#Anne Elliot

[bethanydelleman]

If the Austen heroines lived today (and had to work outside of the home), what jobs do you think they would have?

If we look at the heroine's relative incomes, it's likely that Catherine Morland, Fanny Price, and the Dashwoods would require professions, as clergyman and naval marine don't pay that well today and the Dashwoods lost their inheritance. Elizabeth Bennet, Emma Woodhouse, and Anne Elliot are all trust fund babies, though Elizabeth and Anne would likely get jobs since their families are blowing all their money and they're not idiots. Emma is the only one who genuinely would not need to work, even in a modern context. I am not going to assign her a profession, I suspect if she existed in a similar context today she would manage her father's affairs, run the family company, and a charity, much like she does in the novel.

Catherine Morland - in university, is in a very general program and has no idea what to do with her life. Ends up in some sort of childcare career because she knows she's good at it but still scrolls through job pages imagining what else she could do. Writes very bad novels on the side.

Elinor Dashwood - public school art teacher, secure career path with a solid pay cheque, never even considered becoming an artist

Marianne Dashwood - concert pianist/piano instructor reluctantly, because piano playing doesn't pay well, failed lyricist. Has a very popular YouTube channel

Elizabeth Bennet - I see lawyer SO OFTEN in fan fiction, but I disagree. This observer of human nature is getting sucked into psychology and becoming a researcher. She'll realize how bad of a judge of character she can be pre-Darcy because now she has evidence. May become a therapist as well.

Anne Elliot - Anne is so intelligent, she can be whatever she wants. She's so good with kids too, maybe a pediatrician? She threw herself into education after the Wentworth thing.

Fanny Price - the Bertrams paid for her university education and she chose the most guaranteed source of income: accounting. Companies will always need accountants and she can help support her family.

Jane Bennet - I can see her also choosing a very practical career but then dropping out of the workforce to be a stay-at-home mom. Charles has enough money to make that work.

[wylansvanhendriks]

jane austen was right!!!!! i AM half agony half hope!!!!! if i loved you less i COULD talk about it more!!!!!!!! i WAS in the middle before i knew i had begun!!!!!!!

[queen-paladin]

I love you "boring" female characters. I love you ingenues. I love you female characters who aren't "modern" enough. I love you female characters who aren't "badass" enough. iI love you female characters who aren't "empowering" enough. I love you quiet female characters. I love you unappreciated female characters. I love you polite female characters. I love you female characters who "can't appeal to modern audiences." I love you frightened female characters. I love you female characters labeled as not complex just for being nice. I love you female characters who get criticism just for not being their tomboy or femme fatale counterpart. I love you silk hiding steel trope.

[violaobanion]

PERSUASION 2022 | dir. Carrie Cracknell

[firawren]

Persuasion 1995 text posts

More: Pride and Prejudice 1995 text posts | Sense and Sensibility 1995 text posts | Northanger Abbey 2007 text posts | Emma. 2020 text posts

[alasforher]

I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it

[incognita-soul]

I've spent all afternoon thinking about the line from Wentworth's letter "you sink your voice, but I can distinguish the tones of that voice when they would be lost on others" and about how that really is the most important part of the letter. Yes "you pierce my soul" and "I have loved none but you" and "I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago" are all more swoon-worthy. But the whole point of Persuasion is how Anne suffers because none of her friends or family acknowledge her needs or anything she says. She is made small by everyone around her. She is persuadable because she has been stripped of her agency; not by the circumstances of her life, but because the people in her life have talked over and down to her so much that she has stopped resisting. She knows that she won't be heard, so she just stops speaking. But then Wentworth hears her voice! He hears her, sees her, and he loves her for who she is, not what he wants her to be. I think Jane Austen knew exactly what she was doing by including that line. It's so subtle in such a purposeful way.

