"To compensate a little for the treachery and weakness of my memory, so extreme that it has happened to me more than once to pick up again, as recent and unknown to me, books which I had read carefully a few years before . . . I have adopted the habit for some time now of adding at the end of each book . . . the time I finished reading it and the judgment I have derived of it as a whole, so that this may represent to me at least the sense and general idea I had conceived of the author in reading it." (Montaigne, Book II, Essay 10 (publ. 1580))

Tuesday, March 30, 2021

Persuasion (Jane Austen, 1817)

(236 pages)

Austen's last completed novel; I see that it was published posthumously by her brother.

So she's a later-in-life writer.  The two main characters are a bit later-in-life also.  Anne Elliott was persuaded at a young age to not marry a Captain Wentworth - who had not then proven himself at sea. It turns out that being resolutely unpersuadeable isn't always a virtue.

Anne Elliott is part (a peripheral part) of a noble family quite a bit down on its finances.  Interactions with relatives in varying circumstances, including a seaside trip.

Wonderfully written, enjoyable.  I do feel that the characters tend to be rather black and white, but OK.

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