If there is anything that has stuck out to me in the course of reading through Persuasion, it's the ability that Austen has to make the reader like or dislike a character. This struck me when the Musgroves, Anne, and Frederick Wentworth were in Lyme and Louisa fell and hit here head. I was so happy that she was either dead or knocked out for a while -- I was a little giddy that she might be gone from the story. Similar treatment of this sort can be seen in the description that Ms. Smith gives of the younger Mr. Elliot's behavior a few years before. There was something about him that I just didn't like -- perhaps because he was trying to marry Anne but obviously Frederick is her match -- so when the letter was shared with Anne it finally gave me a good reason to hate him. It's this sort of character treatment that has been able to transcend the language issue and the fact that this is a boring love story and give me something to appreciate in Austen's writing.
To go back to the Louisa incident, it's worth noting that just because Louisa was recovering and out of the picture for several months, she remained part of the plot and was essential to the development of the other characters' relationship. I don't know exactly how this effects the worth of the writing, it's just something I observed that was related to Austen's use of characters.
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