Finally, after months of drudging through, I finished reading Sense and Sensibility! (That's two completed Jane Austen novels, with about 3 I haven't finished in years.) The plot structure was similar to Twilight. It was really slow with a lot of build up, and then bam the last 100 pages are the most exciting, intense parts (the edition I read was 356 pages long). The ending was a little too clean, and Austen, I guess, wants the reader to have warm fuzzy feelings for Edward, and think of Robert as a cad, and Lucy Steele as a vain self-absorbed person. I think the purpose in that is because she wants us to feel like Elinor has some shred of "sense."
Mark Twain didn't care for Jane Austen much, nor did he care for Sense and Sensibility. He doesn't have nice words to say about any of the characters,"Elinor is a wax figure and Edward a shadow, and how could such manufactures as these warm; up and feel a passion. Edward is an unpleasant shadow, because he has discarded his harmless waxwork and engaged himself to Lucy Steele, who is coarse, ignorant, vicious, brainless, heartless, a flatterer, a sneak" and he goes on further. The only character that is endearing from beginning to end is Colonel Brandon and Marianne doesn't appreciate him until it's too late. She doesn't deserve him!
Mark Twain quote from Who is Mark Twain? published by Harper Studio
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