Elinor and Marianne Dashwood are sisters. Both are intelligent, sensitive, charming, and beautiful, but there the similarities end. Elinor values propriety and common sense; she is prudent and cautious with a strong sense of duty. Marianne, by contrast, has extravagant Romantic ideas; she is excessive and spontaneous. Both sisters fall in love early in the story, but both love stories are problematic. In this brilliant novel, Jane Austen explores two different ways of thinking and acting – the 'sense' of Elinor and the 'sensibility' of Marianne – as they try to find happiness in a world full of hypocrisy, vulgarity, and self-interest.
