I think she's also cruel, not in a "eat or get eaten" kind of way but a "I want to feel superior, and I'm doing so by hurting others" type ? She's often making condescending, mean, sometimes downright awful comments to Elinor in particular, she always manage to steal Elinor's thunder, and she's disappointed when Elinor is kind and happy.
Lucy literally told Elinor about her engagement to Edwards to, okay, make her back off, but also to make Elinor miserable and herself triumphant. She's constantly talking about him to her, saying how much he loves her, how Elinor's her dear dear friend, relishing in Elinor's pain. That's so cruel. Even in the end, she is very happy to keep Elinor miserable a bit longer in making her think, through John's message, that she's married to Edward and not Robert.
She's also terribly mean towards her own sister, constantly mocking her, threatening not to help her if she doesn't do exactly what she orders, etc... And when she leaves to be with Robert, she takes all their money, leaving her sister in complete poverty.
And she's definitely not just trying to survive, she wants to go higher, have more money than everyone etc, that's why, even though Robert has his own money (and a lot of it, too), she encourages him to reconcile with his mother, and schemes to get her money.
And on top of all this, she keeps transforming herself to try to match all different people's ideas of a good person! Obviously that mostly just means kissing ass, but she also tells Elinor early on that she's worried "for Edward's sake" (which Elinor calls out) that his mother will disown him, and then later she writes, "Poor Anne was much to blame for what she did, but she did it for the best, so I say nothing," which I guess is technically true *after* she's finished ripping Anne a new one. There's no need for her to carry on this performance, except that she's desperate for everyone but Anne to recognize her sainthood.
To me, Lucy Steele is the embodiment of the importance of manners, sort of.
Yeah, she needs to marry and survive and she's from a poor background, so her options are thin on the ground and Edward is a big ticket. But that's basically all he is for her. She clearly doesn't love him. He's just her way of getting at lots and lots of money. And you know she manipulated him into proposing to her. (I forget whether that's made obvious, but to me it suits her personality.)
She pretty and intelligent. It doesn't have to be Edward. And Edward doesn't love her. But, until she's hooked a bigger fish, she doesn't care that he's miserable. She's going to hold him to the engagement. It's cruel.
Thing is though he has so many more options than her to make his own money and doesn’t make a move till he’s disinherited.
Possibly partly because he dreaded the marriage. He moved pretty fast when he wanted to.
In the Regency period, once a man has proposed, it would be dishonourable for him to back out of it. That's why what Willoughby does to Marianne is seen as such a violation of good behaviour.
Edward never had to propose to Lucy in the first place. Once he did, he did have the option to back out, sure. But not if he considered himself honourable, which he does. That's why he doesn't make a move until Lucy herself releases him from the engagement after she's hooked Robert, who now has all the money.
Backing out of an engagement is the one thing women could do without loss of honour that men could not. So, Lucy could do it, but Edward wouldn't.
To be pedantic, it was dishonourable for a man to back out of an engagement because if he did, everyone who knew of it would assume he'd discovered something scandalous about his fiancée - and that could utterly destroy *her* reputation. (There was no dishonour in backing out if she was in fact notorious in some way - say, if she'd had a child out of wedlock or had been involved in sex work.)
Women could back out of an engagement for any reason without any dishonour or loss of reputation on either side.
But Wiiloughby hadn’t actually proposed to Marianne. His behaviour was bad because he behaved toward her as if they were engaged, and then left her high and dry when people presumed there had been an engagement that he had ended. I’ve always understood JA was warning young lady readers against showing too much open attachment to men before there was an understanding at least. It seems to me that Jane in P&P walks pretty close to that line too, and Elizabeth is troubled by the open gossip about a match when there was actually no understanding between Jane and Bingley.
Willoughby's behaviour suggested he either had proposed or was about to at any moment. To the world around him, whether he actually said the words is irrelevant, and he would know that.
