the actor who played Willoughby in the 1995 adaptation has done it so well even though there was no scene of explanation. The tears in his eyes looking at Marianne and Brandon's wedding say anything. I think it's superior than ever, the power of acting
I love it so much that that actor (Greg Wise) and Emma Thompson fell in love during the filming of the movie, married, and are still together to this day. ❤
I do think that little bit is good, but for me it's not quite enough - I much prefer the 2008 adaptation, though I know a lot of people like the 1995 one!
Like, Edward isn't explicit, but Lucy probably played on his inexperience to try and convince him she was pg, or at least scared she was pg, and that he had to do the honourable thing. Then he was trapped, bc he was too honourable to not keep his promise. While Elinor admires this in him, a part of me gets a 'pearls before swine' vibe from Edward like he doesn't have enough self-respect here.
Willoughby is such a well written character. I think it is super interesting to compare him with Wickham specifically, they basically do the exact same thing but of course we actually get to meet Lydia and Georgiana. I do wonder how differently we would view him if we ever got to see Eliza, if she wasn't just someone we hear about.
Willoughby is a terrible person. The way he treated Eliza was criminal. I've always hated that whitewashing scene when he's talking to Elinor, accusing Eliza, and blaming her for being passionate and of "weak understanding". He's blaming a 15-16yo girl whom he seduced, impregnated, and abandoned to her fate without even having the decency to let her know he was not coming back. And his accountability is reduced to "Eh, maybe I could have treated her better. *shrug*" And then he proceeds to talk so badly about his wife, again blaming her for HIS treatment of Marianne. What a despicable whiny hypocrite. In the end, Elinor just being like - "he deserves my compassion" - is hard for me to swallow. Willoughby being such a loveable, charming, handsome young man leads to everybody jumping at the first opportunity to absolve him - Elinor, Marianne, and even the reader. EDIT: I wrote the above before watching the video. Just wanted to add that I loved your thoughts on the character.
Yes, he was never going to be the hero, after what he'd done. An element of self justification, in everything he says. However, I suspect a lot of 18th C men behaved, just like that: married for money, slept with women who weren't eligible. Mr Darcy's cousin admits as much, Lizzy isn't wealthy enough for him to be interested in. 'Our habits of expense make us too dependent, and there are not many in my rank of life who can afford to marry without some attention to money' - yes Willoughby clearly thinks Eliza should have realised that he was never serious about her, she's poor and illegitimate so she wasn't marriage material as far as he was concerned. She probably wasn't that astute and was very young.
@@clarepotter7584 I feel what makes W ultimately villainous, is not that he ultimately rejected Eliza - he could have paid her maintenance (like Harriet Smith's father did in Emma), and we appreciate that young Edward made a bad choice with Lucy, so W might have hurt himself and Eliza had W forced himself to marry her against his inclinations, but it is that he also rejected Marianne. He has the chance to be either dutiful with his moderate inheritance or to be happy with Marianne and make her happy, but with much less money, but he just panics and runs after the wealth and prioritizes that over everything else. Then he complains that he is so unhappy and hard done to, while admitting to a lot of behaviour that seems romantic to an emotionally immature person - stalking, imagining Marianne as a corpse - which are in themselves obviously huge red flags that he was not ready to make a mature decision, yet at the same time putting at least 2-3 young women in complicated, life-threatening emotional situations without really having any plan.
@@kahkah1986 I think by 18th C standards, just doing what he did, seducing a teenager, would make him illegible for heroics, though he has the appearance of it, rescuing the heroine, by sensation novels standards. Brandon is assumed to be the natural father of Eliza, but he isn't. What amuses me so much is how the 'villains (or the men not fit to be heroes) in the novels like singing and dancing the and heroes don't. 😆
@clarepotter7584 I think it is maybe just too soon for him to have got over the scandal? Like Brandon is only now eligible for another chance to be the romantic hero, Brandon tried to be honourable in the way he dealt with his earlier scandal, but he only marries much later, outwith the action of the book even. W could have been honourable like that without necessarily marrying Eliza, but marrying Marianne would still be scandalous so soon after the discovery of the other baby. Brandon holds back Willoughby's scandal to protect Marianne so they can marry though, it is Willoughby who panics when his aunt finds out, he realises by the end the aunt would have been fine with Marianne and would probably have helped pay off Eliza.
Looking at Austen's rake characters in terms of the damage they do to other people, Willoughby might come out on top (though Wickham might have done worse if Mr. Darcy hadn't intervened). Perhaps that makes it more tragic that he has some capacity for being better than he is. But he is vain to the end-- even in Chapter 44 he wants Elinor to relate his excuses to Marianne because he wants her to think well of him.
This longform video was a joy that does justice to Austen's creation. Willoughby is a complex character as you say, but Austen's skill is also in making her readers have complex responses to him. We shift in how we feel about him over the novel and different readers will finish up in different places by the end of the book. For myself, I was sucked into sympathy for him by chapter 44 as he was speaking and then berated myself afterwards for being taken in and allowing his openness and charm override a recognition of his selfishness and sense of male prerogative. Austen gives us the satisfaction of seeing that he pays a price for this, whilst balancing it out by letting us see he is not all bad and his future life not all misery. I look forward to a Mrs Jennings video one day.
Thanks, Ros! Perhaps Mrs Jennings will be next year :) Jane Austen is such a good writer, that I sort of think she does make us sympathise with Willougby and then question ourselves, as Elinor does!
