Sense and Sensibility
Jane Austen is one of the most famous English novelists. She was born in the end of 18th century in the country of Hampshire (Bauer C. & Jahlmar J. 4). In her works she reflected the world and the social arena she knew the best. In the time of Jane Austen’s life class was the part of the everyday life, and in her realistic novels we can find very interesting and emotional description of the problems and traditions of the middle class, which she belonged to (Bauer C. & Jahlmar 7). Class in England was a hierarchy with the upper 400 families at the top, the middle class, then the working class, and impoverished people at the end (Keating Ashley C.). Women in those times were suppressed in a great extent; they were limited in having property or receiving education and having some specialty, and were mainly dependent on their husbands.
Getting married and raising children were the main targets of women’s life. If the woman was born in a poor family she had little or almost no opportunities to change her situation. To many of Jane Austen’s characters material considerations are more important than emotional ones (Kristina Tengelin 3). We can explore those aspects in all of the Austen’s novels, but one of the most well-known and precious is Sense and Sensibility. The plot of this novel revolves around marriage, love and how money can influence both. Though, main heroines of this novel are widely discussed in terms of different type of love they expressed, still important role of money in their life is omitted. However, money is the main source of action in the novel, where most of decisions are made on the basis of financial circumstances.
However, the money question is not openly discussed in the novel because of its delicacy (Kristina Tengelin 3). In this paper I would like to investigate how money and class influenced personal life of the main heroines and their choice of partners.The main characters of Sense and Sensibility are two sisters Elinor and Marianne, who face financial problems after the death of their father. As women could not inherit property all the money goes to their half-brother, who promised to take care of them but under the pressure of his wife Fanny Dashwood leaves them with no support. Mrs. John Dashwood is a snobbish, cold woman, whose main concerns are about money. Though her husband and she are already rich, she still wants to increase her property getting all the estate of Henry Dashwood.“Mrs. John Dashwood did not at all approve of what her husband intended to do for his sisters. To take three thousand pounds from the fortune of their dear little boy would be impoverishing him to the most dreadful degree.” (Jane Austen 10)
Before the seventeenth century marriages were mainly formed on the basis of improving the financial state of the family, and the concept of romantic love did …
