Sense and Sensibility -Jane Austen

A read  of Jane Austen ( particularly this book)   seems a bit  over bearing or even verbose to say a little :) . Her ability and desire to put expressions and inferences ,general opinion and belief , inside every single statement that the character makes, tries your patience at times.  With a generation , so short and hastily losing on the virtue of patience, this might not be a so hard-to-put down book.

And for someone fond and carved in ways of Jeffrey Archer, Dan Brown or even John Grisham ( by choice or habit) , picking this book seemed like a mistake . A mistake that I didn't intend to take beyond first chapter.
 I would like my read to be concentrating around the plot and characters and not on the length of a line that runs into a paragraph, Each time!! A line that is pregnant with more expressions than the message it wanted to deliver.

I loved the simplistic representation and effortless story-telling of 'Almost Single', which is not hugely distant from the category of this novel. That is ,I would say, a vacation time novel, to read.

But when you crave for a little more than just good story, read this. 'Sense and Sensibility' ,is more than just the story the novel narrates. Yes, I did pick up the book one more time, against myself though!

With every page I read, I saw the era she wrote about. An era which is difficult to relate to, not only in diction but also  in mannerism. I was more and more willing to give her the liberal benefit, for she was writing of a bygone time. Her words sounded and read differently , She would use chuse ( for choose),  handsome for the appearance of a lady ( I dare say we use that for men with caution too :) ) and handful non-existent usages.  English and society has come a long way since then. Courtesy and chivalry have new-found meanings, the pressing-necessity that she sees for them in a person, Am afraid, isn't easy to justify.

Her style of writing grows on you ,as you progress the story. And you would be amazed, without much exaggeration, to see yourself, under the influence of such usage, as shocking as it may seem to those familiar to you.( That was my attempt to her style :) but far shorter from her lengths)

There is an interesting amount of details on the locations, the setting are described in a delightful way ,it almost instantly creates a visual effect on the reader ,as if you were living the age and society of that time. The pace is almost stagnant at times, but there is no undertone she uses in depicting the mindset of society where the matter of money forces a change in matter of hearts and one finds no shame in accepting it. The characters like Miss  Jennings and Miss Lucy,  more or less sum up the expectations and priorities that society had for women back then. The Dashwood sisters ,though play a similar society, have a more relate-able this-day like sensibility.

 The story line is sweet and happily ever-after take away, but the something that I would keep from the novel is its depiction of the lost-world (almost ), when you want to cut out from the modern ways of world for some time, and  its beautiful expressions..like

"There is something so amiable in the prejudices of a young mind, that one is sorry to see them give way to the reception of more general opinions."

Its so very true ..