts the morals and precepts of the society that treats him as an outcast and fails to protect him from abuse. This apprehension about society, and his growing relationship with Jim, lead Huck to question many of the teachings that he has received, especially regarding race and slavery. More than once, we see Huck choose to “go to hell” rather than go along with the rules and follow what he has been taught. Huck bases these decisions on his experiences, his own sense of logic, and what his developing conscience tells him. On the raft, away from civilization, Huck is especially free from society's rules, able to make his own decisions without restriction. Through deep introspection, he comes to his own conclusions, unaffected by the accepted—and often hypocritical—rules and values of Southern culture. By the novel's end, Huck has learned to “read” the world around him, to distinguish good, bad, right, wrong, menace, friend, and so on. His moral development is sharply contrasted to the character of Tom Sawyer, who is influenced by a bizarre mix of adventure novels and Sunday-school teachings, which he combines to justify his outrageous and potentially harmful escapades.

The Hypocrisy of “Civilized” Society

When Huck plans to head west at the end of the novel in order to escape further “sivilizing,” he is trying to avoid more than regular baths and mandatory school attendance. Throughout the novel, Twain depicts the society that surrounds Huck as little more than a collection of degraded rules and precepts that defy logic. This faulty logic appears early in the novel, when the new judge in town allows Pap to keep custody of Huck. The judge privileges Pap's “rights” to his son as his natural father over Huck's welfare. At the same time, this decision comments on a system that puts a white man's rights to his “property”—his slaves—over the welfare and freedom of a black man. In implicitly comparing the plight of slaves to the plight of Huck at the hands of Pap, Twain implies that it is impossible for a society that owns slaves to be just, no matter how “civilized” that society believes and proclaims itself to be. Again and again, Huck encounters individuals who seem good—Sally Phelps, for example—but who Twain takes care to show are prejudiced slave-owners. This shaky sense of justice that Huck repeatedly encounters lies at the heart of society's problems: terrible acts go unpunished, yet frivolous crimes, such as drunkenly shouting insults, lead to executions. Sherburn's speech to the mob that has come to lynch him accurately summarizes the view of society Twain gives in Huckleberry Finn: rather than maintain collective welfare, society instead is marked by cowardice, a lack of logic, and profound selfishness.

Motifs

Motifs are recurring structures, contrasts, or literary devices that can help to develop and inform the text's major themes.
Childhood

Huck's youth is an important factor in his moral education over the course of the novel, for we sense that only a child is open-minded enough to undergo the kind of development that Huck does. Since Huck and Tom are young, their age lends a sense of play to their actions, which excuses them in certain ways and also deepens the novel's commentary on slavery and society. Ironically, Huck often knows better than the adults around him, even though he has lacked the guidance that a proper family and community should have offered him. Twain also frequently draws links between Huck's youth and Jim's status as a black man: both are vulnerable, yet Huck, because he is white, has power over Jim. And on a different level, the silliness, pure joy, and naïveté of childhood give Huckleberry Finn a sense of fun and humor. Though its themes are quite weighty, the novel itself feels light in tone and is an enjoyable read because of this rambunctious childhood excitement that enlivens the story.

Lies and Cons

Huckleberry Finn is full of malicious lies and scams, many of them coming from the duke and the dauphin. It is clear that these con men's lies are bad, for they hurt a number of innocent people. Yet Huck himself tells a number of lies and even cons a few people, most notably the slave-hunters, to whom he makes up a story about a smallpox outbreak in order to protect Jim. As Huck realizes, it seems that telling a lie can actually be a good thing, depending on its purpose. This insight is part of Huck's learning process, as he finds that some of the rules he has been taught contradict what seems to be “right.” At other points, the lines between a con, legitimate entertainment, and approved social structures like religion are fine indeed. In this light, lies and cons provide an effective way for Twain to highlight the moral ambiguity that runs through the novel.

Superstitions and Folk Beliefs

From the time Huck meets him on Jackson's Island until the end of the novel, Jim spouts a wide range of superstitions and folktales. Whereas Jim initially appears foolish to believe so unwaveringly in these kinds of signs and omens, it turns out, curiously, that many of his beliefs do indeed have some basis in reality or presage events to come. Much as we do, Huck at first dismisses most of Jim's superstitions as silly, but ultimately he comes to appreciate Jim's deep knowledge of the world. In this sense, Jim's superstition serves as an alternative to accepted social teachings and assumptions and provides a reminder that mainstream conventions are not always right.

