Persuasion 12/6

The conversation between Anne and Captain Harville in the last volume is very interesting. A large part of this semester has been spent talking about gender and the role of women in society. While this is not an educational tract, which we’ve spent the most time on, the discussion is still relevant and I think the most explicit Austen ever is on this subject. The societal limitations on women are acknowledged by Anne when she says “We live at home, quiet, confined, and our feelings prey on us. You are forced on exertion. You have always a profession, pursuits, business of some sort or other, to take you back into the world immediately” (Austen 241). Anne’s and even Elizabeth’s static existence at the beginning of the novel reflect this statement. Anne’s desire to have the ability to go into the world instead of living at home “quiet” and “confined” was shown through her dream of what she would have done if she were Wentworth. Anne’s insistent that books not being used as examples of women’s inconstancy is also interesting. The examples given in books is presented as unfair since “men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story. Education has been theirs in so much a higher degree; the pen has been in their hands” (Austen 243). I find this interesting because while this statement is true, there does seem to be a shift in who holds the pen during this time. This course has shown that many women are writing a large variety of things during the romantic era and even before this era. It seems that women are now the ones that have the ability to tell their own story and shape the conversations about their society and lives. This novel is doing exactly that, Austen is starting a conversation about the role of women in society and women’s nature in her own terms. It’s no longer only men dictating the conversations taking place.