I've only watched the first 5 minutes of your video so far, but I already like where you're going with Willoughby, in saying how complicated he is. When I first read S&S when I was 12, I was completely invested in W as the hero (Edward simply could not compare, and my 12-yr-old self could not take Col B seriously as a hero), and when W turned out to be so bad, I was in shock! I couldn't believe it, and I'm not sure I got that he had left a girl pregnant and unprotected. I read P&P next, and so was prepared for that book's W and was not as invested in him. I did not read S&S again for years, because I had been so badly let down about Willoughby. Now, 50 years later, I've had time to discover all the layers, go through all the phases of Jane Austen, as it were (I mean, they were MY phases, but it made her seem different each time), and agree with you about Ch 44; every time I read it, I'm almost surprised by how much more multi-faceted W is, and less villainous he seems. For Austen to have written a villain like this in her first book completely changes how villains were to be perceived thereafter.....no melodrama villain this! Ok, now back to your video! 🙂
It's such a great insight to compare W's relationship with Eliza to Edward's relationship with Lucy. You know, Edward also has the option to marry a rich woman he doesn't love to get him out of a sticky situation, so he and W each have a possible 3 women in their lives in this novel: the past -- Eliza and Lucy, the present -- Marianne and Elinor, and the future--Miss Grey and Miss Morton. But Edward wins the best future by honoring the past. Edward is Elinor's counterpart in sense as W is Marianne's in sensibility.
When I first read Sense and Sensibility I could not sympathise with Willoughby at all but after rereading it last year I realised how more complex of a character he is though. I really hope you do the Crawford siblings next year!
Oh, I love Crawford siblings. But then I guess anybody would would love Henry if another option is Edmund. Except of Fanny who's been conditioned to love Edmund b/c he was the only person who treated her half-decent.
I really enjoyed this video Katie, particularly the long form style. Loved the fascinating insights into Willoughby, who I hadn’t considered to be such a complicated character until I watched this, but you’re right, he’s so complex! I think of Willoughby as a kind of Henry Crawford & George Wickham hybrid: terrible with money, handsome, somewhat bored bad boy who is also very magnetic for both heroine and reader alike!
chapter 44 really earned my tears (mostly because of the irrevocable yet regrettable harm done by an impressionable individual in a toxic social environment, the sadness derived from the too-late awakening to the true feelings, also Elinor's strong reasoning and her good heart). S&S just makes me admire Miss Austen so much, it's just so good, i think i may soon become a janeite😂❤ in terms of Willoughby, it's a love-hate-sympathy relationship for me 😢 really love your video so inspiring and i also end up loving Mrs. Jennings, Sir John and the Palmers whom I dislike so much, though ridiculously funny, for being annoying at first, but Miss Austen is constantly pointing out my prejudice 😂
Wow what a great and amazing video love it and your brilliant and fantastic channel love it ❤❤❤please stay safe and healthy and prayers and blessings for you and your family love your Aussie family friend John ❤❤❤
I want to put in a request that for this Jane Austen July you do a character analysis on Mrs. Jennings! She grows on me every single time I reread the book and I think she’s such a fascinating and overlooked character with an interesting arc.
Thanks very much for another thought-provoking character analysis. Fascinating. Just one point: Dr Octavia Cox challenges the accepted interpretation that Elinor represents common sense and that Marianne is the over-emotional one. She points out that both are both. In particular, when Elinor sees Edward's ring containing a lock of hair she jumps into the irrational conclusion that it's her hair that Edward has somehow purloined. Elinor is fantasising from emotion and wishful thinking.
This is fascinating! I remember reading S&S for the first time at 12 or 13 years old, after watching the 1995 film adaptation, and saying "this is not the way things should happen!" because of chapter 44 😂. To me, at that age, that chapter was completely out of place and I prefered things as they were in the film. I reread the novel in 2021 but I don't remember how I felt about it... in any case, I agree with some of the other comments here, I think the regrets and sorrows that Willoughby is feeling towards the end of the story are shown in the film on that brief scene of him watching Marianne getting married to Brandon. I love these "Let's talk about..." videos!
I’d love a video on Mrs. Jennings ❤ I love her! I don’t believe that Marianne would’ve made Willoughby a better man. I think that in the end they would’ve reinforced each other’s bad habits. While very entertaining in her own right, Marianne had a lot of growing to do. She was typically the first to “cast the first stone”. Meeting Willoughby only made her worse if not encourage it. I would elaborate but my thumbs hurst 😅 Fantastic discussion!
This was such an interesting character breakdown! Now I'm comparing Willoughby and Henry Crawford in my head. Would the women in their lives made them better men if they could marry them? It's an interesting thought experiment. In either case I'm glad they didn't get the women they wanted.
This is brilliant! I have to say I have little compassion for Willoughby, including in chapter 44. He feels sorry for himself, not for Marianne. I would greatly enjoy if you did an analysis of Henry Crawford in Mansfield Park. Despite his honorable behaviour towards Fanny, I can’t help thinking he’s just amusing himself and would have treated her badly after a few weeks of mariage. I believe his nature is to be a rake and that his behaviour with Fanny was only temporary, but I haven’t examined the text closely to see if it supports my impression.
I liked very much your in depth analysis, Katie! I haven't never thought about Willoughby in this light and the comparison wit Edward and his past with Lucy is something very interesting and new for me. It could be said that bother Edward and Willoughby embodies sense and sensibility in some way. I never liked W to be honest but I can understand him better
Yeah:) I love your Jane Austen character analysis videos and was excited for this one! If it's alright, may I please ask your opinion on Edward's family estate going to his younger brother due to his mother being awful? I apologize if I'm overstepping by straying from Willoughby as I was wondering if I was the only one who felt this way (recently made a video on this, lol).
Thanks very much! I think maybe, for Austen, it's a happy ending for Edward in that he doesn't really want that inheritance? He kind of just wants to be a quiet clergyman, not a gentleman of fashion, so maybe it's a better life for him than the pressure the inheritance was putting on him before.
