Persuasion

Captain Frederick Wentworth acts as Anne’s main love interest throughout Persuasion. As a newly influential captain in the British Navy, Wentworth returns to England during peacetime and eagerly searches for a wife. His history with Anne creates a latent resentment toward her and her arrogant family; at any instance of pride in the novel, Wentworth is described as turning cool toward that character, having little interest in interacting with the kind of people who once persuaded Anne away from him.

Captain Wentworth’s initial interest in the Musgrove sisters suggests that he is no longer interested in Anne. However, through small acts of thoughtfulness—putting Anne in Mrs. Croft’s carriage, sending her a note on Louisa’s condition—Wentworth contradicts his own professed desire to find a wife in any young woman besides Anne Elliot. He is described as having impeccable manners deep loyalty to his friends. Wentworth’s main role in the narrative is to serve as a catalyst for Anne’s own character development toward self-assurance, independence, and confidence.

By the conclusion of the novel and after his reunion with Anne, Wentworth resolutely admits to the way he himself has acted out of pride. He regrets his inability to sympathize with Anne’s unique position as a young woman without a mother, and admits that it was his own wounded pride that kept him from proposing to Anne immediately after receiving his fortune. Though he once hated pride above all else and believed himself free of it, Wentworth readily admits to Anne that he had an equal part in their separation because he was too proud to return to the woman he still loved but who once refused him.

Mrs. Clay and Mr. Elliot serve as examples of the economic and social threats that Anne and her family face in the novel. The novel’s primary antagonists, Mrs. Clay and Mr. Elliot each threaten the financial or social status of the Elliots. Mrs. Clay attempts to manipulate Sir Walter’s emotions in the hopes of securing herself a comfortable income. Her character is the antithesis of the stock middle-class female characters of Persuasion in that, while each young woman actively pursues marriage, Mrs. Clay behaves in an underhand way per their society’s standards. As a woman born of a lower class than the Elliots and Musgroves, Mrs. Clay is thought to be reaching beyond her boundaries by flattering Sir Walter.

Her second, secret entanglement with Mr. Elliot is all the worse considering that he, too, was attempting to manipulate Sir Walter’s marriage prospects. Furthermore, Mr. Elliot actively flirts with Anne in an attempt to maintain a close watch over his inheritance. Mr. Elliot presents the inverse threat as Mrs. Clay; he is so socially desirable that his true, devious motives almost go unrecognized. It is only Anne’s trust in Mrs. Smith, another social outcast, that saves her from being persuaded into an unhappy marriage with the conniving Mr. Elliot. Neither Mrs. Clay nor Mr. Elliot develop as characters in Persuasion; rather, they serve as threats and reminders to the other characters of what could happen from an unsuitable marriage match.