Persuasion brilliantly combines the pungent ironies of Austen's earlier comedies
with a profound Romantic lyricism and plagency. At the heart of the novel is
Anne Elliot, a self reliant and preternaturally perceptive heroine in the line
of Elizabeth Bennet of Pride and Prejudice and Emma Woodhouse of Emma. She is
persuaded by her Godmother, Lady Russell, not to marry Captain Fredrick
Wentworth, a young officer in the British Navy. "Forced in to prudence in her
youth, Elliot learns romance as she grows older and Austen unfolds the story of
her second chance at love with Wentworth. As the essays collected in this
volumen attest, Persuasion subtly entertains