My mom and I just watched S&S 1995 the other day and I was reminding her of the Willoughby scene that was missing there! I'm not that fond of the S&S book as it seems a bit long and slow-paced at times. But I consider it to be a great book about the power one could hold over another when it came to money. It truly shows so many different situations when people are faced with how powerless they are on a "whim" of another. The scene with Willoughby is one of my favourite in the book and he is most certainly my favourite character there. He has so much depth to his character and story and when I read the book for the second time, it was an entirely different experience. I understand why the scene was taken out of the movie. It's quite long for a movie as it is. But I feel it's very important and I'm not sure the dialogue between Elinor and Marianne at the end is sufficient. It tells more about Marianne's personal development than Willoughby's character. I don't see Willoughby as either a villain or a pathetic fool, I see him as a human. I see him as a young man who is a product of his upbringing and societal pressures. One who (in a panic) did the only thing that he believed he could when it came to his financial situation. And considering a certain marriage from Mansfield Park, I can't say his not marrying Marianne was ultimately a wrong decision. And let us remind ourselves that Eliza was a woman born out of wedlock/was of questionable parentage, making her stand somewhat outside of the societal structure of the time. It's not like Willoughby was with a gentleman's daughter without intending to marry her. (Nope, I really didn't enjoy writing that...) And we know precious little about their situation and relationship. Was Eliza fooled by Willoughby, expecting elopement followed by marriage? Or was she going into the relationship and its sexual nature fully consenting? Was she seduced or could it even be she who approached him? My current sensibilities don't allow me to judge or pity either of them very strongly when I don't have the answers. I feel like the devil's advocate here. It doesn't help that we are speaking of people that might find themselves in reduced circumstances much below what they were used to and expect in their life... but they are not truly poor. They don't have to leave the group they were born to and work for someone else. It would be very interesting to read a book (written by Austen's contemporary) about someone like Eliza or perhaps someone who was born a gentleman/gentleman's daughter and found themselves working. A book written without judgment against such a person or the people they now share the social class with. My cynical question is: Do we know how Mrs Smith found out? Could it be Brandon hoping to save his ward but perhaps, in the back of his head, hoping that once Eliza and Willoughby marry, Marianne would find out and break off her attachment to Willoughby quite cleanly, giving Brandon a chance?
How succinctly Austen conveyed the risks of any female in the marriage market; the legal avenues for a broken engagement were in terms of compensation for lost youth and opportunity to form a good marriage, not to protect a mother and child as in Eliza’s case. When Marianne says there was no engagement, she has no legal recourse as she prefers the emotional commitment over the open engagement (heart over head.) And Willowby benefits from her emotion, while she loses the small protection Georgian society offers her as a gentleman’s daughter. I think Edward was a child when he agreed to marry Lucy, he had a secret engagement because he was not of age not because he didn’t want to marry. But 5 years later he has changed his mind, he has matured and no longer wants Lucy. Him avoiding any commitments, not speaking to either woman in his life shows how much more he needs to mature, but when given an ultimatum marry Lucy or inherit, he chooses to keep his word despite it being unenforceable (Lucy has no one to enforce it even if he were not a child at the time). I wonder if Edward hoped that Lucy would drop him when she knew how poor her “catch” was?
I agree Willoughby is obviously a product of his time, and because of this, Brandon was willing to keep quiet about the scandal to protect Marianne and allow her and Willoughby to marry, like it would have been more expected that a young man would have a few emotional entanglements, and her extreme youth would be less shocking than it would be now, and after all, as the video pounts out, Edward had one as well, with a teenage Lucy. Mrs Smith got it from a cousin I think who was maybe hoping to get Willoughby disinherited so they could get the estate. I'm guessing because they are all neighbours there's a limit to how secret things can be kept.
He's the absolute best of the Austen men in every way, and much superior to Mr. Darcy. He is not a game player, and is confident without being arrogant or full of himself. He's totally a grown up and that's very appealing.
I haven't - I've more done the minor characters, because I feel like they're more forgotten - but I do love Mr Knightley! He is my favourite Austen hero :)
While I think W is too selfish, Edward is too unselfish. While it seems more right to push ahead with his marriage to Lucy, he doesn't love her, so his marriage will be both dishonest and bring real pain to at least 2 people - Elinor as well as himself - and really, given the long-term effects of marrying someone you don't love when you are in love with someone else, he will eventually hurt Lucy too. His extreme emphasis on doing the right thing, rather than what he actually wants to do, is as unbalanced as Marianne or Willoughby, and it leaves him open to being manipulated by schemers such as Lucy and indeed Robert, who ends up taking his inheritance in the suspiciously fortuitous disinheritance. The original meaning of the term sensibility, which (I think?) is still actually used in SS (like when Marianne says 'I would have been sensible of it, Elinor' or words to that effect) was about being aware of what is going on around you, like using your 5 senses. Edward doesn't seem to pick up on enough around him re Lucy and also Elinor's affection for him, vs W who seems very alert to everything but is so focused on the main material chance, i.e. how it can benefit him, as is Lucy, so they don't have the new type of sensibility, even although they seem to. Arguably, the idea of being emotionally receptive/ sensitive would actually help Edward to act to take control of his situation.
Edward is infuriatingly wimpy for such a long time in the novel, it's quite frustrating. He, of course, eventually redeems himself but until he does it can be bit much.
@@MothGirl007 yes, even at the end when Lucy has obviously married Robert for the cash, it is still unclear whether Edward realizes he was being played!
