Books
Nearly 200 years after her death, Jane Austen still captures the hearts and minds (and bookshelf space) of readers everywhere. The author of six major novels that featured some of the most strong-willed and complex heroines English literature had ever seen, Austen is also responsible for writing some of the most romantic lines in all of literature — which could be one reason her fiction has been told, retold, reimagined, and adapted for screen and stage for over two centuries. From the countless replays of a rain-soaked Matthew Macfadyen (you know you do this too), to the improbable Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, to the HuffPost’s recent speculation that if Austen were alive today, she’d be “a star Bachelor live-tweeter” (totally with you there), the Jane Austen obsession shows no signs of abating anytime soon. And let's be honest: we wouldn’t want it to.
But modern manifestations aside, there’s a reason Austen’s novels have rarely been out of print since they were first published — from Sense and Sensibility in 1811, to the posthumously-published Persuasion in 1818 — and that’s the writing itself. It’s Austen’s language — the humor, the wit, the emotional suspense, and of course, the romance — that keep readers coming back for more, over and over again.
Here are 15 of the most romantic Jane Austen quotes of all time (including one line that will leave any book lover weak in the knees.)
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.”
― Fitzwilliam Darcy, Pride and Prejudice
2
“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.”
― Marianne Dashwood, Sense and Sensibility
3
“Know your own happiness. You want nothing but patience — or give it a more fascinating name, call it hope.”
― Mrs. Henry Dashwood, Sense and Sensibility
4
“If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more.”
― George Knightley, Emma
5
“A man does not recover from such devotion of the heart to such a woman! He ought not; he does not.”
― Captain Frederick Wentworth, Persuasion
6
She was feeling, thinking, trembling about everything; agitated, happy, miserable, infinitely obliged, absolutely angry.
― Jane Austen, Mansfield Park
7
“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. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone forever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own… I have loved none but you.”
— Captain Wentworth, Persuasion
8
“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.”
— Isabella Thorpe, Northanger Abbey
9
“I've come here with no expectations, only to profess, now that I am at liberty to do so, that my heart is, and always will be, yours.”
— Edward Ferrars, Sense and Sensibility (1995 screenplay)
10
“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.”
― Fitzwilliam Darcy, Pride and Prejudice
11
“Give a loose to your fancy, indulge your imagination in every possible flight…”
― Elizabeth Bennet, Pride and Prejudice
12
Her heart did whisper that he had done it for her. But it was a hope shortly checked by other considerations, and she soon felt that even her vanity was insufficient, when required to depend on his affection for her—for a woman who had already refused him…
― Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
13
“There are as many forms of love as there are moments in time.”
— Henry Crawford, Mansfield Park (1999 screenplay)
14
“It taught me to hope,” said he, “as I had scarcely ever allowed myself to hope before. I knew enough of your disposition to be certain, that had you been absolutely, irrevocably decided against me, you would have acknowledged it to Lady Catherine, frankly and openly.”
― Fitzwilliam Darcy, Pride and Prejudice
