Recently reread Persuasion. Not sure why it is a lesser known work. Anne is perhaps not as colorful a heroine as Elizabeth Bennett and the Bennett family in toto are far more full of event, but Austen's clear eye for self indulgence and selfishness within families and the perils of mismatched couples is as good as in other novels. Interestingly we have in this edition some evidence of the author's style of revision as an earlier version of the final chapters have been preserved and are reprinted here. It is interesting to see how she completely altered the scene in which her hero and heroine finally reconcile. ( )

no emotional antagonists ( )

A somewhat different Jane Austen book. I started reading it because it had been referenced several times in Pikketty's book on Capitalism due to its many discussions of the prices of things and the interest of investments. ( )

Northanger Abbey: Such fun. This playful novel, filled with meta-references, send-ups to gothic tropes, &c., is right is my wheelhouse, and I absolutely loved it.

Persuasion: It was really interesting to read these two right in a row, as they were originally published (but not as originally written). The styles are vastly different. This novel is good in its own way, but I didn't have as much fun with it as with Northanger. ( )

804. Northanger Abbey & Persuasion by Jane Austen (read 18 May 1965) When I finished Northanger Abbey on May 15, 1965, I said of it: Pleasant, delightful, and, I presume, instructive as to the life of the rich in late 18th century England, I found it enjoyable indeed. Catherine Marland, 17, goes to the resort town of Bath, meets Henry Tilney, and is invited by his father, General Tilney, to visit at the family home, Northanger Abbey. Catherine is steeped in the Gothic novels, such as Ann Radcliffe's Mysteries of Udopho, and her misconceptions of the Abbey, and her adventures, there are hilarious. The close of the story is rapid, satisfyingly so, and I will now proceed to read the other novel in the book: Persuasion.
I finished Persuasion on May 18, 1965, and said this is the story of Ann Elliott, daughter of a vain and petty baronet and sister of Elizabeth and Mary (such reprehensible women they could not be sisters to some one like Ann except in a novel), who broke her engagement to Capt. Wentworth 8 years before. This is the story of their coming back together. Put like this, the story seems inexpressibly slight. But the style, the manner, is so well-done, that the story is absorbing. ( )