I think Edward does need to be seen very much in terms of his time. Marriage at this point in time was, yes, partly about love, but it was also about security and money. In proposing to Lucy, Edward has effectively offered her life and financial support as much as love, so that's a big deal to turn back on. Also, at this point in time, it was basically considered appropriate for women to break off engagements, but not for men - if a man broke off an engagement, he could be sued in the courts for 'breach of promise' and asked to financially recompense his rejected fiancee!
@@katiejlumsden you would think so, but in SS Edward's family clearly try to reason with him to get him to break it off, rather than immediately speaking of it as a done deal, which suggests that it wasn't unheard of for men to behave in that way. Robert, as a last resort, goes to Lucy to try and get her to break it off after Mrs Ferrars (at least) has failed with Edward. Lucy obviously plays Edward''s, and then Robert's, honour to her own advantage. Willoughby plays on his female victim's good nature and desire to fall 'in love' in a similar way to Lucy imo.
It just occurred to me that the letter itself is not that horrible when we realize that it was written by his fiancée. But it IS horrible because it was sent with Willoughby's approval and knowledge that many of the things that are stated in the letter are just no true and thus cruel.
MD on JW and his affair with EW. "I could never have been happy with him, after knowing, as sooner or later I must have known all this - I should have had no confidence, no esteem" (Ch 47 - or Vol 3 Ch 11) At the beginning of the chapter, we get Mrs Dashwood's reaction to Elinor's re-telling of W's monologue "Nothing could do away what (Marianne) had suffered through his means, nor remove the guilt of his conduct towards Eliza.........Had Mrs Dashwood......heard Willoughby's story from himself - had she witnessed his distress and been under the influence of his countenance and his manner......her compassion would have been much greater" In other words, W was a brilliant actor I think that you are too soft on W. Speaking of Eliza Williams he remarks on "the violence of her passions, the weakness of her understanding - I do not mean, however, to defend myself"(!!!) He goes on to pour scorn on Mrs Smith's common decency "In the height of her morality, good woman! - she offered to forgive the past if I would marry Eliza. That could not be." Why not, if he merely wanted to avoid "the dread of poverty"? Of Miss Grey he is almost equally despicable (he doesn't injure her in quite the same way) - ""I had reason to believe myself secure of my present wife, if I chose to address her": so presumably he thought that Miss Grey was attracted to him and he had only to convince that the feeling was mutual. How cold-blooded can you get? He has the nerve to criticise his wife's jealousy (which probably existed) and then expresses his jealousy of anybody who might marry Marianne - double standards, I think. He says of his wife "She knew I had no regard for her when we married" - another palpable lie, since he is confident that his "address" to her would be received favourably. Sorry, Willoughby is a despicable liar, who doesn't care for the trouble he causes, he merely wishes to lay the responsibility on anybody but himself relying on his personal charisma to carry him through.
Willoughby is a selfish character that doesn't admit his selfishness almost making him worse than Wickham or even Henry Crawford. They acknowledge that they're scoundrels and rogues while Willoughby thinks himself a victim. I do think he loved Marianne, but it was impure and selfish love, and not helping her become a better person.
I think Eliza was 16 when she met Willoughby. (Bradon says: 'It is now three years ago (she had just reached her fourteenth year,) that I removed her from school, to place her under the care of a very respectable woman, residing in Dorsetshire, who had the charge of four or five other girls of about the same time of life; and for two years I had every reason to be pleased with her situation. But last February, almost a twelvemonth back, she suddenly disappeared.' I also had it in my head that she was 15 before this reread, so I think maybe they made her 15 in one of the adaptations. That feels different to me, but I think probably because in the UK, where I live, 16 is the age of consent, but obviously regardless she was still a lot younger than Willoughby and the power dynamics were definitely very unequal.
@@katiejlumsden She's 15 in both the film adaptations I saw. It makes a bit more sense that she's 16 in the book. It's terrible because he knows he can't marry her regardless.
Personally, I see many parallels between Willoughby and Henry Crawford. Both absolutely terrible men, who serve to cheekly subvert the trope of the rake who gets reformed by the love of the chaste and pure heroine. Would he really be redeemed had he married Marianne? His treatment to Eliza Williams would not have changed. The way he talks about Eliza also reminds me of the way Wickham talks about Lydia (as reported by Mrs Gardiner), not taking a single ounce of responsibility for seducing a 16 years old girl.
it's not exactly the video's subject but have you ever heard this interpretation: that Marianne got pregnant of Willoughby and had a misscarrying? that's why she got sick and almost dye... what do you think about that?
I jiust can't bring myself to sympathise Willoughby at all.Especially after what I saw in Edward and Colonel Brandon.They bring him out as an absolutely evil character.
Willoughby is worse than Wickham. Nothing that was written in Chapter 44 absolves him of that "deep in hardened villainy" Elinor once accused him of. On the contrary - the speech he made to Elinor was vile.
the actor who played Willoughby in the 1995 adaptation has done it so well even though there was no scene of explanation. The tears in his eyes looking at Marianne and Brandon's wedding say anything. I think it's superior than ever, the power of acting
I love it so much that that actor (Greg Wise) and Emma Thompson fell in love during the filming of the movie, married, and are still together to this day. ❤
I do think that little bit is good, but for me it's not quite enough - I much prefer the 2008 adaptation, though I know a lot of people like the 1995 one!
Wow I never thought of comparing how Willoughby treats Eliza to the way Edward treats Lucy...that just blew my mind
Like, Edward isn't explicit, but Lucy probably played on his inexperience to try and convince him she was pg, or at least scared she was pg, and that he had to do the honourable thing. Then he was trapped, bc he was too honourable to not keep his promise. While Elinor admires this in him, a part of me gets a 'pearls before swine' vibe from Edward like he doesn't have enough self-respect here.
