Sense & Sensibility

In Jane Austen's perceptive portrayal of the Dashwood sisters, both wounded by love, Elinor is guided by "sense," or logic, while Marianne is guided by her "sensibility," or feelings. Both heroines undergo violent passions when they are separated from the men they love; while impetuous Marianne falls into paroxysms of grief over the ardent but fickle Willoughby, Elinor masks her despair when it appears that her true love is to marry a woman he no longer cares for. Yet all ends well in Austen's 1811 comedy of manners, her first published novel.