Essay - English Class System Jane Austin's Novel Persuasion, Director Michael Caton-jones'...

English Class System

***** Austin's novel Persuasion, Director Michael Caton-Jones' movie Scandal, and T. W. C. Banning's Oxford History of Modern Europe each portray the English upper class and English ***** system in a largely unflattering manner. Persuasion shows the pre-Victorian British upper class to be superficial and obsessed largely with appearance over substance. Similarly, Scandal shows a more modern Brit*****in as a society that bases class on superficial c*****straints, and is quick to vilify and condemn those who dare ***** aim above their class. In contrast, T. W. ***** Banning's accounting provides a more b*****lanced accounting ***** Britain's class ***** from the late 1700s to the present. Ultimately, these three readings reveal that while Britain's ***** system has changed dramatically in the past centuries, the ingrained idea of class dominance remains very real within ***** Europe.

***** ***** a deeply rom*****ntic novel that satirically examines ***** social pretensions of the ***** upper ***** through the eyes of one of its mem*****rs. *****he novel's heroine, Anne Elliot, is a woman in her late 20s who ***** struggling with ***** feeling ***** her life has slipped by her. Many years earlier, Anne fell in love ***** Captain Frederick Wentworth but rejected him as a romantic partner because he was considered ***** be below her in ***** class.

As the novel progresses, Anne aga***** comes into contact with ***** Wentworth, ***** begins to see that she made a mist*****ke in rejecting him based on her family's insistence that she find a man closer matched to her social status.

Persuasion is a biting commentary on ***** social pretensions that ex*****ted in pre-Victorian England. As *****n in the novel, this society values appearance and prestige over true happiness ***** friendship. Many of ***** characters are duplicitous and shallow, and yet *****age to be highly successful in the English upper class ***** the era. ***** contrast, Anne and Frederick are honest and trustworthy, and act as a refreshing foil ***** pretentious ***** like Anne's fa*****r and sister Elizabeth.

*****, the 2000 movie by director Michael Caton-Jones also provides a ***** criticism of the English upper ***** ***** *****, but in ***** more modern context. In the movie, starring John Hurt and Ian McKellen, a British social climber takes a young showgirl under his wing. Under his tutelage, she becomes a coveted British socialite who soon ***** almost all of ***** political elite eating out of the palm ***** her h*****. Ultimately, she creates the scandal of the *****'s title when she reveals ***** affairs ***** John Profumo, a British g*****nment official and a Russi*****n spy.

Similar to Austin's Persuasion, Scandal reveals ***** British class system as being obsessed with superficial appearance and *****. The young showgirl is treated as the to*****t of the town when she ***** *****ed as an upper class *****. However, ***** she is embroiled in a sex ***** and her real roots are revealed, she ***** vilified ***** ***** ***** social elite, partially for daring to aspire beyond her station in