Sense & Sensibility Chapter 27

The Middletons arrive in London, as does Willoughby, and Colonel Brandon has something to conceal

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Transcript

Frances:  Kia ora, welcome to the amateur austinite. i'm frances duncan, author, austinite, and life coach. my cohost is emma dunning. reader. she identifies as a reader. excellent. today, we're discussing chapter 27 of sense and sensibility. emma's gonna give us a summary.

Emma:  so chapter 27 takes place in london. mary anne is cheered by the idea that willoughby may be detained in the country by good hunting weather and anticipates a frost. after a week, willoughby leaves his card at last. sir john and lady middleton arrive in town and have an impromptu dance to which willoughby is invited but does not come, whereupon mary anne writes to him again. eleanor writes to her mother urging her to demand from mary anne an account of her real situation with willoughby. colonel brandon continues to visit to look at mary anne and talk to eleanor, indirectly confirming his love for mary anne to eleanor.

Frances:  the chapter opens up at the breakfast table. missus jennings is saying sir john won't be here for a while yet because there's still good weather for the sportsman. that's the hunters and mary anne, uh, is so freaking excited by this. all of her good spirits were restored

Emma:  i had not thought of that. the open weather means it's mild enough that they can still hunt. and when the frost sets in, they'll have to stop hunting and come to london.

Frances:  which is what mary anne is desperate for and spends the entire chapter looking at the sky, looking at fires, all of this, deciding that it's going to frost soon. she's observing the direction of

Emma:  the wind, watching the variations of the sky, and imagining alterations in the air. so she's become a weather forecaster in order to bring willoughby to london. you can just imagine her constantly sitting at the window commenting on the weather. it would have been infuriating. can hardly keep my hands warm even in my muff it's very cold. definitely gonna be frosty.

Frances:  we learn lady middleton's first name. her first name is mary.

Emma:  this is the

Frances:  first time it's been mentioned.

Emma:  i didn't see it. where does it say that?

Frances:  mary always has her own way. missus jennings talking about lady middleton getting sir john to london.

Emma:  i did not see it. good spotting.

Frances:  i'm not sure if it was you and me or me and rachel that we're talking about that we don't know missus henry dashwood's first name. i don't know that we discover it, but this may be the only time we hear lady middleton's first name. we know missus palmer's first name, but that could be because she hasn't long been married. so she's often referred to as charlotte as opposed to missus palmer because they're in the habit of calling her charlotte.

Emma:  yes. and also, your mother is more likely to call you by your first name, and, missus jennings talks about charlotte a lot.

Frances:  but missus dashwood does not have a mother to call her by her first name, so we do not know.

Emma:  and her daughters call her

Frances:  mama mama.

Emma:  or mother. so we have these old city friends of missus jennings turning up in her house.

Frances:  but it seems, that they visit her rather than her visiting them, so it seems to be okay. eleanor's more comfortably situated than she had expected, which does make her sound like a snob, if you're viewing things how we would view things, but inside her society kind of makes sense. but she likes missus jennings. missus jennings is always kind to them. she's bored, though. the only person she really has conversations with again is colonel brandon. there are parties that are only for cards just like anne elliot. eleanor's not interested in cards. willoughby does arrive. i didn't think it was this chapter.

Emma:  yes. willoughby does arrive in this chapter because a week after they arrive in london, they find out that willoughby's arrived because he leaves his card while they're out. imagine the agony. marianne's been waiting so long, and then she's out when he comes.

Frances:  which makes her want to stay home forever after that. and she steals the card. and i'm like, does she put it under her pillow? does she sleep with it there? she's probably put it inside her bodice. oh, scandal. we later find out that willoughby was getting her letters, but this was very intentional of him to merely leave a card to make it appear that he is common and indifferent acquaintance.

Emma:  yeah. it would have been suspicious if he hadn't. he had to do the minimum because it's not to do that would have been a statement. so a letter arrives and mary anne grabs for it. it's not for her. it's for missus jennings, but it does reveal that she's expecting a letter from willoughby, not just a card, but she's revealing that a correspondence is what she's expecting, and a correspondence implies that they are engaged.

Frances:  because a single man and a single woman cannot directly communicate with each other unless they are engaged, related, or married. it leaves them open to saying and doing things unchaperoned. if you think of it like teenagers sexting, they could be getting up to that, and you don't want that happening.

