Marianne Dashwood: She’s just your average teenage girl.
What can you say about Marianne Dashwood? She’s beautiful, she’s emotional, she gets way too depressed after a breakup, and she’s into music. Is she a drama queen? Yes. Does she cause her sister unnecessary pain and worry? Yes. Is she responsible and rational? No. But should we dislike her for it? I would argue no. Because she’s seventeen.
Marianne has hilariously naive views of love, “I could not be happy with a man whose taste did not in every point coincide with my own… I shall never see a man whom I can really love. I require so much!” (Ch 3) but she is also relatable. She is dreaming of her Prince Charming, or shall we say Mr. Darcy and she is seventeen. Having unrealistic views of matrimony and love is perfectly normal for a teenager.
Marianne does not comply with the rules of decorum and propriety, leaving, Elinor, “the whole task of telling lies when politeness required it” (Ch 21). That is selfish, sure, but it’s also, what teenagers do. They rebel against social norms. And yes, this is the 1800s and they expect more of younger women, but that doesn’t mean her brain grew any faster than a modern teenager! And her mother lets her get away with it, so it’s no wonder she doesn’t conform.
Elinor is far more mature and reasonable than Marianne, and therefore more admirable, but she is a paragon of self control, almost unrealistically so. Elinor is able to maintain her composure in a conversation with Lucy Steele that rips out her heart. I don’t even think Darcy, Austen’s other master of self control, could have been as controlled (he also changes colour when angry, he’s like an emotional chameleon). Marianne seems worse/annoying because she’s compared to someone who is a different extreme. No nineteen-year-old should be so mature, it’s probably because of her father’s death (in part) that Elinor is so controlled. Marianne has reacted in a different way.I think the point of the book is that neither of them have a completely healthy way of dealing with the world.
Marianne does grow up, “she found herself at nineteen, submitting to new attachments, entering on new duties, placed in a new home, a wife, the mistress of a family, and the patroness of a village.” (Ch 50) In two years, she is as old as Elinor and much more rational. Remember that Jane Austen’s other heroines sometimes also fall into irrationality and are much older, like Elizabeth B (20) and Emma W (21).
Marianne Dashwood: She’s seventeen! (and a bit of a drama queen)