Two sisters of opposing temperament but who share the pangs of tragic love provide the subjects for Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility. Elinor, practical and conventional, the epitome of sense, desires a man who is promised to another woman. Marianne, emotional and sentimental, the epitome of sensibility, loses her heart to a scoundrel who jilts her. A powerful drama of family life and growing up, the novel is at once a subtle comedy of manners and a striking critique of early nineteenth-century society.