The documents collected in the Backgrounds and Contexts and Criticism sections of this volume suggest a range of possibilities and adumbrate changing attitudes and trends in critical discourse. The excerpt from William Hayley's Essay on Old Maids (1785), for instance, implicitly sketches the social context in which Austen chose to investigate the emotional situation of a twenty-seven-year-old unmarried woman. For Austen, at least in her role as fiction maker, as for Hayley, marriage constituted the happy ending of a woman's youth. Within this conceptual framework, however, Austen found it possible to imagine a woinan neither preoccupied with marriage nor initially convinced that no female fulfillment can exist outside it. Her letters to Fanny Knight remind us of lane Austen's comic skepticism about marriage as constituting inevitable female bliss; Persuasion helps elucidate that skepticism.

The text of this Norton Critical Edition is that of the first edition (dated 1818 but probably issued in late 1817), which was published posthumously. The editor has spelled out ampersands and made superscript letters lowercase.

The novel, which is fully annotated, is followed by the two canceled chapters that comprise Persuasion’s original ending.

"Backgrounds and Contexts" collects contemporary assessments of Jane Austen as well as materials relating to social issues of the period.

Included are an excerpt from William Hayley’s 1785 "Essay on Old Maids"; Austen’s letters to Fanny Knight, which reveal her skepticism about marriage as the key to happiness; Henry Austen’s memorial tribute to his famous sister; assessments by nineteenth-century critics Julia Kavanagh and Goldwin Smith, who saw Austen as an unassuming, sheltered, "feminine," rural writer; and the perspective of Austen’s biographer Geraldine Edith Mitten.

"Modern Critical Views" reflects a dramatic shift in the way that twentieth-century scholars view both Austen and Persuasion. Increasingly, the focus is on Austen's moral purposefulness and political acumen and on Persuasionís historical, social, and poliical implications.

A variety of perspectives are provided by A. Walton Litz, Marilyn Butler, Tony Tanner, Robert Hopkins, Ann W. Astell, Claudia L. Johnson, and Cheryl Ann Weissman.

A Selected Bibliography is also included.

Preface

The Text of Persuasion

　[The Original Ending of Persuasion]

Backgrounds and Contexts

　[William Hayley], [On Old Maids]

　Jane Austen, Letters from Persuasion

　To Fanny Knight (March 13, [1817])

　To Fanny Knight (March 23, [1817])

　Henry Austen, Biographical Notice of the Author

　[Richard Whateley], [A New Style of Novel]

　Anonymous, [Austen’s Characters]

　Julia Kavanagh, [The Language of Feeling]

　Goldwin Smith, From Life of Jane Austen

　Geraldine Edith Mitton, From Jane Austen and Her Times

Modern Critical Views

　A Walton Litz, New Landscapes

　Marilyn Butler, [On Persuasion]

　Tony Tanner, In Between: Persuasion

　Robert Hopkins, Moral Luck and Judgment in Jane Austen’s Persuasion

　Ann W. Astell, Anne Elliot’s Education: The Learning of Romance in Persuasion

　Claudia L. Johnson, Persuasion: The "Unfeudal Tone of the Present Day"

　Cheryl Ann Weissman, Doubleness and Refrain in Jane Austen’sPersuasion

Jane Austen: A Chronology

Selected Bibliography