Emma:  well, they can certainly organize a rendezvous. this brings things to a head with eleanor. she has to outright ask what's going on. and marion resists. she says, we neither of us have anything to tell you because you do not communicate, and i because i conceal nothing.

Frances:  neither of them actually have anything to tell. neither of them are engaged. the only concealment eleanor has from mary anne is edwards engaged to somebody else, and there's no way she can tell her that. but mary anne is

Emma:  we discovered for the first time here, hurt by the idea that her sister is not sharing her feelings or thoughts with her.

Frances:  we know that eleanor is intentionally not indulging her feelings for edward to keep herself safe, to keep herself from being hurt. whereas mary anne is overindulging her feelings for willoughby to more experience the feeling. and that's why there isn't anything to communicate on eleanor's side, because she's not even communicating it with herself. she doesn't wanna increase it.

Emma:  it leaves eleanor in quite the dilemma because she's distressed that mary anne thinks i'm hiding something, i'm not free to tell her this thing.

Frances:  which means she then, in turn, cannot press mary anne for more information

Emma:  because she feels it's best for mary anne to tell her what's going on, but she doesn't have a leg to stand on.

Frances:  yeah. yeah. they go to a small ball at the middletons. the middletons turn up and immediately have a small ball, which lady middleton's like, this is terrible. it should be properly planned. there should be a proper invitation list, an entire supper, not a sideboard, and willoughby doesn't turn up. and we know he's been invited because sir john met him somewhere in the street this morning, he has a habit of running into sir john in the street, and it causing problems for him. mary anne's so hurt by this that eleanor decides i'm gonna write to her mother, figure out what's going on.

Emma:  because eleanor doesn't have a leg to stand on, but their mother has a right to know.

Frances:  you'd hope that were she engaged, mary anne would've told her mother already. she should have because her mother's technically in charge of her, in charge of her well-being, she cannot care for her properly if she doesn't know what's going on.

Emma:  there's some great writing here again, about the physicality of what marianne's doing. for example, she's too restless for employment, too anxious for conversation, walked from one window to the other, or sat down by the fire in melancholy meditation. that's like four short phrases, comma, comma, comma. agitation. yes. it's agitation, but the writing is agitated. it's just this long series of different actions.

Frances:  it helps drum up that feeling in the reader. you can actually see what's happening. when colonel brandon turns up, he can tell or he has been telling that mary anne hasn't been well. but this time she's basically ran from the room before he turns up. there are two things going on. what the reader and eleanor perceive as happening here may be different from what's actually happening. colonel brandon has turned up to tell eleanor to warn mary anne off willoughby because he's recently discovered that willoughby is the father of his step grandchild. foster grandchild? and he wants to, in a roundabout way, or as directly as he can, warn eleanor so she can warn mary anne. however, he thinks that willoughby and mary anne are engaged, and he wants to ascertain the fact of that before saying anything, because he will not disrupt an engagement, and he will not make mary anne unhappy. his wish is to make her happy or avoid unhappiness for her.

Emma:  so the right thing to do if they are not already engaged is to warn her because to be married to willoughby is to be unhappy because he is an unethical man. yes. but if they are already engaged, then she is committed to marriage to him. and knowing about it won't change the fact that she must marry him, and knowing about it's gonna make things worse. so it's better if he doesn't tell her.

Frances:  yep. eleanor has to not exactly lie, but i don't know that they're engaged.

Emma:  i'm not surprised to hear that they're writing to each other. the thing that changes colonel brandon's mind about what he's gonna do today is as he comes through the door, there's a letter. he sees in the servant's hand a letter to willoughby from mary anne. he recognizes mary anne's handwriting. and he knows that they cannot possibly be writing to each other unless they are engaged.

Frances:  so he has to get confirmation of that from eleanor when is he to congratulate her on the acquisition of a brother, and then go, your sister's engagement is generally known like, i need you to confirm this for me before i put my foot in the mouth.

Emma:  so do you think he could have told missus dashwood or even john dashwood during an engagement about willoughby's we call it love child, to be generous to willoughby. because to be married to an immoral man is a terrible fact. really? was that ethically the right thing to do to allow her to marry him?

Frances:  i don't think they would have thanked him.

Emma:  well, that's not the point in ethics.

