“Her Own More Elegant and Cultivated Mind”: Anne Elliot and Music

This essay considers the role that music plays in Jane Austen’s depiction of Anne Elliot in Persuasion. Anne is a unique character set apart from her society not only by her family’s contempt for her and the failure of other characters to appreciate her qualities, but also by her own refusal to compromise her sense of self. She is presented as a musician of a particular type: she plays the piano expertly but does not sing; she provides music for others to dance to; and she is an appreciative listener. Each of these qualities tells us something about her isolation from and invisibility to most other characters, as well as her fractured connection with Captain Frederick Wentworth, which slowly mends as the novel progresses.