#scarcely odd rereads persuasion 2022

[scarcelyodd]

"Persuasion is Austen's saddest and most impassioned novel, and in its blend of the public and the personal it explores both the anguish of silence and the value of hope."

Persuasion: An Annotated Edition, Introduction by Robert Morrison

[scarcelyodd]

"Virginia Woolf...suggested that Persuasion proved 'not merely the biographical fact that Jane Austen had loved, but the aesthetic fact that she was no longer afraid to say so. Experience, when it was of a serious kind, had to sink very deep, and to be thoroughly disinfected by the passage of time, before she allowed herself to deal with it in fiction.'"

Persuasion: An Annotated Edition, Introduction by Robert Morrison

[scarcelyodd]

"Mrs. Croft is a new woman who acts as her husband's collaborator, guide, supporter, and confidante - on the land and on the sea, in peacetime and in wartime, across private and public realms - and the admiral's relationship with her thrives as he redefines masculinity in terms that respect women as equals and that embrace partnership with them rather than power over them....In Admiral and Mrs. Croft, [Austen] dismantles the notion of separate spheres for men and women and gives us the future of gender relations."

Persuasion: An Annotated Edition, Introduction by Robert Morrison

[scarcelyodd]

"Amy King writes that 'we might today assume that bloom is simply a reference to complexion, health, or physical beauty,' but in fact in Austen's day it also carried connotations of courtship and sexual attractiveness, so that Anne's 'lack of bloom' means, in effect, the 'lack of a marriage plot.'"

Persuasion: An Annotated Edition, annotation by Robert Morrison (Ch. 1, #22)

[scarcelyodd]

The level at which this edition was researched! Editor Robert Morrison didn't just read but compared four different copies of the 1818 publication of Persuasion, down to grammar, probable typos, you name it! I love Persuasion, but this is a whole new level of intense Austen appreciation.

[scarcelyodd]

A couple of years ago I treated myself at the end of the semester by completing my collection of The Jane Austen Annotated Editions by Harvard University Press. I decided given everything happening on my dash that it was high time to reread Persuasion. I will definitely share any interesting tidbits that I learn!

[scarcelyodd]

"At the time of her death, Austen seems not to have decided on a title. Cassandra later reported that the name of the novel "had been a good deal discussed between Jane and herself, and that among several possible titles, the one that seemed most likely to be chosen was 'The Elliots.'" In any event, however, it was probably Henry who decided to call the novel Persuasion."

Persuasion: An Annotated Edition, edited by Robert Morrison

[scarcelyodd]

"Although they seem often to be moving in opposite directions, and in some instances even to feel justified in doing so, Anne and Wentworth are subtly in touch with one another almost from the moment of his return. In fact, in many ways they know each other better than they know themselves."

Persuasion: An Annotated Edition, Introduction by Robert Morrison

[scarcelyodd]

"...it is part of the enormous appeal of Persuasion that Wentworth and Anne seem destined for each other even as they wander from each other, and that the errors and misjudgments that define their relationship upon Wentworth's return from the war only heighten the enormous sense of relief that they and we feel when the reconciliation scene finally arrives."

Persuasion: An Annotated Edition, Introduction by Robert Morrison