Is there anything more heartwarming and timeless than a classic romance novel? As we meander through the pages of literary history, there's one name that stands as the beacon of English romantic literature: Jane Austen. With her brilliant use of satire and her keen sense of human nature, Austen penned some of the most well-loved tales of love and courtship, leaving us with a treasure trove of “Romantic Jane Austen Quotes.” From the earnest confessions of Mr. Darcy to the witty remarks of Emma Woodhouse, Austen's characters have charmed readers for centuries, spinning narratives that embody love, passion, and human connection.
Did you know that while she painted vivid romantic scenes in her novels, Austen herself never married? Her life was a stark contrast to the matrimonial endings of her books, yet it never affected her ability to craft exquisite romantic narratives. This paradox adds an intriguing layer of depth to her work, making “Jane Austen Quotes” all the more fascinating to explore. So, buckle up, dear readers! Get ready to dive deep into the realm of Austen's romantic universe as we present to you 50 of the most endearing quotes that have captured the hearts of readers across generations. From first love to heartbreak, and enduring passion, these quotes will take you on an emotional journey, one that is as nuanced, engaging, and timeless as Austen's novels themselves.
Love and Courtship
1. “In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.” – Pride and Prejudice
2. “If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more.” – Emma
3. “You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope…I have loved none but you.” – Persuasion
4. “A lady's imagination is very rapid; it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony in a moment.” – Pride and Prejudice
5. “There is no charm equal to tenderness of heart.” – Emma
6. “To be fond of dancing was a certain step towards falling in love.” – Pride and Prejudice
7. “I cannot make speeches, Emma…If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more.” – Emma
8. “We are all fools in love.” – Pride and Prejudice
9. “There could have been no two hearts so open, no tastes so similar, no feelings so in unison.” – Persuasion
10. “It is not time or opportunity that is to determine intimacy; it is disposition alone. Seven years would be insufficient to make some people acquainted with each other, and seven days are more than enough for others.” – Sense and Sensibility
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Declarations of Love
- “You must be the best judge of your own happiness.” – Emma
- “You have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love, I love, I love you. I never wish to be parted from you from this day on.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature.” – Northanger Abbey
- “I wish, as well as everybody else, to be perfectly happy; but, like everybody else, it must be in my own way.” – Sense and Sensibility
- “I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope.” – Persuasion
- “Till this moment I never knew myself.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “I cannot fix on the hour, or the spot, or the look, or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “To you, I shall say, as I have often said before, do not be in a hurry, the right man will come at last.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “When I fall in love, it will be forever.” – Sense and Sensibility
- “Silly things do cease to be silly if they are done by sensible people in an impudent way.” – Emma
The Complexity of Love
- “What wild imaginations one forms where dear self is concerned! How sure to be mistaken!” – Persuasion
- “One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other.” – Emma
- “It is such a happiness when good people get together—and they always do.” – Emma
- “It isn't what we say or think that defines us, but what we do.” – Sense and Sensibility
- “The more I know of the world, the more I am convinced that I shall never see a man whom I can really love.” – Sense and Sensibility
- “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “There is a stubbornness about me that never can bear to be frightened at the will of others. My courage always rises at every attempt to intimidate me.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “It sometimes happens that a woman is handsomer at twenty-nine than she was ten years before.” – Persuasion
- “Give a girl an education and introduce her properly into the world, and ten to one but she has the means of settling well, without further expense to anybody.” – Mansfield Park
- “Men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story. Education has been theirs in so much higher a degree; the pen has been in their hands.” – Persuasion
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The Delicacy of Emotions
- “The distance is nothing when one has a motive.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “I must learn to be content with being happier than I deserve.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “We none of us expect to be in smooth water all our days.” – Persuasion
- “I have not the pleasure of understanding you.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “I hate to hear you talk about all women as if they were fine ladies instead of rational creatures.” – Persuasion
- “There is a quickness of perception in some, a nicety in the discernment of character, a natural penetration, in short, which no experience in others can equal.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “Time will explain.” – Persuasion
- “Laugh as much as you choose, but you will not laugh me out of my opinion.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “Indulge your imagination in every possible flight.” – Pride and Prejudice
Love’s Endurance
- “Nothing ever fatigues me, but doing what I do not like.” – Mansfield Park
- “My idea of good company…is the company of clever, well-informed people, who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company.” – Persuasion
- “Vanity and pride are different things, though the words are often used synonymously. A person may be proud without being vain. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “Our scars make us know that our past was for real.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “How quick come the reasons for approving what we like.” – Persuasion
- “To be so bent on marriage—to pursue a man merely for the sake of situation—is a sort of thing that shocks me; I cannot understand it. Poverty is a great evil, but to a woman of education and feeling it ought not, it cannot be the greatest.” – Mansfield Park
- “There is something so amiable in the prejudices of a young mind, that one is sorry to see them give way to the reception of more general opinions.” – Sense and Sensibility
- “What strange creatures brothers are!” – Mansfield Park
- “I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle.” – Pride and Prejudice
- “I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading! How much sooner one tires of anything than of a book!” – Pride and Prejudice
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