How to Tell Your Sister You Love Her: Write Fiction
Sisters often provide opportunities for conflict, bonding, and in the case of Jane Austen, inspiration for fictional characters. Jane and Cassandra Austen forged a friendship that sustained them through happiness and heartbreak, a friendship not unlike that of Jane and Elizabeth Bennett of Pride & Prejudice. Upon closer inspection, the personality traits of the elder Austen sister greatly resemble those of the elder Bennett sister. It is not so great an assumption, therefore, that Jane Bennett was inspired by and modeled after Cassandra Austen.
In the novel Pride & Prejudice, Jane Bennett exudes a “composure of temper” and a “uniform cheerfulness of manner” that is juxtaposed to the lively and less predictable nature of her younger sister (Austen 23). Cassandra Austen was likewise described as having prudence that occasionally allowed for her to caution Jane about her “excessive vivacity” that might get her into trouble (Tucker 17). Cassandra consequently had a more mature understanding of the expectations surrounding the situation of a respectable single woman seeking a husband. In fact, Mrs. Austen was confident that Cassandra would have no trouble settling down into a good life with a respectable man, reminiscent of the confidence that Mrs. Bennett had in her eldest daughter to do the same (Austen-Leigh 99). Knowing Cassandra would satisfy this marital expectation may have provided Mrs. Austen with more lax marital expectations for Jane, thereby balancing the responsible daughter with the more strong-willed one in much the same way that the Bennett sisters balance each other.
There was a heartbreaking situation in which the Austen sisters found themselves one night that is echoed somewhat in a scene from the novel. Cassandra Austen was once betrothed to Thomas Fowle whose help was enlisted by a lord for a journey overseas, a man whom Cassandra decided to wait for his return in order to start a life together (Austen-Leigh 81). Afraid of offending his patron, Fowle did not divulge that he was engaged and so should decline the offer, and left on the expedition during which he ultimately perished in 1797 (Austen-Leigh 91). When the family received word of this tragedy, Cassandra’s “hope was over, entirely over” for her dreams of a happy marriage, similar to Jane’s reaction when she discovers Bingley left the country and found a potential wife in Miss Darcy (Austen 151). Although they had different reasons for leaving, both Fowle and Bingley left the women they loved, and both women reacted with unwavering loyalty (Austen 151). Jane Bennett continued to love Bingley through her pain, and Cassandra Austen continued to love Fowle through his death, feeling “no man could replace Tom” in her heart (Austen-Leigh 101). While Bennett became a wife and Austen became a spinster, the loyalty and grace of both women were highlighted through this scene in Jane Austen’s novel. Elizabeth Bennett’s fierce protection of her sister upon Bingley’s betrayal parallels the closeness that the Austen sisters experienced after the death of Thomas Fowle. In a way, writing a happy conclusion for Jane Bennett was the way in which Jane Austen could give her sister the happy ending she was denied.
Knowledge of Cassandra’s demeanor and her tragic engagement sheds light on this particular predicament for Jane Bennett. It also explains the emphasis on the relationship between the eldest two of the five Bennett sisters, as they are presumably based loosely upon the countenances of the Austen sisters. Given the opposite natures of the Bennett sisters and their impenetrable connection, Jane Austen most assuredly wrote some of herself and her sister into her novel, but with happier endings for both.
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Bibliography
Austen, Jane. Pride & Prejudice. New York: Pocket Books, 2004. Print.
Austen-Leigh, William, Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh, and Deirdre Le Faye. Jane Austen: A Family Record. London:
The British Library, 1989. Print.
Tucker, George Holbert. Jane Austen the Woman: Some Biographical Insights. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994.
Print.
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