Thanks for coming to my ted talk

[cottagecore-raccoon]

The more I think about it, the more I think that Persuasion has my favorite premise of all of Jane Austen's novels

Anne Elliot as a character speaks to my soul. She feels tremendous guilt for a decision she made eight years ago. Her life is lonely, as she doesn't really have anyone she can truly confide in despite being surrounded by people. So she swallows her pain, the yearning she feels deep in her soul, and vows that if nothing else at least she'll be helpful.

And of course she is reunited with Frederick Wentworth (the one that got away) who seems to hate her now, and she just keeps going. She keeps being kind and supporting her loved ones while slowly carving out a life for herself. There's something about her classic heroism that just feels so attainable. I don't have Elizabeth Bennett's wit, or Jane Bennett's unwavering belief in the goodness of everyone, or even Elinor's constant composure. But I can be like Anne and just keep moving forward attempting to be helpful

Of course it all works out in the end, and Anne is finally surrounded by people who truly appreciate her, even if she had to wait an extra eight years. Others have observed the fairy tale quality of the ending, and perhaps that's why it speaks to me. The idea that if you just keep doing your best and being kind, you'll eventually find happiness

[mellpenscorner]

A Ranking of Jane Austen Heroines, in Ascending Order of Culpability

Fanny (Mansfield Park): Has done nothing wrong ever in her life (but would never say this as she is far too humble).

Elinor (S&S): Must have scoliosis from carrying the whole weight of the Dashwood family at the ripe old age of 19. Should probably have asked for help by now, but who's she going to ask? Her mother? Unlikely.

Anne (Persuasion): Pros: is the only functioning member of her family. Cons: took some really bad advice when she was 17.

Elizabeth (P&P): So dead-set on hating Mr. Darcy that she falls hook-line-and-sinker for the lies Wickham tells her with no questions asked. Otherwise has good sense.

Marianne (S&S): Throws herself headlong into the Romantic Experience™️ and gets her heart broken by a playboy when Colonel Brandon is literally RIGHT THERE. 

Catherine (Northanger Abbey): Good-hearted, but easily led astray. So obsessed with Gothic novels that she kind of accuses Mr. Tilney's father of murdering his wife and burying her in the basement.

Emma (Emma): Tells Harriet to refuse the nice guy she likes, too prideful to see that Mr. Elton is pursuing her instead of Harriet, gossips about Jane Fairfax, feels like the rules don't apply to her, won't listen to Mr. Knightly. Is a menace.

[haaam-guuuurl]

[boltlightning]

Anne was tenderness itself, and she had the full worth of it in Captain Wentworth’s affection. His profession was all that could ever make her friends wish that tenderness less, the dread of a future war all that could dim her sunshine. She gloried in being a sailor’s wife, but she must pay the tax of quick alarm for belonging to that profession which is, if possible, more distinguished in its domestic virtues than in its national importance.

[my-little-random-world]

𝑰 𝒉𝒂𝒗𝒆 𝒍𝒐𝒗𝒆𝒅 𝒏𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒃𝒖𝒕 𝒚𝒐𝒖. 𝑼𝒏𝒋𝒖𝒔𝒕 𝑰 𝒎𝒂𝒚 𝒉𝒂𝒗𝒆 𝒃𝒆𝒆𝒏, 𝒘𝒆𝒂𝒌 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒓𝒆𝒔𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒇𝒖𝒍 𝑰 𝒉𝒂𝒗𝒆 𝒃𝒆𝒆𝒏, 𝒃𝒖𝒕 𝒏𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝒊𝒏𝒄𝒐𝒏𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒏𝒕... 𝑨 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒅, 𝒂 𝒍𝒐𝒐𝒌, 𝒘𝒊𝒍𝒍 𝒃𝒆 𝒆𝒏𝒐𝒖𝒈𝒉 𝒕𝒐 𝒅𝒆𝒄𝒊𝒅𝒆 𝒘𝒉𝒆𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓 𝑰 𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒆𝒓 𝒚𝒐𝒖𝒓 𝒇𝒂𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓’𝒔 𝒉𝒐𝒖𝒔𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒏𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒐𝒓 𝒏𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓. | Persuasion 1995

[bethanydelleman]

Ranking Jane Austen heroines/women on how good of a mother they’d be?

