female characters in sense ad sensibility

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SUBJECT: ROMANTIC LITERATURE

TOPIC: FEMALE CARACTERS IN SENSE AND SENSIBILITY

NAME: AMI G. SOJITRA

ROLL NO: 30

COLLEGE: DEPARTMET OF ENGLISH, MAHARAJA KRISHNAKUMARSINHJI   BHAVANAGAR UNIVERSITY

SEMESTER: 2

EMAIL: amisojitra23@gmail.com

INTRODUCTION:

In 1798 with the publication of "Lyrical Ballad" by William Wordsworth and S.T. Coleridge the era of romanticism was started. Here the word romanticism doesn't mean only romance or love but it has given the way to literature. Life of common man also can be the theme of the poetry. There is also development of novel form. Some of the writers like Jane Austin, john Keats, William Black, William Wordsworth, S.T. Coleridge etc. They have described various themes. Jane Austin has written very famous book "sense and sensibility". When we look at the female character of the novel we find that most of them represent various types of personality.

SENSE AND SENSIBILITY:

Sense and Sensibility is a novel by Jane Austin, and was her first published work when it appeared in 1811 under the pseudonym "A Lady". A work of romantic fiction, better known as a comedy of manners, Sense and Sensibility is set in southwest England, London and Kent between 1792 and 1797,and portrays the life and loves of the Dashwood sisters, Elinor and Marriane. The novel follows the young ladies to their new home, a meagre cottage on a distant relative's property, where they experience love, romance and heartbreak.

 

           Female characters in Sense and Sensibility:

                  Sense and sensibility is novel published in 1811 written by Jane Austin. It reflect the romantic society because whatever described by Wordsworth is not reality. This type of novel describes the life style of people of romantic era. We can read the condition of women in romantic time. In this novel we also find them. Some of the important of main characters are as below:

·        Elinor

·        Marrianne

·        Margrate

·        Fenny

·        Lucy

·        Sophia

            They all are symbol of romantic society and how the people live their life. The novel has many characters and many characters that played various types of roles. When we discuss only female characters we find that most of the time we are taking side of female but we also see that what the condition of women is in romantic era. The theme of marriage is also appeared here which shows the attitude of female characters. Now let’s discuss about them in detail.

ELINOR DASHWOOD:

              Elinor Dashwood is elder sister of Marianna and Margareta. She is beautiful and by nature very simple. We can compare her character with character of Dorothea Brooke (Middlemarch). She is also just like common girl not having any super power or something like heroic figure. She has a great deal of common sense. She prefer to keep her troubles secret, as she is always trying to make sure that her mother and sisters are untroubled by her private woes. Elinor personifies the sense in title of the book. Firstly she falls in love with Edward who is the brother of Ferry. She believes that:

"All you need is love in marriage"

Elinor loves Edward but they both never spoke to each other about their feelings. we can say that there is silent bondage between both of them.

MARIANNE:

                         Marianne is a character in her own right: "She was sensible and clever, but eager in everything; her sorrows, her joys, could have no moderation."

Marianne is amazed that Elinor could love the colorless Edward. "He is not the kind of young man — there is something wanting," she tells her mother. She looks on Colonel Brandon as an old man, past romance, although he is only thirty-five, and falls headlong in love with the shallow Willoughby: "His person and air were equal to what her fancy had ever drawn for the hero of a favorite story." Always too impulsive, Marianne goes with Willoughby to look over Mrs. Smith's house, accepts his offer of a horse, and pokes fun at Colonel Brandon to please him. Intolerant of the feelings of others, Marianne is displeased by Sir John's jests and finds Mrs. Jennings vulgar and gossipy.

                        She treats the old lady impolitely during their trip to London but is eager to avail herself of Mrs. Jennings' hospitality. She is outspoken and honest, and cannot tell even a polite lie: "It was impossible for her to say what she did not feel, however trivial the occasion."

