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I am half agony, half hope.

Jane Austen, Persuasion

Literature

The story behind the card

Captain Frederick Wentworth writes this in a letter to Anne Elliot in chapter 23 of Persuasion. Eight years earlier Anne, then 19, broke off their engagement because her family and her friend Lady Russell persuaded her that a naval officer without a fortune was an unwise match. Now rich, he meets her again, and neither speaks. In Bath he overhears her telling his friend Captain Harville that women love longest, even when hope is gone. Persuasion, Jane Austen's last completed novel, appeared months after her death in 1817.

Türkçe oku
Yarı ıstırap, yarı umut içindeyim.
Jane Austen, İkna

Yüzbaşı Frederick Wentworth bu satırları, İkna romanının 23. bölümünde Anne Elliot'a yazdığı mektupta yazar. Sekiz yıl önce, henüz 19 yaşındaki Anne nişanı bozmuştur; ailesi ve güvendiği dostu Lady Russell, servetsiz bir deniz subayıyla evlenmenin akıllıca olmadığına onu ikna etmiştir. Artık zengin ve başarılı bir kaptan olan Wentworth onunla yeniden karşılaşır, ama ikisi de duygularını açamaz. Bath'ta Anne'in, arkadaşı Yüzbaşı Harville'e kadınların umut kalmasa bile daha uzun sevdiğini söylediğini duyar ve hemen kalemi eline alır. İkna, Jane Austen'ın tamamladığı son romandır ve 1817'de, ölümünden aylar sonra yayımlandı.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: Jane Austen
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