Full Description
This revised Norton Critical Edition is based on the first edition text (dated 1818, but likely issued in late 1817). The editor has spelled out ampersands and made superscript letters lowercased. The novel, which is accompanied by revised and expanded explanatory annotations, is followed by the two canceled chapters that comprise Persuasion's original ending.
"Backgrounds and Contexts" collects contemporary assessments of Jane Austen as well as materials relating to the social issues of the day. Included are an excerpt from William Hayley's 1785 "Essay on Old Maids"; Austen's letters to Fanny Knight, which reveal her skepticism about marriage as the key to happiness; Henry Austen's memorial tribute to his famous sister; assessments by nineteenth-century critics Julia Kavanagh and Goldwin Smith, who viewed Austen as an unassuming, sheltered, and "feminine" rural writer; and the perspective of Austen's biographer, Geraldine Edith Mitten.
The Second Edition emphasizes current critical scholarship, reflecting enormous shifts in our comprehension of Austen's achievement and opening the door to new ways of thinking about Persuasion and its author. For the first time, we can think complexly about Austen living through the Napoleonic Wars on the Continent and experiencing their political repercussions at home—the same as everyone else in England at that time. Four new essays—by Linda Bree, Sidney Gottlieb, John Wiltshire, and David Monaghan—speak to these new perspectives; those by Gottlieb and Monaghan expand the conversation into film adaptations of the novel.
A Chronology of Austen's life and work, new to the Second Edition, is included along with an updated Selected Bibliography.
Contents
Preface
The Text of Persuasion
The Original Ending of Persuasion
Backgrounds and Contexts
[William Hayley] · [On Old Maids]
Jane Austen · Letters about Persuasion
To Fanny Knight, March 13, [1817]
To Fanny Knight, March 23, [1817]
Henry Austen · Biographical Notice of the Author
[Richard Whateley] · [A New Style of Novel]
Anonymous · Austen's Characters
Julia Kavanagh · [The Language of Feeling]
Goldwin Smith · From Life of Jane Austen
Geraldine Edith Mitton · From Jane Austen and Her Times
Criticism
A. Walton Litz · New Landscapes
Marilyn Butler · [On Persuasion]
Ann W. Astell · Anne Elliot's Education: The Learning of Romance in Persuasion
Claudia L. Johnson · Persuasion: The "Unfeudal Tone of the Present Day"
Cheryl Ann Weissman · Doubleness and Refrain in Jane Austen's Persuasion
Linda Bree · Belonging to the Conversation in Persuasion
Sidney Gottlieb · Persuasion and Cinematic Approaches to Jane Austen
Bharat Tandon · [Language and Action in Persuasion]
Tara Ghoshal Wallace · Filming Romance: Persuasion
John Wiltshire · [Anne Elliot's Consciousness]
David Monaghan · Movement and a Modern Perspective in Dear and Michell's
Persuasion
Jane Austen: A Chronology
Selected Bibliography
