#Margaret Dashwood

[dirbenaffleck]

Sense and Sensibility 1995 ‧ Dir. Ang Lee

[didanagy]

SENSE AND SENSIBILITY (1995)

dir. ang lee

[watchinghallmark]

[bethanydelleman]

What role does Margaret Dashwood play? Would Sense & Sensibility change much if Mrs. Dashwood only had two daughters? I enjoy Margaret's portrayal in the adaptations, but she is hardly present in the book.

Margaret Dashwood has a few important purposes, but she's not vital to the story. Here they are:

She gives Sir John and Mrs. Jennings the hint about Mr. F, Marianne would never do that

She provides the intelligence about Willoughby cutting Marianne's hair, you could have Elinor observe that herself, however Elinor is unlikely to be peeping

She makes it hard for Elinor to claim she needs to stay home from London to be with her mother

Margaret is the one walking with Marianne when they meet Willoughby for the first time. Elinor would have likely stopped to help Marianne herself (not blaming Margaret here, she's probably too small to help much)

Adaptations have certainly made a lot more of her! The story wouldn't change much if you took her out, someone else would need to drop the hint about Mr. F, Elinor could accidentally observe the hair cutting, Mrs. Dashwood could have a friend stay while her daughters were in London, and Elinor could slide down the hill unharmed, leaving Marianne to Willoughby or something like that. Having Margaret around just makes these events smoother.

[underrtheskinn]

Sense and sensibility (1995)

[aria-baerose]

[bad-at-names-and-faces]

Time Capsule

Day 29 of @flufftober with "time capsule" and my Sense and Sensibility modern AU...

Elinor heard some commotion in the yard and walked out to find Marianne and Margaret.

“What are you doing?” Elinor asked.

“We’re making a time capsule,” Margaret announced. “It was Marianne’s idea.”

“Really?” Elinor asked. 

“I want some record that we were here,” she said. 

“That’s very sweet,” Elinor smiled.  She had the feeling that any chances their brother’s family made to the property wouldn’t leave the yard undisturbed, but it wouldn’t help anyone to say so out loud.  “I’ll leave you two to it, then.”

“Don’t you want to put something in the box?” 

“Maybe I’ll think of something.”

[favorite-characters]

𝕊𝕖𝕟𝕤𝕖 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕊𝕖𝕟𝕤𝕚𝕓𝕚𝕝𝕚𝕥𝕪

Emma Thompson as ᴇʟɪɴᴏʀ ᴅᴀsʜᴡᴏᴏᴅ × Kate Winslet as ᴍᴀʀɪᴀɴɴᴇ ᴅᴀsʜᴡᴏᴏᴅ × Emilie Francois as ᴍᴀʀɢᴀʀᴇᴛ ᴅᴀsʜᴡᴏᴏᴅ (dir. Ang Lee • 1995)

[showmethesneer]

Margaret Dashwood: I wish that somebody would give us all a large fortune apiece!

Me:

[nerdgatehobbit]

Here are two screencaps from the scene right before Marianne encounters Willoughy for the first time.

[hitchell-mope]

Decent movie. I’d probably watch it again.

[didanagy]

SENSE AND SENSIBILITY (1995)

dir. ang lee

[bethanydelleman]

Margaret Dashwood: Is it canon?

Short answer: Margaret Dashwood basically isn’t in the book, so it’s all fanon. She is mentioned 36 times total. Compare that to Mrs. Jennings at 234 and Mrs. Charlotte Palmer at 62.

Margaret Dashwood has a tree fort, a favourite atlas, sword fights with Edward, wants to be a pirate, has a pony, does puppetry, hides under things, etc.

Fanon (I’m using this term to cover adaptations and JAFF), not canon.  Here is the sum total of stuff we know about Margaret: Margaret, the other sister, was a good-humored, well-disposed girl; but as she had already imbibed a good deal of Marianne’s romance, without having much of her sense, she did not, at thirteen, bid fair to equal her sisters at a more advanced period of life.

Margaret Dashwood literally has no possessions mentioned in the novel. Also, unless he actually paid for it, Edward stole that atlas.

Margaret Dashwood bonds with Edward

Fanon, not canon. The only time we know that Margaret even speaks to Edward is when she opens the discussion on what they would do if they were all rich. Edward never actually replies to Margaret and he only mentions Marianne and Elinor in his speech

“I wish,” said Margaret, striking out a novel thought, “that somebody would give us all a large fortune apiece!”

“Oh that they would!” cried Marianne, her eyes sparkling with animation, and her cheeks glowing with the delight of such imaginary happiness.

“We are all unanimous in that wish, I suppose,” said Elinor, “in spite of the insufficiency of wealth.”

“Oh dear!” cried Margaret, “how happy I should be! I wonder what I should do with it!”

Marianne looked as if she had no doubt on that point.

“I should be puzzled to spend so large a fortune myself,” said Mrs. Dashwood, “if my children were all to be rich without my help.”

“You must begin your improvements on this house,” observed Elinor, “and your difficulties will soon vanish.”

“What magnificent orders would travel from this family to London,” said Edward, “in such an event! What a happy day for booksellers, music-sellers, and print-shops! You, Miss Dashwood, would give a general commission for every new print of merit to be sent you—and as for Marianne, I know her greatness of soul, there would not be music enough in London to content her. And books!—Thomson, Cowper, Scott—she would buy them all over and over again: she would buy up every copy, I believe, to prevent their falling into unworthy hands; and she would have every book that tells her how to admire an old twisted tree. Should not you, Marianne? Forgive me, if I am very saucy. But I was willing to show you that I had not forgot our old disputes.”

Margaret is not mentioned again in this conversation.

Margaret is rude to Fanny Dashwood

Fanon, not canon. Margaret doesn’t even have quoted speech until the Dashwoods are settled in Barton. I can’t even find an instance of Marianne being rude to Fanny or John, though we know she dislikes both of them.

What the heck is canon?

Margaret plays a few important roles. She that lets slip that Elinor has a lover left behind at Norland whose name is “F” to Sir John and Mrs. Jennings. Margaret is also the one who saw Willoughby request a lock of hair from Marianne, which she tells to Elinor. Margaret is also the one walking with Marianne when Marianne falls and is saved by Willoughby. She is the one who romantically calls Willoughby, “Marianne’s preserver”.

Her presence at home allows Marianne and Elinor to travel to London without leaving their mother to be lonely.

I think it is clever to use Margaret to make Edward more of a fleshed out character, but it’s not actually in the novel. Edward only says one single line of speech before the Dashwoods leave for Barton, this is it: “Devonshire! Are you, indeed, going there? So far from hence! And to what part of it?” For a visual medium, this just doesn’t work. You need to do something with Edward and both 1995 and 2008 used Margaret to help with the Edward problem.

[favorite-characters]

𝕊𝕖𝕟𝕤𝕖 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕊𝕖𝕟𝕤𝕚𝕓𝕚𝕝𝕚𝕥𝕪

Emilie Francois as ᴍᴀʀɢᴀʀᴇᴛ ᴅᴀsʜᴡᴏᴏᴅ (dir. Ang Lee • 1995)

[whenthegoldrays]

Elinor Dashwood 🤝🏼 Margaret Hale

19-year-old girls whose spine must be splitting from carrying their entire family on their back and additionally being forced to keep someone else’s secrets