Willoughby is such a well written character. I think it is super interesting to compare him with Wickham specifically, they basically do the exact same thing but of course we actually get to meet Lydia and Georgiana. I do wonder how differently we would view him if we ever got to see Eliza, if she wasn't just someone we hear about.
That is very true - Eliza is entirely off the page, so we know very little about her.
As is Miss Grey: we get some gossip from Mrs Jennings and Willoughby's monologue - but we never hear anything from Miss Grey herself
Willoughby is a terrible person. The way he treated Eliza was criminal. I've always hated that whitewashing scene when he's talking to Elinor, accusing Eliza, and blaming her for being passionate and of "weak understanding". He's blaming a 15-16yo girl whom he seduced, impregnated, and abandoned to her fate without even having the decency to let her know he was not coming back. And his accountability is reduced to "Eh, maybe I could have treated her better. *shrug*" And then he proceeds to talk so badly about his wife, again blaming her for HIS treatment of Marianne. What a despicable whiny hypocrite. In the end, Elinor just being like - "he deserves my compassion" - is hard for me to swallow. Willoughby being such a loveable, charming, handsome young man leads to everybody jumping at the first opportunity to absolve him - Elinor, Marianne, and even the reader.
EDIT: I wrote the above before watching the video. Just wanted to add that I loved your thoughts on the character.
Yes, he was never going to be the hero, after what he'd done. An element of self justification, in everything he says. However, I suspect a lot of 18th C men behaved, just like that: married for money, slept with women who weren't eligible. Mr Darcy's cousin admits as much, Lizzy isn't wealthy enough for him to be interested in. 'Our habits of expense make us too dependent, and there are not many in my rank of life who can afford to marry without some attention to money' - yes Willoughby clearly thinks Eliza should have realised that he was never serious about her, she's poor and illegitimate so she wasn't marriage material as far as he was concerned. She probably wasn't that astute and was very young.
@@clarepotter7584 I feel what makes W ultimately villainous, is not that he ultimately rejected Eliza - he could have paid her maintenance (like Harriet Smith's father did in Emma), and we appreciate that young Edward made a bad choice with Lucy, so W might have hurt himself and Eliza had W forced himself to marry her against his inclinations, but it is that he also rejected Marianne. He has the chance to be either dutiful with his moderate inheritance or to be happy with Marianne and make her happy, but with much less money, but he just panics and runs after the wealth and prioritizes that over everything else.
Then he complains that he is so unhappy and hard done to, while admitting to a lot of behaviour that seems romantic to an emotionally immature person - stalking, imagining Marianne as a corpse - which are in themselves obviously huge red flags that he was not ready to make a mature decision, yet at the same time putting at least 2-3 young women in complicated, life-threatening emotional situations without really having any plan.
@@kahkah1986 I think by 18th C standards, just doing what he did, seducing a teenager, would make him illegible for heroics, though he has the appearance of it, rescuing the heroine, by sensation novels standards. Brandon is assumed to be the natural father of Eliza, but he isn't. What amuses me so much is how the 'villains (or the men not fit to be heroes) in the novels like singing and dancing the and heroes don't. 😆
@clarepotter7584 I think it is maybe just too soon for him to have got over the scandal? Like Brandon is only now eligible for another chance to be the romantic hero, Brandon tried to be honourable in the way he dealt with his earlier scandal, but he only marries much later, outwith the action of the book even. W could have been honourable like that without necessarily marrying Eliza, but marrying Marianne would still be scandalous so soon after the discovery of the other baby. Brandon holds back Willoughby's scandal to protect Marianne so they can marry though, it is Willoughby who panics when his aunt finds out, he realises by the end the aunt would have been fine with Marianne and would probably have helped pay off Eliza.
@@kahkah1986 I think it's more that Mrs Jenkins is a well meaning gossip, not reliable information! 😀
Looking at Austen's rake characters in terms of the damage they do to other people, Willoughby might come out on top (though Wickham might have done worse if Mr. Darcy hadn't intervened). Perhaps that makes it more tragic that he has some capacity for being better than he is. But he is vain to the end-- even in Chapter 44 he wants Elinor to relate his excuses to Marianne because he wants her to think well of him.
This longform video was a joy that does justice to Austen's creation. Willoughby is a complex character as you say, but Austen's skill is also in making her readers have complex responses to him. We shift in how we feel about him over the novel and different readers will finish up in different places by the end of the book. For myself, I was sucked into sympathy for him by chapter 44 as he was speaking and then berated myself afterwards for being taken in and allowing his openness and charm override a recognition of his selfishness and sense of male prerogative. Austen gives us the satisfaction of seeing that he pays a price for this, whilst balancing it out by letting us see he is not all bad and his future life not all misery.
I look forward to a Mrs Jennings video one day.
Thanks, Ros! Perhaps Mrs Jennings will be next year :)
Jane Austen is such a good writer, that I sort of think she does make us sympathise with Willougby and then question ourselves, as Elinor does!
I've only watched the first 5 minutes of your video so far, but I already like where you're going with Willoughby, in saying how complicated he is. When I first read S&S when I was 12, I was completely invested in W as the hero (Edward simply could not compare, and my 12-yr-old self could not take Col B seriously as a hero), and when W turned out to be so bad, I was in shock! I couldn't believe it, and I'm not sure I got that he had left a girl pregnant and unprotected. I read P&P next, and so was prepared for that book's W and was not as invested in him. I did not read S&S again for years, because I had been so badly let down about Willoughby. Now, 50 years later, I've had time to discover all the layers, go through all the phases of Jane Austen, as it were (I mean, they were MY phases, but it made her seem different each time), and agree with you about Ch 44; every time I read it, I'm almost surprised by how much more multi-faceted W is, and less villainous he seems. For Austen to have written a villain like this in her first book completely changes how villains were to be perceived thereafter.....no melodrama villain this! Ok, now back to your video! 🙂
It's such a great insight to compare W's relationship with Eliza to Edward's relationship with Lucy. You know, Edward also has the option to marry a rich woman he doesn't love to get him out of a sticky situation, so he and W each have a possible 3 women in their lives in this novel: the past -- Eliza and Lucy, the present -- Marianne and Elinor, and the future--Miss Grey and Miss Morton. But Edward wins the best future by honoring the past. Edward is Elinor's counterpart in sense as W is Marianne's in sensibility.
