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Read through the most famous quotes by topic #austen
... [In 'Pride and Prejudice'] Mr Collins's repulsiveness in his letter [about Lydia's elopement] does not exist only at the level of the sentence: it permeates all aspects of his rhetoric. Austen's point is that the well-formed sentence belongs to a self-enclosed mind, incapable of sympathetic connections with others and eager to inflict as much pain as is compatible with a thin veneer of politeness. Whereas Blair judged the Addisonian sentence as a completely autonomous unit, Austen judges the sentence as the product of a pre-existing moral agent. What counts is the sentence's ability to reveal that agent, not to enshrine a free-standing morsel of truth. Mr Darcy's letter to Elizabeth, in contrast, features a quite different practice of the sentence, including an odd form of punctation ... The dashes in Mr Darcy's letter transform the typographical sentence by physically making each sentence continuous with the next one. ... The dashes insist that each sentence is not self-sufficient but belongs to a larger macrostructure. Most of Mr Darcy's justification consists not of organised arguments like those of Mr Collins but of narrative. ... The letter's totality exists not in the typographical sentence but in the described event. ↗
Peter was now standing very close - as if he wanted to comfort me - as if he knew how hurt I felt that Mrs Knowles had not asked me to play or to sing. And I did feel comforted. It was as if a tide of warmth was carrying me out of myself, inclining me to trust him and to conduct myself well. ↗
#jennifer-paynter #love #loyalty #mary-bennet #peter-bushell
At that moment a solitary violin struck up. But the music was not dance music; it was more like a song - a solemn, sweet song. (I know now that it was Beethoven's Romance in F.) I listened, and suddenly it was as if the fog that surrounded me had been penetrated, as if I were being spoken to. ↗
After a moment, he added more seriously: 'I don't get as angry as m'father used to about things. Or maybe I', just better at hiding m'feelings.' 'I fear I'm not very good at hiding my feelings.' He covered my hand with his own. 'That's what I like about you. I liked it from the first. You're so different from the others. ↗
I saw that he was looking anxious. 'I thought you weren't coming.' As he spoke, he grasped my hand. And if the sight of him had not quite restored the magic, the touch of him most certainly did. 'You're not wishing yourself some place else, Mary? ↗
Ah yes.' Peter's tone was scornful. 'And they must always be paid before the poor tradesmen's bills, mustn't they?' 'They must indeed. They are debts of honour.' 'Oh, Mary.' He leant over and kissed me quickly. 'What a lot we'll have to argue about after we're married. ↗
#jennifer-paynter #love #mary-bennet #peter-bushell #pride-and-prejudice
My beloved Laura” (said she to me a few Hours before she died) “take warning from my unhappy End …Beware of fainting-fits…Beware of swoons, Run mad as often as you chuse; but do not faint—”. ↗
If you mean Miss Austen, I don't find her particularly romantic," Tasmin declared. "Can't say that I care much about the marriage arrangements among the middle classes." Tasmin Berrybender ↗
Miss Austen’s novels … seem to me vulgar in tone, sterile in artistic invention, imprisoned in the wretched conventions of English society, without genius, wit, or knowledge of the world. Never was life so pinched and narrow. The one problem in the mind of the writer … is marriageableness. ↗
After having so nobly disentangled themselves from the shackles of Parental Authority, by a Clandestine Marriage, they were determined never to forfeit the good opinion they had gained in the World, in so doing, by accepting any proposals of reconciliation that might be offered them by their Fathers – to their farther trial of their noble independence however they never were exposed. ↗
#jane-austen #love-and-friendship #marriage #parents #satire