Elizabeth Elliot: As I read this utterly civilized dismemberment of Elizabeth Elliot, I find myself comparing Elizabeth to Caroline Bingley of Pride and Prejudice. They are similar in their cold snobbery and deliberate, self-serving husband-hunting, but at least Caroline actually has some recognizable skills,some "accomplishments". Elizabeth Elliot seems utterly without redeeming qualities. Since Persuasion was Austen's last novel, can we guess that she was finally letting her sense of the inequities of English country life have full expression, or was she just in a bad mood, and letting her usual targets have it with both barrels?

Lady Russell's independence: I'm fascinated by Lady Russell's apparently having "permission" to stay unmarried. The society Austen describes "is rather apt to be unreasonably discontented when a woman does marry again, than when she does not. but Sir Walter's continuing in singleness requires explanation." In other words, women were expected to marry, but once married, they were expected to remain faithful to that one spouse, while a man was not. Not surprising, but the ironic implication is that a wealthy widow would have been more free and independent than almost anyone else in Austen's world. As long as she stayed single and wealthy, a woman could arrange her own affairs to suit herself. She would have been even more free than a wealthy, single young man. For, as we all know, "a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife".

In the interests of clarity: Sir Walter's character is laid out from the beginning with devastating clarity and efficiency. There's no room left for ambiguity. I am only left to wonder how the late Lady Elliot, so "sensible and amiable", could have been so infatuated with him as to marry him.