Yes, definitely - I hadn't thought of comparing Miss Morton and Miss Grey, but I should have done. So interesting!
When I first read Sense and Sensibility I could not sympathise with Willoughby at all but after rereading it last year I realised how more complex of a character he is though. I really hope you do the Crawford siblings next year!
Oh, I love Crawford siblings. But then I guess anybody would would love Henry if another option is Edmund. Except of Fanny who's been conditioned to love Edmund b/c he was the only person who treated her half-decent.
I have a huge soft spot for Frank and would love an episode on him or Mrs Jennings.
I loved this Katy. I’d never thought Willoghby through in this way before. Thank you. I’m going to watch this again.
I really enjoyed this video Katie, particularly the long form style.
Loved the fascinating insights into Willoughby, who I hadn’t considered to be such a complicated character until I watched this, but you’re right, he’s so complex!
I think of Willoughby as a kind of Henry Crawford & George Wickham hybrid: terrible with money, handsome, somewhat bored bad boy who is also very magnetic for both heroine and reader alike!
I know he’s not a major character but I’m fascinated and endlessly amused by Robert Ferrers. Any hope?
chapter 44 really earned my tears (mostly because of the irrevocable yet regrettable harm done by an impressionable individual in a toxic social environment, the sadness derived from the too-late awakening to the true feelings, also Elinor's strong reasoning and her good heart). S&S just makes me admire Miss Austen so much, it's just so good, i think i may soon become a janeite😂❤ in terms of Willoughby, it's a love-hate-sympathy relationship for me 😢 really love your video so inspiring and i also end up loving Mrs. Jennings, Sir John and the Palmers whom I dislike so much, though ridiculously funny, for being annoying at first, but Miss Austen is constantly pointing out my prejudice 😂
I've been waiting for the 'Let's Talk About' so excited!
Wow what a great and amazing video love it and your brilliant and fantastic channel love it ❤❤❤please stay safe and healthy and prayers and blessings for you and your family love your Aussie family friend John ❤❤❤
I want to put in a request that for this Jane Austen July you do a character analysis on Mrs. Jennings! She grows on me every single time I reread the book and I think she’s such a fascinating and overlooked character with an interesting arc.
She's going on my list :) I really like her and find her very interesting.
Can u please do a deep dive on Mr Darcy !!!
Thanks very much for another thought-provoking character analysis. Fascinating.
Just one point: Dr Octavia Cox challenges the accepted interpretation that Elinor represents common sense and that Marianne is the over-emotional one. She points out that both are both. In particular, when Elinor sees Edward's ring containing a lock of hair she jumps into the irrational conclusion that it's her hair that Edward has somehow purloined. Elinor is fantasising from emotion and wishful thinking.
Ooo, interesting! I really like Dr Octavia Cox.
Enjoyed this immensely.
Another Great video
This is fascinating! I remember reading S&S for the first time at 12 or 13 years old, after watching the 1995 film adaptation, and saying "this is not the way things should happen!" because of chapter 44 😂. To me, at that age, that chapter was completely out of place and I prefered things as they were in the film. I reread the novel in 2021 but I don't remember how I felt about it... in any case, I agree with some of the other comments here, I think the regrets and sorrows that Willoughby is feeling towards the end of the story are shown in the film on that brief scene of him watching Marianne getting married to Brandon.
I love these "Let's talk about..." videos!
I’d love a video on Mrs. Jennings ❤ I love her! I don’t believe that Marianne would’ve made Willoughby a better man. I think that in the end they would’ve reinforced each other’s bad habits. While very entertaining in her own right, Marianne had a lot of growing to do. She was typically the first to “cast the first stone”. Meeting Willoughby only made her worse if not encourage it. I would elaborate but my thumbs hurst 😅 Fantastic discussion!
Mrs Jennings is wonderful! :)
This was such an interesting character breakdown! Now I'm comparing Willoughby and Henry Crawford in my head. Would the women in their lives made them better men if they could marry them? It's an interesting thought experiment. In either case I'm glad they didn't get the women they wanted.
Yes, I definitely need to do a video on Henry Crawford in the future!
This is brilliant! I have to say I have little compassion for Willoughby, including in chapter 44. He feels sorry for himself, not for Marianne.
I would greatly enjoy if you did an analysis of Henry Crawford in Mansfield Park. Despite his honorable behaviour towards Fanny, I can’t help thinking he’s just amusing himself and would have treated her badly after a few weeks of mariage. I believe his nature is to be a rake and that his behaviour with Fanny was only temporary, but I haven’t examined the text closely to see if it supports my impression.
I totally agree with you about Henry Crawford - shallow and totally unworthy.
Henry Crawford is definitely on my list for some point in the future, because I feel much more divided about him, and I sort of like him, haha.
I liked very much your in depth analysis, Katie! I haven't never thought about Willoughby in this light and the comparison wit Edward and his past with Lucy is something very interesting and new for me. It could be said that bother Edward and Willoughby embodies sense and sensibility in some way. I never liked W to be honest but I can understand him better
Thanks :)
Yeah:) I love your Jane Austen character analysis videos and was excited for this one! If it's alright, may I please ask your opinion on Edward's family estate going to his younger brother due to his mother being awful? I apologize if I'm overstepping by straying from Willoughby as I was wondering if I was the only one who felt this way (recently made a video on this, lol).