As with the men, I think they would all be good mothers, though in different ways.

Elizabeth Bennet: Soccer mom, she wasn't given the opportunity to have a structured education herself, it will be different for her kids. She's hiring the best governess she can find (after Darcy does a full background check), she's encouraging her kids to do extracurriculars, they will speak six languages that she doesn't understand or else! Has a minor panic attack if she says anything that sounds even remotely like something either of her parents would say.

Jane Bennet: Gentle mom, she cannot imagine punishing her children, she just has a killer disappointed face (she is unaware of this). Encourages her children to always try to understand both sides of the story. Will eventually fall for a lie one of her children tells and be devastated when she figures out the truth.

Anne Elliot: Perfect mother, there is indeed no one so proper, so capable as Anne. She has also watched her sister do everything wrong and she knows exactly how to do it right.

Emma Woodhouse: Scatterbrained mom, makes a resolution to teach her daughter fancy work but then gets distracted and the sampler is left half finished. Promised to read with her son but they only make it halfway through the novel. Good thing she hired an excellent "Miss Taylor" to pick up the slack! And despite her occasional screw-ups, her kids love her to pieces. They just better be on guard when they hit 18 and she starts trying to marry them off.

Marianne Dashwood: Crunchy mom, or whatever the Regency period equivalent would be. She wants her kids to feel the dead leaves between their toes, she encourages them to write poetry and play moving ballads. Otherwise, a lot like her own mother (they have very similar personalities)

Elinor Dashwood: I-Say-I-Love-You-With-Food Mom, she may not be exactly emotionally available, but she orders her daughter's favourite meal when she's sad and there are tiny hearts in the stiches of her son's clothes. She makes sure her kids are provided for, educated, and healthy. When she asks if they are hungry, they know she's saying, "I love you."

Fanny Price: Nurturing mom, she will be everything for those children that Edmund and William were to her, but nothing like Sir Thomas, Lady Bertram, Mrs. Norris or her own parents. She has a good deal of experience from nursing her own siblings so it's a pretty smooth beginning.

Catherine Morland: Overconfident mom, Catherine has been there and done that, she has six younger brothers and sisters after all, she's READY! This will be easy! All you have to do is make sure the baby is fed, washed, changed, and napped... oh... it's a lot harder to do this when you have only slept for 2.5 hours last night... (I know she would have servants, but still, being a new mother is tough!)

Bonus: Jane Fairfax tries to keep Frank from spoiling the kids, but it is literally impossible. He keeps buying them huge presents and then she would be the bad guy for saying no. Also, she knows that Frank lost their child in Kensington Gardens (twice), that's why she always insists he take a footman now.

Bonus bonus: Harriet Smith has a special box where she keeps all the 'treasures' her kids collect. It is her most precious possession.

[lily-s-world]

Thanks to @hotjaneaustenmenpoll I decided to watch Persuasion (1995) for the millionth time this weekend, and inspired me to create some propaganda on why you should vote for Captain Wentworth as the Hottest Austen Man:

Anne's face the moment she saw him after eight years screams "Oh, no, he is hot!" and she is right.

He makes one snarky comment towards Anne and immediately shows a regretted puppy face, because he realized he can't hurt her in any way. Gentleman as it finest.

Life of the party charms the pants off anyone. Not literally, except for Anne.

Mister "I don't care about Anne", but will gladly listen to anything other people has to say about her and won't stand seeing her struggle in anyway. Pure gentleman behavior.

Also, will give deadly stares to the men that approach Anne in a romantic manner.

Ciaran Hinds in a Marine Uniform. Even Lady Dalrymple said he looked fine as hell in that uniform.

The letter with that voice, perfection.

The yearning and longing on his eyes is worthy of an Oscar, this man embodies that character perfectly.

I know you love Darcy, I do too, but that is the obvious choice; Wentworth is as good as he is (if not even more).

[alasforher]

Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever.

[firawren]