Read-along – Persuasion (1 of 4)

Chapters 1-7 – and Debrett's Baronetage

Dear Persuasion readers,

We’ve read the first seven chapters. How are you enjoying it? If you’re rereading Persuasion, how are you finding it this time round? Please do share your thoughts and reactions as a comment below. Here are mine:

I’m looking forward to reading the rest of Volume One, Chapters 8-12, this week and discussing them next Friday 14th February, Valentine’s Day. (For reference, the full schedule is here.)

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I wanted to share Gillian Beer’s impressive unpacking of the very short (fictional) extract from Debrett’s Baronetage of England, with which the novel opens. As she says, ‘the entry compacts much poignant information’ —

ELLIOT OF KELLYNCH HALL.

Walter Elliot, born March 1, 1760, married, July 15, 1784, Elizabeth, daughter of James Stevenson, Esq. of South Park, in the county of Gloucester, by which lady (who died 1800) he has issue Elizabeth, born June 1, 1785; Anne, born August 9, 1787; a still-born son, November 5, 1789; Mary, born November 20, 1791.

Debrett’s Baronetage was first published in 1808, in two volumes; this is the title page from the seventh edition (1835)

‘The key absence in this family history,’ Beer writes, ‘is [Sir Walter’s] “still-born son, Nov. 5, 1789”. That death generates the various compensatory plots of the novel. It has left the father without an heir, dependent on the vagaries of Mr William Elliot, the cousin who will inherit.

‘The death of Sir Walter’s wife, and mother to his three diverse daughters, is recorded in brackets – “(who died 1800)”: the lady matters here only in her genealogical function, subordinated to the only begetter of this entry “by which lady . . . he has issue”.

Corin Redgrave as Sir Walter in the 1995 BBC adaptation

‘Anne is the middle child, her presence subdued by the absence of the son whose birth came next after hers.

‘Elizabeth, the eldest, is “Miss Elliot”; she has become a meta-wife to her father after her mother’s death when she was sixteen. She has frozen into a female simulacrum of Sir Walter, mirroring and reinforcing his narcissism, forming a mutual regard which is like that of a mirror not a marriage. [. . .]

‘The youngest daughter already has another name, through marriage to a suitable neighbour, Charles Musgrove.

Anthony Head as Sir Walter, with Sally Hawkins as Anne, Julia Davis as Elizabeth and Amanda Hale as Mary in the 2007 ITV film adaptation

‘Sir Walter adds to the Baronetage two pieces of information in his own hand: the account of Mary’s marriage and “inserting most accurately the day of the month on which he had lost his wife”. Is there a frisson of feeling here, or its freezing out? The narrative comment – “most accurately” – suggests that Sir Walter seals off his wife’s death in this record.’

Richard E. Grant as Sir Walter, with Dakota Johnson as Anne, Yolanda Kettle as Elizabeth and Lydia Rose Bewley as Mrs Clay in the 2022 Netflix adaptation

Gillian Beer’s 1998 introduction to the Penguin edition is a brilliant example of what a good introduction should do. It reads like the opening of a treasure box lid: she shows us how to read the book in ways that make it even more impressive and more enjoyable. It is scholarly but accessible – it is humorous and inspiring – and best of all it’s just twenty pages long. I do recommend it!

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I hope you enjoy the next few chapters of Persuasion. I look forward to discussing them with you next week!

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Here are links to our previous Persuasion posts:

• The Schedule (8 January)

• Jane Austen (24 January)

• 0. Dissuading Fanny Knight (31 January)

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