             When Willoughby deserts her, Marianne loses all self-control and eventually becomes ill. When she recovers, she realizes that she has brought her troubles on herself, and she admits to Elinor that Willoughby never actually proposed marriage to her. She realizes her faults and how often she has hurt others: "Everybody seemed injured by me. The kindness, the unceasing kindness of Mrs. Jennings, I had repaid with ungrateful contempt. To the Middletons, the Palmers, the Steeles, to every common acquaintance even, I had been insolent and unjust.

MARGARET DASWOOD:

       The thirteen-year-old, good-humoured youngest daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Dashwood, Margaret shares her sister Marianne's romantic tendencies. Poor Margaret really gets the short shrift here – her two older sisters always steal all of her thunder. All we need to know about Margaret is that she's just as romantic and silly as her mother and Marianne, and will no doubt continue to be so as she grows up. She loves intervening in the matters of grownups (like when she reveals the initial of Elinor's suitor to Mrs. Jennings and Sir John), and she can't wait to be one herself. The end of the book, in which Margaret reaches her teenage, flirtatious years, hints that there are many more romantic  for the remaining Dashwood still in store.

FENNY DASHWOOD:

          The selfish, snobbish, and manipulative wife of John Dashwood and the sister of Edward and Robert Ferrars. A most unpleasant woman, Fanny represents the spoiled and selfish woman of wealth of Austen's time. She is egoistic and believes that what is good for her or her child is the best thing for everyone. Deter-mined to get all she can for her son, she cleverly persuades her husband to break his promise and give up any idea of providing for his stepmother and half-sisters. Neither courteous nor kindly, she does not wish to entertain Elinor and Marianne in London and is resentful when they are invited by her friends. When her husband suggests that they should invite the girls to stay with them, she persuades him to invite the Misses Steele instead — and believes that she is acting "out of the benevolence of her heart." Ironically, she discovers during their stay that Lucy is engaged to Edward. This brings on an absurd fit of hysterics.

     In London, she is naturally attracted to Lady Middleton, for there is "a kind of cold-heartedness on both sides," and they sympathize with each other "in an insipid propriety of demeanour, and a general want of understanding."

LUCY STEEL:

           Exceptionally pretty, Lucy ensnares Edward's affection while he is her uncle's pupil. She herself has little education and no money and is glad of this opportunity to come up in the world. When Sir John invites Lucy and her sister Anne to Barton Park, the sisters are shrewd enough to bring presents for the children and to flatter their mother into thinking they dote on them.

              Lucy is determined to become intimate with the Misses Dashwood, whom she praises as "the most beautiful, elegant and accomplished and agreeable girls." Clever and cunning, Lucy confides her secret to Elinor and watches for her reactions. Knowing that Elinor doubts her story, she shrewdly shows her a letter and picture from Edward. She acts her part well, but Elinor is not deceived, rightly seeing Lucy as "illiterate, artful and selfish."

                When Fanny Dashwood and Mrs. Ferrars are pleasant to her, Lucy is delighted. But her sister tells Fanny about Lucy's secret engagement, and Fanny orders her from the house.

                Not averse to lying, she declines Edward's offer to release her from her engagement but tells Elinor that it was she who offered to set Edward free. Then she subtly flatters Robert and beguiles him into eloping with her. She insinuates herself into the favor of old Mrs. Ferrars by flattery and false penitence, and actually becomes the old lady's favorite daughter-in-law.

SOPHIA GRAY:

  She is the wealthy heiress whom Willoughby marries after abandoning Marianne. She was very wealthy women to whom willghby meet in party and than just because of her wealth willghby will marry her. The reason for her marriage is not love but it is just for her wealth.

CONCLUSION:

      All the character of the novel represent various symbol of the  romatic society.  Elinor and Marriane are sisters who both are symbol of sense and sensibility and we can also see the feminine perspective from the cover page of the novel. This the novel has described all the female with some special characteristics.

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