Thanks very much! I think maybe, for Austen, it's a happy ending for Edward in that he doesn't really want that inheritance? He kind of just wants to be a quiet clergyman, not a gentleman of fashion, so maybe it's a better life for him than the pressure the inheritance was putting on him before.
@@katiejlumsden Thanks:) True, you make a good point!
My mom and I just watched S&S 1995 the other day and I was reminding her of the Willoughby scene that was missing there!
I'm not that fond of the S&S book as it seems a bit long and slow-paced at times. But I consider it to be a great book about the power one could hold over another when it came to money. It truly shows so many different situations when people are faced with how powerless they are on a "whim" of another. The scene with Willoughby is one of my favourite in the book and he is most certainly my favourite character there. He has so much depth to his character and story and when I read the book for the second time, it was an entirely different experience. I understand why the scene was taken out of the movie. It's quite long for a movie as it is. But I feel it's very important and I'm not sure the dialogue between Elinor and Marianne at the end is sufficient. It tells more about Marianne's personal development than Willoughby's character.
I don't see Willoughby as either a villain or a pathetic fool, I see him as a human. I see him as a young man who is a product of his upbringing and societal pressures. One who (in a panic) did the only thing that he believed he could when it came to his financial situation. And considering a certain marriage from Mansfield Park, I can't say his not marrying Marianne was ultimately a wrong decision. And let us remind ourselves that Eliza was a woman born out of wedlock/was of questionable parentage, making her stand somewhat outside of the societal structure of the time. It's not like Willoughby was with a gentleman's daughter without intending to marry her. (Nope, I really didn't enjoy writing that...) And we know precious little about their situation and relationship. Was Eliza fooled by Willoughby, expecting elopement followed by marriage? Or was she going into the relationship and its sexual nature fully consenting? Was she seduced or could it even be she who approached him? My current sensibilities don't allow me to judge or pity either of them very strongly when I don't have the answers.
I feel like the devil's advocate here. It doesn't help that we are speaking of people that might find themselves in reduced circumstances much below what they were used to and expect in their life... but they are not truly poor. They don't have to leave the group they were born to and work for someone else. It would be very interesting to read a book (written by Austen's contemporary) about someone like Eliza or perhaps someone who was born a gentleman/gentleman's daughter and found themselves working. A book written without judgment against such a person or the people they now share the social class with.
My cynical question is: Do we know how Mrs Smith found out? Could it be Brandon hoping to save his ward but perhaps, in the back of his head, hoping that once Eliza and Willoughby marry, Marianne would find out and break off her attachment to Willoughby quite cleanly, giving Brandon a chance?
How succinctly Austen conveyed the risks of any female in the marriage market; the legal avenues for a broken engagement were in terms of compensation for lost youth and opportunity to form a good marriage, not to protect a mother and child as in Eliza’s case.
When Marianne says there was no engagement, she has no legal recourse as she prefers the emotional commitment over the open engagement (heart over head.) And Willowby benefits from her emotion, while she loses the small protection Georgian society offers her as a gentleman’s daughter.
I think Edward was a child when he agreed to marry Lucy, he had a secret engagement because he was not of age not because he didn’t want to marry. But 5 years later he has changed his mind, he has matured and no longer wants Lucy.
Him avoiding any commitments, not speaking to either woman in his life shows how much more he needs to mature, but when given an ultimatum marry Lucy or inherit, he chooses to keep his word despite it being unenforceable (Lucy has no one to enforce it even if he were not a child at the time). I wonder if Edward hoped that Lucy would drop him when she knew how poor her “catch” was?
I agree Willoughby is obviously a product of his time, and because of this, Brandon was willing to keep quiet about the scandal to protect Marianne and allow her and Willoughby to marry, like it would have been more expected that a young man would have a few emotional entanglements, and her extreme youth would be less shocking than it would be now, and after all, as the video pounts out, Edward had one as well, with a teenage Lucy. Mrs Smith got it from a cousin I think who was maybe hoping to get Willoughby disinherited so they could get the estate. I'm guessing because they are all neighbours there's a limit to how secret things can be kept.
I'm finding everyone's discussions on this so interesting :)
Have you done one on Mr.Knightly? He is the best MMC of Jane Austen in my opinion. He is underrated especially in comparison to Mr.Darcy.
@elainegallagher2949 same here
He's the absolute best of the Austen men in every way, and much superior to Mr. Darcy. He is not a game player, and is confident without being arrogant or full of himself. He's totally a grown up and that's very appealing.
I haven't - I've more done the minor characters, because I feel like they're more forgotten - but I do love Mr Knightley! He is my favourite Austen hero :)
While I think W is too selfish, Edward is too unselfish. While it seems more right to push ahead with his marriage to Lucy, he doesn't love her, so his marriage will be both dishonest and bring real pain to at least 2 people - Elinor as well as himself - and really, given the long-term effects of marrying someone you don't love when you are in love with someone else, he will eventually hurt Lucy too. His extreme emphasis on doing the right thing, rather than what he actually wants to do, is as unbalanced as Marianne or Willoughby, and it leaves him open to being manipulated by schemers such as Lucy and indeed Robert, who ends up taking his inheritance in the suspiciously fortuitous disinheritance.
The original meaning of the term sensibility, which (I think?) is still actually used in SS (like when Marianne says 'I would have been sensible of it, Elinor' or words to that effect) was about being aware of what is going on around you, like using your 5 senses. Edward doesn't seem to pick up on enough around him re Lucy and also Elinor's affection for him, vs W who seems very alert to everything but is so focused on the main material chance, i.e. how it can benefit him, as is Lucy, so they don't have the new type of sensibility, even although they seem to. Arguably, the idea of being emotionally receptive/ sensitive would actually help Edward to act to take control of his situation.
