Jane Austen · 1818 · First edition text, 1818
Persuasion
Persuasion (1818), Austen’s last completed novel, gives Anne Elliot a second chance at the man she was talked out of marrying eight years earlier. The Rhetorician reading companion in IO reader breaks down how Austen’s opening sentence — one man’s vanity, in one long unbroken clause — does the whole book’s setup work.
Read the opening in Reels
PART I · PARAGRAPH
Sir Walter Elliot, of Kellynch Hall, in Somersetshire, was a man who, for his own amusement, never took up any book but the Baronetage; there he found occupation for an idle hour, and consolation in a distressed one; there his faculties were roused into admiration and respect, by contemplating the limited remnant of the earliest patents; there any unwelcome sensations, arising from domestic affairs changed naturally into pity and contempt as he turned over the almost endless creations of the last century; and there, if every other leaf were powerless, he could read his own history with an interest which never failed. This was the page at which the favourite volume always opened:
Sir Walter Elliot, of Kellynch Hall, in Somersetshire, was a man who, for his own amusement, never took up any book but the Baronetage; there he found occupation for an idle hour, and consolation in a distressed one; there his faculties were roused into admiration and respect, by contemplating the limited remnant of the earliest patents; there any unwelcome sensations, arising from domestic affairs changed naturally into pity and contempt as he turned over the almost endless creations of the last century; and there, if every other leaf were powerless, he could read his own history with an interest which never failed.
Persuasion · Jane Austen
Interactive demo — real text, web replica of the reading view
Read it with a reading companion
Dissects the author's craft — word choice, rhythm, and rhetorical devices.
Read it with the Rhetorician in IO reader.
The facts
| Length | about 83,300 words · 3,170 sentences |
|---|---|
| In sentence cards | about 211 minutes |
| Difficulty | gentle |
| First line | Sir Walter Elliot, of Kellynch Hall, in Somersetshire, was a man who, for his own amusement, never took up any book but the Baronetage; there he found occupation for an idle hour, and consolation in a distressed one; there his faculties were roused into admiration and respect, by contemplating the limited remnant of the earliest patents; there any unwelcome sensations, arising from domestic affairs changed naturally into pity and contempt as he turned over the almost endless creations of the last century; and there, if every other leaf were powerless, he could read his own history with an interest which never failed. |
| Themes | Volume I · Volume II |
Is Persuasion hard to read?
No — Austen's shortest, most autumnal novel, and one of the gentlest here. In sentence cards it's about 211 minutes.
Which translation is this?
None needed — the original 1818 English text, published posthumously and public domain.
How long is Persuasion?
About 83,300 words across two volumes; roughly 3,170 sentences.
Read Persuasion in IO reader
Colophon
Text: First edition text, 1818, from Project Gutenberg (pg:105). Cover: Standard Ebooks CC0 cover, jane-austen/persuasion. Reviewed 2026-09-04.