Burkian vs. Romanticism in Jane Austen

Roman Roads Media produced a virtual conference discussing the Old Western Culture in 2020. One of their lectures focused on Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. The lecturer brought up the idea that though Jane Austen wrote during the Romantic era, she herself was not a Romantic, but a Burkian. This is an idea worth exploring in Sense and Sensibility, not just Pride and Prejudice. Austen’s Burkian ideals are balanced: not true stoicism, but not runaway Romantic ideals either.

In Pride and Prejudice, two of the main contrasts are between Elizabeth and her younger sister Lydia and Mr. Darcy and Mr. Wickham. Elizabeth and Darcy personify the ideals of a Burkian society: they stay within expected societal norms, never do anything to tarnish their reputations, and work within the expected rules of society. Lydia and Wickham do the opposite. From Lydia’s thoughtlessness becoming a plot device to Wickham’s prodigal son behavior, they personify ideals of a Romantic worldview. Both are impulsive and only think about pleasing their feelings in the moment. Elizabeth and Darcy on the other hand, tend to think about the future as well as the people around them. While Lydia and Wickham do not care whom they hurt by running off together, Mr. Darcy quietly patches up the scandal and does not look for thanks even from Elizabeth. There are even smaller moments in the book which highlight the differences between Elizabeth and Lydia in sharper contrast. Compare the amount of times Elizabeth feels awkward or is described as being embarrassed. She is described this way even at Mr. Darcy’s second proposal, when she arguably should not feel embarrassed. By contrast, Lydia is completely impulsive and shameless. She even boasts about how she got married and invites the rest of her sisters to join her in her method. The contrast between Elizabeth and Lydia is as stark as the contrast between Mr. Darcy and Mr. Wickham. While Elizabeth and Darcy are not devoid of feeling (there are great and wonderful descriptions of both their feelings), they are not run away with them as Lydia and Mr. Wickham are. Each lady has received a fitting husband indeed.

In Sense and Sensibility, the main contrast is between Elinor and Marianne. Elinor is a faithfully logical woman whose good sense provides her with the ability to work through the various heartbreaks she encounters in the story. Marianne, on the other hand, is quite the Romantic: even her favorite poem betrays her personality as very romantic. She gets swept away with her feelings during the story to the extent that she is careless about her health and nearly dies as a result. By the end of the story, Elinor is the one who loses control over her emotions, and Marianne is the one submitting to logic and reason. So, what made the difference, and what does it have to do with Burkian versus Romantic worldviews? Everything. As a litmus test, let’s take a look at the love interests of both women.

Elinor loves Edward, who, for the majority of the novel, is engaged to someone else. Edward and Elinor both feel the heartbreak of this, but as Edward says, “ ‘I thought it my duty…independent of my feelings to give her [Lucy] the option of continuing the engagement or not.’ ” This sums up Edward’s character, and likewise Elinor’s character: they both function within their duty, independent of their feelings. This is not to say they are devoid of feeling – indeed, when it is revealed at the end of the novel that Edward can marry Elinor, Elinor runs out of the room crying with happiness. However, they both understand the importance of submitting their feelings to the duty at hand, and they both do so until the (seemingly) bitter end. The fact that Austen works it so that they both end up happily married to each other in the exact situation that they both described as being their preferred mode of living shows Austen’s support for the balanced Burkian worldview.

By contrast, Marianne and her initial lover, Mr. Willoughby, are constantly carried off by their feelings and do not feel shame for this. Their conduct constantly leaves them open to the comments of the other characters in the novel, and Elinor reproaches Marianne on this subject. The way Marianne and Mr. Willoughby even meet is incredibly Romantic. Marianne falls on a rainy walk and sprains her ankle so she cannot stand, and Mr. Willoughby carries her home. Marianne thinks this is how love should be: love is when one is so carried away with their feelings, they will dramatically die for the one they love. When Mr. Willoughby breaks her heart, Marianne goes into a deep depression that eventually causes her to fall ill with a terrible fever and nearly die.

However, Marianne’s second lover, Colonel Brandon, follows his duty. It is very fitting that he has a military title, as he is as stoic and soldier-like as it implies. Though he has his own tragic backstory, he does not use it to fuel any self-pity. Instead, it makes him more merciful towards others, including Marianne. When Marianne slows down enough from her exciting Romantic adventures with Mr. Willoughby to see this, she finds that Colonel Brandon is the true Romantic, and marries him. Marianne, indeed, perhaps represents the Burkian balance between true stoicism and runaway Romanticism best. “Instead of falling a sacrifice to an irresistible passion, as she once had fondly flattered herself with expecting, instead of remaining even for ever with her mother, and finding her only pleasures in retirement and study, as afterwards in her more calm and sober judgment she had determined on, 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.” Notice the pendulum swing in this quote. Marianne swings from a “sacrifice to an irresistible passion” to “finding her only pleasures in…study” to “submitting to new attachments, entering on new duties” at the end. It is not that Marianne’s emotions were wrong, it is that she did not govern them well. It is not that her sense of duty was wrong, but it did not have a correct submission. When she finds the balance and marries Colonel Brandon, she ends up happy. She has now the correct submission for her sense of duty, and this can help govern her rightful passions. Her Burkian balance has been achieved.

This Burkian balance achieved at the end of each novel is a fitting reminder of how feelings and duties must be kept in tension with each other. Emotions are not wrong, but they need strong governance to keep them in check. Duty is not wrong, but it should submit itself to the right authority. The Austen-Burkian balance between these two is what gives the protagonists of Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice their happy endings.

Citations:

Austen, Jane. Sense and Sensibility.

(Roman Roads Media Video)