Jane Austen Critical Analysis

Jane Austen has attracted a great deal of critical attention in recent years. Many critics have given their view points and analysis about the strengths and weaknesses of her characters, particularly her heroines. Austen has been cast as both a friend and foe to the rights of women. Others feel that her marriage plots are representative of her allegiance to the social situation of her time.

Without examining the eighteenth century English society, we cannot make analysis on the Austen as an author. She lived in a society where women could not attend educational institutions like Oxford or Cambridge but they were expected to be ‘accomplished’ in the abilities of drawing, singing, speaking modern languages (such as Italian or French), and playing

The idea of life without having a financial support is a matter of great consternation, especially for 2 women. Thus, as illustrated in Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, and Emma, many people are taken in low esteem and in high esteem just on the basis of financial condition and women are suffered badly in this era.

In these three popular novels, the heroines of Austen are facing the harsh realities of the deprived society. Elinor and Marianne Dashwood were deprived of their manor by their uncle after their father’s death and then they are left with little money. Elizabeth Bennet has to face the attitudes of aristocrats due to the lack of societal recommendations. Emma Woodhouse appears headed for a life of spinsterhood occupied with the care of her aging father. These four women are continuously finding a tricky road toward happiness, sometimes in love and money, or love of money, but it is the gradual revelation of his characters in comparison with each other that displays Austen's writing at its

The main theme of this novel is disadvantage of sensibility in temperament and the advantage of sense. Firstly, a reader makes a comparison between two heroines. However neither of the women is ideal and perfect. Both of them are on the extreme of their abilities. One is so prudent and smooth in her manners, that she seems stolid, although she is not and the other one is impulsive in her manners as she does not know to govern her feelings. However, “Marianne’s abilities, we are told, were in many respects quite equal to Elinor’s. She was sensible, clever and generous but passionate, her joys and sorrows have no moderation. Elinor possess a great and affectionate heart and moderate in her manners and dispositions.

It is a common view that men use to prefer the women like Marriane, who are very expressive and passionate as compared to the women like Elinor. But in a true sense, Elinor needs to show some feelings in her life and Marianne needs to calm her wild emotions which may harm her. Marianne does not like Elinor and Edward’s reserved attitude towards each other and it is totally opposed to Marianne’s expressiveness and Willoughby’s outspokenness, he is energized and enthusiastic in her ways and presented as a romantic hero. But when he leaves, she is again at the height of emotions, becomes ill and near to