In reality, Austen can not accurately be evaluated as an author (or feminist subversive) without first examining the eighteenth century English society in which she lived and placed her heroines. Watt says that Austen's characters cannot be seen "clearly until we make allowances for the social order in which they were rooted" (41). Austen lived in a society where women were expected to b

Only within the context of a subtle comparison with other women is the reader able to see each Austen heroine for who she really is, whether or not she is able to see that yet. Elinor and Marianne learn from each other that a real woman must possess a balance of both sense and sensibility. Elizabeth Benet sees that both her pride and her prejudice have prevented her from loving her only equal. Emma greatly embarrasses herself and others until she realizes that she is wrong about almost all of her life's focus (matchmaking and remaining single). When she realizes that she loves Knightley, she finds a place to start an internal reformation. Whether or not Austen was trying to be an early writer for women's rights is really unimportant. Austen's works are about women discovering who they are and that discovery must take place for a woman to truly live and love, regardless of her social position or the century in which she was born.

marry another, she placidly talks to Lucy Steele about her engagement and upcoming marriage to Edward. Instead of breaking down like her sister, she "fulfill[s] her obligations as a daughter, a sister, and a member of society" while trying "to control the anguish of disappointed love" (45). In most of her dealings with the outside world, Elinor represents the sense side of the equation.

The second woman Austen uses to further characterize Emma is a young lady who does not have a single line of dialogue in the entire novel, Jane Fairfax. Austen tells her readers that Jane and Emma "are alike in many ways: age, station, accomplishments," and yet it is their differences that so clearly portray to the reader what reality is, versus what Emma thinks it to be (Schorer 107). Though Austen never describes Jane Fairfax to the reader beyond Emma's perceptions, it is obvious that Jane is passionate, spirited, elegant, beautiful, intelligent, and well aware of her unfortunate plight in life. Jane has not wasted time in attaching to a young man of

A woman's financial status was very important, and yet there was little she could do to improve it. Women of some social standing could not just go out and get a job. The only opportunities for support outside one's family was work as a governess, or live-in teacher. Money for a woman usually only came through marriage or the death of her father, and then only if she had no brothers or other male relatives.

These are the realities that four of the most popular of Austen's heroines had to face. Elinor and Marianne Dashwood's future prospects of happiness are greatly diminished when they are forced out of their family manor by their father's death, "and their great-uncle's injudicious will" leaves the four remaining Dashwoods with little income (Liddell 25). Elizabeth Benet is the second-oldest daughter in a family with five young women and a lack of societal recommendations. Emma Woodhouse is the younger daughter of a widower. She has reached the point that she can no longer require her governess, who gets married, and, as the younger, unmarried sister, she appears headed for a life of spinsterhood occupied with the care of her aging father. These four women navigate a tricky road toward happiness, sometimes falling into the pitfalls of love and money, or love of money, but it is the gradual revelation of their character in comparison with others that displays Austen's writing at its best.

According to Watt, Elinor "consistently tries to relate her imagination and her feelings to her judgement and to the moral and social tradition on which her society is based" (49). In other words, Elinor is not led by her emotions. She never tells Edward that she loves him even though it is obvious that a mutual attraction exists. Even when she learns that the man she loves will

The last woman with whom Elizabeth Benet should be compared is Charlotte Lucas. Charlotte finds herself with little to recommend her and even fewer options on the marriage front

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 4460
Approximate Pages = 18 (250 words per page double spaced)