Parodies of Popular Romance Novels

Huckleberry Finn is full of people who base their lives on romantic literary models and stereotypes of various kinds. Tom Sawyer, the most obvious example, bases his life and actions on adventure novels. The deceased Emmeline Grangerford painted weepy maidens and wrote poems about dead children in the romantic style. The Shepherdson and Grangerford families kill one another out of a bizarre, overexcited conception of family honor. These characters' proclivities toward the romantic allow Twain a few opportunities to indulge in some fun, and indeed, the episodes that deal with this subject are among the funniest in the novel. However, there is a more substantive message beneath: that popular literature is highly stylized and therefore rarely reflects the reality of a society. Twain shows how a strict adherence to these romantic ideals is ultimately dangerous: Tom is shot, Emmeline dies, and the Shepherdsons and Grangerfords end up in a deadly clash.

Symbols

Symbols are objects, characters, figures, or colors used to represent abstract ideas or concepts.

The Mississippi River

For Huck and Jim, the Mississippi River is the ultimate symbol of freedom. Alone on their raft, they do not have to answer to anyone. The river carries them toward freedom: for Jim, toward the free states; for Huck, away from his abusive father and the restrictive “sivilizing” of St. Petersburg. Much like the river itself, Huck and Jim are in flux, willing to change their attitudes about each other with little prompting. Despite their freedom, however, they soon find that they are not completely free from the evils and influences of the towns on the river's banks. Even early on, the real world intrudes on the paradise of the raft: the river floods, bringing Huck and Jim into contact with criminals, wrecks, and stolen goods. Then, a thick fog causes them to miss the mouth of the Ohio River, which was to be their route to freedom.

As the novel progresses, then, the river becomes something other than the inherently benevolent place Huck originally thought it was. As Huck and Jim move further south, the duke and the dauphin invade the raft, and Huck and Jim must spend more time ashore. Though the river continues to offer a refuge from trouble, it often merely effects the exchange of one bad situation for another. Each escape exists in the larger context of a continual drift southward, toward the Deep South and entrenched slavery. In this transition from idyllic retreat to source of peril, the river mirrors the complicated state of the South. As Huck and Jim's journey progresses, the river, which once seemed a paradise and a source of freedom, becomes merely a short-term means of escape that nonetheless pushes Huck and Jim ever further toward danger and destruction.
Notice and Explanatory

Summary

The novel begins with a Notice from someone named G. G., who is identified as the Chief of Ordnance. The Notice demands that no one try to find a motive, moral, or plot in the novel, on pain of various and sundry punishments. The Notice is followed by an Explanatory note from the Author, which states that the attention to dialects in the book has been painstaking and is extremely true-to-life in mimicking the peculiar verbal tendencies of individuals along the Mississippi. It assures the reader that if he or she feels that the characters in the book are “trying to talk alike but failing,” then the reader is mistaken.

Analysis

The Notice and Explanatory set the tone for The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn through their mixing of humor and seriousness. In its declaration that anyone looking for motive, plot, or moral will be prosecuted, banished, or shot, the Notice establishes a sense of blustery comedy that pervades the rest of the novel. The Explanatory takes on a slightly different tone, still full of a general good-naturedness but also brimming with authority. In the final paragraph, Twain essentially dares the reader to believe that he might know or understand more about the dialects of the South, and, by extension, the South itself. Twain's good nature stems in part from his sense of assurance that, should anyone dare to challenge him, Twain would certainly prove victorious.

Beyond tone, the Notice and Explanatory set the stage for the themes that the novel explores later. Twain's coy statement about the lack of seriousness in Huckleberry Finn actually alerts us that such seriousness does in fact exist in the text. At the same time, Twain's refusal to make any straightforward claims for the seriousness of his work add a note of irony and charm. The Explanatory note from the Author concerns the use of dialect, which Twain says has been reconstructed “painstakingly.” Again, if Huckleberry Finn is not meant to be a “serious” novel, the claim seems strange. But it is a serious novel, and Twain's note on dialogue speaks for the authority and experience of the author and establishes the novel's antiromantic, realistic stance. In short, the Notice and Explanatory, which at first glance appear to be disposable jokes, link the novel's sense of fun and lightheartedness with its deeper moral concerns. This coupling continues throughout Huckleberry Finn and remains one of its greatest triumphs.


Source: http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/huckfinn/section2.rhtml