Jane Austen couldn't spell!

[Ecurb]

I didn't find P&P better than Persuasion, on the contrary in fact. Sure, P&P is lighter and funnier than Persuasion, but that does not signify necessarily that the first is better than the last. I found Persuasion more subtle and more subdued, but not at all less to the point. If anything it was less naïve and more profound. Clearly, to me, the work of a person who has got older and who has more of a pragmatic look on life. P&P was rather black and white.

I think most Austen fans think either Persuasion or Emma is her best novel (although all six of the novels are similar in quality). The non-Austen-fan public prefers Pride and Prejudice for its romantic, Cinderella story and its witty, charming heroine. However, snooty, snobbish, and deluded Emma is just as much fun as Elizabeth, and Anne Eliot is just as charming, albeit less flashy.

[kiki1982]

Haha, I think I agree with that assessment.
You are right about the similar quality, I think. There is not something that is really really better than another. They all have something that is better than the other novels.

I think Emma, for me, is the most world-wise of everything that I have read (all but MP). It really carries the satire she used in P&P a little further. It is no longer about manners and type-people and what those people have to do in order to obtain what they want, but it's about perception. That sub-plot was brilliant. The voice of the 'community' is great.

Persuasion had more of a waw factor in another way... A subtle way. Despite the funny characters (Admiral Croft who almost crashes into the trees on the side of the road because he can't drive a carriage ), the satire is blacker I think. There is not a lot of mirth. Though it does sparkle at the end. That last comparison was the most imaginative end. In view of her first version (classic explosion when they are left alone, similar to Jane and Bingley, but the reader is not turned away from it), it was a lot better.

Ah.