Persuasion: Anne Elliot’s personality

People may have different favourites (mine is Fanny), but Anne Elliot is the wisest and most understanding of her heroines: she doesn’t make hasty judgment like Elizabeth Bennet, she doesn’t have an over-active imagination and misread every situation like Catherine Morland or Emma Woodhouse, she’s not so jealous like Fanny Price, etc. Enough has been said of her patience, sensitivity, understanding, loyalty, and sweet temper. 
There are some other aspects of Anne’s personality that I find interesting. 
1/ She has pride. 
This is pride in the good sense—not the bad sense as in Pride and Prejudice. 
Interestingly, the word “proud” appears 8 times in Persuasion, “pride” 18 times. Jane Austen makes a distinction between bad pride (snobbery, self-satisfaction, self-importance), as in Sir Walter, Elizabeth, and Mary, and good pride (self-respect, confidence), as in Anne. 
When Anne moves to Bath to reunite with her family, after some time in Uppercross, she’s surprised to find that her father and sister have the same self-importance and arrogance as before, being in Bath, without feeling the degradation of having had to leave their house Kellynch-Hall to cut down on expenses. 

“She might not wonder, but she must sigh that her father should feel no degradation in his change, should see nothing to regret in the duties and dignity of the resident landholder, should find so much to be vain of in the littlenesses of a town; and she must sigh, and smile, and wonder too, as Elizabeth threw open the folding-doors and walked with exultation from one drawing-room to the other, boasting of their space; at the possibility of that woman, who had been mistress of Kellynch Hall, finding extent to be proud of between two walls, perhaps thirty feet asunder.” (Ch.15)  

Later, when Sir Walter tries to regain contact with his relative the Dowager Viscountess Dalrymple and her daughter, the Honourable Miss Carteret: 

“Anne had never seen her father and sister before in contact with nobility, and she must acknowledge herself disappointed. She had hoped better things from their high ideas of their own situation in life, and was reduced to form a wish which she had never foreseen; a wish that they had more pride; for "our cousins Lady Dalrymple and Miss Carteret;" "our cousins, the Dalrymples," sounded in her ears all day long.” (Ch.16)  

Anne also says to William Walter Elliot (mostly called Mr Elliot in the novel): 

“"I certainly do think there has been by far too much trouble taken to procure the acquaintance. I suppose" (smiling) "I have more pride than any of you; but I confess it does vex me, that we should be so solicitous to have the relationship acknowledged, which we may be very sure is a matter of perfect indifference to them."” (ibid.) 

2/ Anne isn’t as soft as she seems. 
In the previous blog post, I wrote that Anne appeared soft and persuadable.  
Look at these lines, when Anne is told by Mary that Captain Wentworth has said he finds her so altered: 

“He had thought her wretchedly altered, and in the first moment of appeal, had spoken as he felt. He had not forgiven Anne Elliot. She had used him ill, deserted and disappointed him; and worse, she had shewn a feebleness of character in doing so, which his own decided, confident temper could not endure. She had given him up to oblige others. It had been the effect of over-persuasion. It had been weakness and timidity.” (Ch.7) 

This is of course what Anne thinks Captain Wentworth thinks, but her assumption isn’t far off—later we hear him speaking to Louisa Musgrove about a character that is “too yielding and indecisive”. 
However, Anne isn’t so feeble and weak-minded. An example is when Sir Walter wants her to go with him and Elizabeth to see Lady Dalrymple, the day she means to see her old friend Mrs Smith (formerly Miss Hamilton). He insults Mrs Smith, and finds it shocking that Anne should want to associate with her, but in the end, she keeps her appointment, whilst they keep theirs. She doesn’t drop her friendship because of him. 
It is a particularly interesting scene: 

“"Westgate Buildings must have been rather surprised by the appearance of a carriage drawn up near its pavement," observed Sir Walter. "Sir Henry Russell's widow, indeed, has no honours to distinguish her arms, but still it is a handsome equipage, and no doubt is well known to convey a Miss Elliot. A widow Mrs Smith lodging in Westgate Buildings! A poor widow barely able to live, between thirty and forty; a mere Mrs Smith, an every-day Mrs Smith, of all people and all names in the world, to be the chosen friend of Miss Anne Elliot, and to be preferred by her to her own family connections among the nobility of England and Ireland! Mrs Smith! Such a name!"
Mrs Clay, who had been present while all this passed, now thought it advisable to leave the room, and Anne could have said much, and did long to say a little in defence of her friend's not very dissimilar claims to theirs, but her sense of personal respect to her father prevented her. She made no reply. She left it to himself to recollect, that Mrs Smith was not the only widow in Bath between thirty and forty, with little to live on, and no surname of dignity.” (Ch.17) 

The final line is excellent—in a few words, Jane Austen shows the irony of the situation, Mrs Clay’s awareness, Sir Walter’s obliviousness, and Anne’s quiet contempt for her father. 
This is also one of those moments where Jane Austen leaves something unsaid. 

3/ Another argument against Anne’s persuadable temper is the case of William Walter Elliot. 
Lady Russell, the same friend who over 7 years ago persuaded Anne to reject Frederick Wentworth, now tries to persuade her to accept William Walter Elliot. It doesn’t work. We know that Anne still loves Frederick, but there’s little reason for her to think that there’s any hope for her and him getting back together. She trusts her own judgment. 
The passage is so good:  

“Mr Elliot was rational, discreet, polished, but he was not open. There was never any burst of feeling, any warmth of indignation or delight, at the evil or good of others. This, to Anne, was a decided imperfection. Her early impressions were incurable. She prized the frank, the open-hearted, the eager character beyond all others. Warmth and enthusiasm did captivate her still. She felt that she could so much more depend upon the sincerity of those who sometimes looked or said a careless or a hasty thing, than of those whose presence of mind never varied, whose tongue never slipped.
Mr Elliot was too generally agreeable. Various as were the tempers in her father's house, he pleased them all. He endured too well, stood too well with every body. He had spoken to her with some degree of openness of Mrs Clay; had appeared completely to see what Mrs Clay was about, and to hold her in contempt; and yet Mrs Clay found him as agreeable as any body.” (ibid.) 

Jane Austen’s novels, especially the last 3, are too great, too magnificent to be reduced to self-help books, but people also read her for passages like this. Reading her works, we can see that Jane Austen has no illusion about anything, including herself—nothing fools or escapes her. 

4/ To look again at the passage above, I find it amusing that some readers dislike Fanny Price for being judgmental, but not Anne Elliot. 
It should be made clear that I’m not saying Anne is judgmental—the cliché that people shouldn’t judge is foolish, we must judge things to be right or wrong, people to be trustworthy or unreliable, and so on. The thing I find funny is why the same people who take no issues with Anne judging Mr Elliot based on a general distrust because he’s too agreeable, criticise Fanny for judging Henry and Mary Crawford based on their comments and actions. 
But of course, these readers think so because they like Henry and/or Mary, and misjudge their character.