Jane Austen's Perfect Heroine: Say No to Plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay The Use of Reserve in Persuasion “His character was now fixed in his mind like perfection itself. » Jane Austen, Persuasion Anne Elliot is often described as Jane Austen's most mature and perfect heroine; and that's what it is. One is prepared to share Captain Wentworth's sentiments when he declares that Anne's character is "perfection itself, retaining the finest milieu of courage and gentleness" (226). Jane Austen's use of reserve in her 1818 novel Persuasion is a way of contrasting her heroine with the people and society around her and, above all, giving Anne an air of perfection. By giving her a reserved character, Anne becomes the antipode of a society with decadent values. Austen denounces the attitude of the aristocracy, the tendency towards a willful disposition and a decreasing sense of decorum. Sir Walter Elliot is the embodiment of the declining aristocracy of the English Regency, from which Anne escapes by marrying someone from the rising professional class. According to Paul Cantor, "the aristocracy no longer bases its claim to rule on its intrinsic merit or its superiority in virtue, [but] now the preeminence of the aristocracy rests solely on its birth, which in practice means on pure snobbery ". Sir Walter is the epitome of such snobbery; he ignores the responsibilities he has as a landed nobility and denies ancient aristocratic values. However, traditional aristocratic norms are upheld by the rising middle-class characters, and they take up the role of the landed gentry in society and in the navy. During the Napoleonic Wars, the aristocracy abandoned their responsibility as military leaders and left it to the middle class to fight their battles. The result is a power shift that places political power and wealth in the hands of the middle class and allows the aristocracy to perish. Anne Elliot is aware of all this and rather wishes to be associated with the professional class than with the old aristocracy into which she was born. truly understanding people, had no one with his father or his sister: his word had no weight; his convenience was always to yield; - she was only Anne” (7). In the opening chapters of Austen's novel, we quickly learn that, despite her excellent character, Anne is nothing to those close to her. She's put in the background and she seems quite comfortable there. But even though Anne is nothing and no one to those close to her, we also learn that her family is simply made up of people without "real understanding." They are proud, snobbish and only interested in outward appearances. Anne is marginalized by members of her own family and she herself believes that "to be claimed as good, even if in an inappropriate style, is at least better than to be dismissed as not good at all" (32 ). Furthermore, her importance here is not only diminished by Anne and her family, but Austen reinforces this assertion by not letting Anne speak for herself until the third chapter of the novel. Before that, we only know her through the eyes and words of her family, Lady Russell, and the narrator. Slowly but surely, Anne moves toward center stage, as she quietly shares with the reader her observations and judgments about the people around her. In the introduction to Persuasion, Gillian Beer states that "Anne, like the reader, like her author, discreetly participates in the scenes [of The Bath], her dramapsychic being almost entirely invisible to any other person. She can fit in and be useful. anywhere, hence its obscurity” (xxi). In other words, Anne's reserve gives her the opportunity to quietly criticize her family's behavior, while her personality continues to become even more admirable. As we have better understood Anne's character, the members of her aristocratic family continue to become more and more inferior to her. EB Moon aptly points out that "the heroine's evaluation...becomes a test of character for others," a test at which those close to her fail miserably. Austen uses this contrast between Anne and the other Elliots to criticize the narcissistic and vain attitude of the aristocracy, but above all to emphasize the perfection of Anne Elliot. By comparing Anne's reserved and collected disposition to Louisa's unbridled personality, Austen, once again, paints Anne's portrait. superiority of character. While talking with his sister, Captain Wentworth describes the woman he would like to marry. With a convincing Anne Elliot in the back of his mind, he declares that his ideal woman should possess a "strong spirit, with gentle manners" (58). Therefore, he praises Louisa for her "character of decision and firmness" and tells her that if she appreciates Henriette's "conduct of happiness", she should "infuse into him as much of [her] own spirit as [she] can” (81). According to Wentworth, firmness is equal to happiness: “It is the worst evil of a character that is too flexible and indecisive, on which no influence can be relied upon. You can never be sure that a good impression will last. Everyone can influence it; let those who want to be happy be firm” (81). However, Louisa's "firmness" is only willful behavior and ultimately proves to be her weakness and downfall. After Louisa's accident on the Cobb at Lyme, Anne wonders if [Captain Wentworth] had ever had the idea of ​​questioning the correctness of his own previous opinion as to universal felicity and the advantage of firmness of character; and if it could not strike him, let it, like all the other qualities of the mind, have its proportions and its limits. She thought that it could hardly escape her feeling that a persuasive character [like hers] could sometimes be as much in favor of happiness as a very resolute character. (108) Indeed, this incident taught Captain Wentworth "to distinguish between the firmness of principles and the obstinacy of one's own will, between the daring of carelessness and the resolution of a collected spirit" and this It is only now that he understands “the perfect excellence of the mind with which that of Louisa could so poorly bear comparison” (227). Anne's reserve does not make her an inconstant character, but she is a level-headed young woman who knows and illustrates the value of reticence. Wentworth, finally, recognizes this quality of character in Anne, this “too good, too excellent creature,” and he realizes that she is the woman he has always been looking for (223). Anne's perfect sense of decorum prevents her from sharing it. real feelings directly with Captain Wentworth. In her work, Austen emphasizes the constraint of feeling and emotion. This may be due, according to some critics, to the fact that Austen's celibacy deprived her of the chance to experience such a situation herself, and she therefore avoided emotionally charged scenes in her novels. But, whether it was reason or not, Austen lived in a society that, like her, was dedicated to decorum; a society which imposed reserve on its women. In her account of strategies of reticence in Jane Austen's work, Janis P. Stout explains that Austen uses "reservation as a touchstone of positive evaluation," and she goes on to emphasize "., 1990.