Edward is infuriatingly wimpy for such a long time in the novel, it's quite frustrating. He, of course, eventually redeems himself but until he does it can be bit much.
@@MothGirl007 yes, even at the end when Lucy has obviously married Robert for the cash, it is still unclear whether Edward realizes he was being played!
I think Edward does need to be seen very much in terms of his time. Marriage at this point in time was, yes, partly about love, but it was also about security and money. In proposing to Lucy, Edward has effectively offered her life and financial support as much as love, so that's a big deal to turn back on. Also, at this point in time, it was basically considered appropriate for women to break off engagements, but not for men - if a man broke off an engagement, he could be sued in the courts for 'breach of promise' and asked to financially recompense his rejected fiancee!
@@katiejlumsden you would think so, but in SS Edward's family clearly try to reason with him to get him to break it off, rather than immediately speaking of it as a done deal, which suggests that it wasn't unheard of for men to behave in that way. Robert, as a last resort, goes to Lucy to try and get her to break it off after Mrs Ferrars (at least) has failed with Edward. Lucy obviously plays Edward''s, and then Robert's, honour to her own advantage. Willoughby plays on his female victim's good nature and desire to fall 'in love' in a similar way to Lucy imo.
It just occurred to me that the letter itself is not that horrible when we realize that it was written by his fiancée. But it IS horrible because it was sent with Willoughby's approval and knowledge that many of the things that are stated in the letter are just no true and thus cruel.
MD on JW and his affair with EW. "I could never have been happy with him, after knowing, as sooner or later I must have known all this - I should have had no confidence, no esteem" (Ch 47 - or Vol 3 Ch 11)
At the beginning of the chapter, we get Mrs Dashwood's reaction to Elinor's re-telling of W's monologue "Nothing could do away what (Marianne) had suffered through his means, nor remove the guilt of his conduct towards Eliza.........Had Mrs Dashwood......heard Willoughby's story from himself - had she witnessed his distress and been under the influence of his countenance and his manner......her compassion would have been much greater" In other words, W was a brilliant actor
I think that you are too soft on W. Speaking of Eliza Williams he remarks on "the violence of her passions, the weakness of her understanding - I do not mean, however, to defend myself"(!!!) He goes on to pour scorn on Mrs Smith's common decency "In the height of her morality, good woman! - she offered to forgive the past if I would marry Eliza. That could not be." Why not, if he merely wanted to avoid "the dread of poverty"?
Of Miss Grey he is almost equally despicable (he doesn't injure her in quite the same way) - ""I had reason to believe myself secure of my present wife, if I chose to address her": so presumably he thought that Miss Grey was attracted to him and he had only to convince that the feeling was mutual. How cold-blooded can you get? He has the nerve to criticise his wife's jealousy (which probably existed) and then expresses his jealousy of anybody who might marry Marianne - double standards, I think. He says of his wife "She knew I had no regard for her when we married" - another palpable lie, since he is confident that his "address" to her would be received favourably.
Sorry, Willoughby is a despicable liar, who doesn't care for the trouble he causes, he merely wishes to lay the responsibility on anybody but himself relying on his personal charisma to carry him through.
Willoughby is a selfish character that doesn't admit his selfishness almost making him worse than Wickham or even Henry Crawford. They acknowledge that they're scoundrels and rogues while Willoughby thinks himself a victim. I do think he loved Marianne, but it was impure and selfish love, and not helping her become a better person.
He knew he couldn't marry Beth. He knew she was only 15. He seduced and lied to her. There isn't any defense.
I think Eliza was 16 when she met Willoughby. (Bradon says: 'It is now three years ago (she had just reached her fourteenth year,) that I removed her from school, to place her under the care of a very respectable woman, residing in Dorsetshire, who had the charge of four or five other girls of about the same time of life; and for two years I had every reason to be pleased with her situation. But last February, almost a twelvemonth back, she suddenly disappeared.' I also had it in my head that she was 15 before this reread, so I think maybe they made her 15 in one of the adaptations. That feels different to me, but I think probably because in the UK, where I live, 16 is the age of consent, but obviously regardless she was still a lot younger than Willoughby and the power dynamics were definitely very unequal.
@@katiejlumsden She's 15 in both the film adaptations I saw. It makes a bit more sense that she's 16 in the book. It's terrible because he knows he can't marry her regardless.
Personally, I see many parallels between Willoughby and Henry Crawford.
Both absolutely terrible men, who serve to cheekly subvert the trope of the rake who gets reformed by the love of the chaste and pure heroine.
Would he really be redeemed had he married Marianne? His treatment to Eliza Williams would not have changed.
The way he talks about Eliza also reminds me of the way Wickham talks about Lydia (as reported by Mrs Gardiner), not taking a single ounce of responsibility for seducing a 16 years old girl.
it's not exactly the video's subject but have you ever heard this interpretation: that Marianne got pregnant of Willoughby and had a misscarrying? that's why she got sick and almost dye... what do you think about that?
I haven't heard that theory. I don't hugely credit it, but it's interesting to think about.
I jiust can't bring myself to sympathise Willoughby at all.Especially after what I saw in Edward and Colonel Brandon.They bring him out as an absolutely evil character.
Willoughby would not have remained a good person with Marianne. I could see him having affairs and ultimately still descending into a rake!
Willoughby is worse than Wickham. Nothing that was written in Chapter 44 absolves him of that "deep in hardened villainy" Elinor once accused him of. On the contrary - the speech he made to Elinor was vile.