Frances:  colonel brandon is a prudent man, and he is aware that they are more likely to shoot the messenger. it's my thoughts on that. if she's already engaged, there's nothing he can do about it. if she is not engaged, i doubt she would listen anyway because she's so in love with willoughby. it takes some time after all the shit goes down for her to hear anything bad of him despite the way that he treats her. were they at barton? perhaps colonel brandon could have said something quietly to missus dashwood if willoughby and mary anne were not engaged. but here, missus jennings is not someone you could tell this to and expect her not to tell other people. she's not actually providing the kind of protection that the dashwood girls require. she can't be that level of chaperone. oh, yes. i don't think you should have told missus jennings. he hasn't met john dashwood. and when he does meet john dashwood, pretty sure colonel brandon will be able to read him and go, well, this guy sucks. not much point in telling him, but i think potentially everything's already fallen apart at that point. if it's absolutely resolved on, then concealment, if concealment is possible, is his only option.

Emma:  is he talking about concealment of his own love?

Frances:  that's what the reader's supposed to think, and that's what eleanor thinks yeah. that he's concealing his affections for mary anne, his feelings. however, it is likely he's actually referring to concealing willoughby's behavior and love child. with willoughby not being married, potentially not being engaged, this could be something that is made public to shame him into acting. as marrying the with eliza, as we will later discover. yeah. whether that's marrying eliza or putting aside money for his child, i don't think colonel brandon is the sort to actually publicly shame him. also there are men that would just shrug it off. he's in a really difficult situation, made worse by the fact that he has feelings for mary anne because anything he says is gonna be colored by that. people are less likely to believe him. you can't just rock up and say my foster daughter just had willoughby's child. oh, willoughby? the guy that's engaged to the girl you love? how convenient that you have shit on him. but he doesn't say anything because eleanor has said in a roundabout way, pretty sure they're engaged without ever actually saying that. so all he can do is wish mary anne happy and hope that willoughby just deserves her. he doesn't, by the way.

Emma:  well, that he will try to deserve her.

Frances:  i was gonna say fucking deserves her because he fucking doesn't. but at this point, eleanor is also trying to shield mary anne's conduct from censure. mary anne and willoughby have both been acting inappropriately in very different ways. but because mary anne's been acting like she's engaged when she's not engaged, that is a bad thing.

Emma:  if she is trying to protect mary anne, it is better for her to say that they are engaged because her behavior as an unengaged woman would be open to censure. so she errs on the side of engagement rather than not.

Frances:  the engagement has never been publicly announced. it is talked about including by people who do not even know the dash words according to colonel brandon, but he wants to get the actual truth before saying anything. people are talking about it, but there hasn't been a public announcement of the engagement, so it's not official.

Emma:  in fact, eleanor says, uh, family don't know about it.

Frances:  which is true. he's, oh, sorry. we're being very, uh, proper. are we? when is it gonna be public? that's cool. you don't have to tell me anything until it's public. that's okay. marianne has put herself and everyone around her into a really awkward situation, but had colonel brandon spoken now, i don't think it would make any difference to the outcome.

Emma:  no. the state of mary anne's heart could not have been changed.

Frances:  it's not till after she knows that wilburys' a cad that she's willing to hear that.

Emma:  even then, she's remarkably quick to, make excuses for his behavior. but as things stand, we're all set up for a showdown. it's about time that marianne and willoughby came face to face. dun dun.

Frances:  before we finish, i did have one little conversation that i wanted to add in there. at the ball, mister palmer is there.

Emma:  well, are we gonna call it a ball little dance? sorry.

Frances:  impromptu. only a cold collation. can't call that a ball. the impromptu dance, the absolutely shockingly not real ball, mister palmer's there and avoids missus jennings to never coming near her. then eventually wanders over to eleanor and has a conversation which is very reminiscent to me of some of the ones in her juvenilia. oh

Emma:  oh oh, should we should we do a reading?

Frances:  okay.

Emma:  do you wanna be mister palmer or do you wanna be eleanor?

Frances:  i can be mr palmer.

Emma:  you be mister palmer, i'll be eleanor.

Frances:  i thought you were both in devonshire. did you? when do you go back again? i do not know. and thus ended their discourse. that is yeah. very austin in her juvenilia. and that's our discussion of chapter 27 of sense and sensibility by jane austen. i've been frances duncan. this has been emma dunning. thank you for listening, and we wish you happy reading.