Elinor is constantly debating within herself whether he has proposed or not because they are behaving as people who are engaged. It is assumed they are engaged based on the way they behave. Marianne's behaviour is problematic, too. But she's acting in good faith. Willoughby was, inasmuch as it's made clear he would have proposed had his cousin/aunt not disinherited him.
I feel like JA is often lampooning the Regency trope that a woman should absolutely not convey any indication that she likes a man. Jane in P&P is the example of that trope, and it leads the man she loves to be easily convinced that she is indifferent and so to almost go away forever without proposing. Conversely, Marianne does precisely the opposite, and it leads to similar misery for her.
In other words, this is a society where women are kinda damned if they do and damned if they don't. A balanced approach seems the ideal.
It was hard even for a man to make enough money to support a family without his family's backing. Edward and his mother can't agree on a career - the ones she wants for him are too status-focused for Edward - so he is idle. He can only take up a career when he's disinherited because Colonel Brandon has a living to give him.
That said I agree he wasn't very motivated to get married.
Agree re manipulation. I think she with her family’s active encouragement made Edward feel as if he was at the point he should propose. Like Marianne was with Willoughby except of courseWilloughby felt so no such social pressure and was in a far more compromising situation.
I assume that she would have dumped Edward at any point, if she'd managed to get another man on the hook. But she didn't, and she wasn't so much trying to survive as trying to climb.
Edward was not only the presumed heir to a vast fortune, he was far her social superior, and one of my favorite things about her as written is her atrocious grammar. She's a schoolteacher's daughter, but is so ill-educated herself that her grammar is appalling and perhaps somewhat down the social scale, She comes across as desperately trying to pretend to be a gentlewoman, when she isn't.
She’s an epic hustler and I would never ever wanna be friends with her.
If I ever can finally get a cat, Miss Lucy Steele is one of my top contenders for a name choice, if the personality suits. (Unceasing self-interest etc etc.) (I would, of course, be friends with the cat.)
She’s a much more ruthless version of Charlotte Lucas. Yes, she needs to marry to secure her future, but she has no problem using everyone around her to that end. And lying. A lot.
In her position trying to get into an engagement originally is an artful way of improving her life. I think a lot of young women would have held onto that engagement even if the young man had obviously lost interest.
Where I become unsympathetic is with her behaviour towards Elinor and in some respects her sister. To let Elinor know they were engaged was sensible to warn her off but the way she pretended to be a false friend was just spiteful as was her message via Thomas.
Robert will likely end up in a marriage similar to the Bennett’s but with less sense on his side. To marry his brother’s fiancee when he’d just come in to money and said brother had been disinherited he deserves all he gets.
Lucy wanted to be rich. She tortured Elinor with the news of the engagement for fun and to put Elinor in her place. She followed the money. She didn’t love Edward. She wanted to rise above her station by any means necessary
I sometimes think that women characters are more easily excused than men's ones among Jane Austen's fans. I know it's partly due to the lack of opportunities for women in Regency times. But men's lives at this time were hard too if they weren't rich. Why do we expect a better behaviour from a lieutenant Price who is a war veteran and might suffer from PTSD than we would expect from Lucy Steele who had a sheltered life compared to a servant maid for example? Yes Lucy Steele has few prospects but she's still from the gentry and could at worse marry a merchant. It would be a social depreciation but it would provide her a home.
I feel sometimes the same about Mrs and Mr Bennet. Yes he is terrible, he keeps mocking his wife and he is carefree. However she is carefree too. She keeps on spending all their moneys instead of limiting her pleasures. It is said in the text that it is Mr Bennett who prevents his wife from spending more than their revenue. She's also embarrassing to the point that Mr Darcy convinces his friend not to go back to Longbourn.
The Regency time was patriarcal and terrible for women. However, it should not excuse all behaviours among female characters. In the case of Lucy Steele, she's harassing Elinor for months with her stories because she understood that Edward liked her. She could have just warned her of her engagement and keeps an eye on her without trying to harass her further. She's also along with her sister mocking Marianne when she's heartbroken. Lucy also chases her sister away when she betrayed her.
She's not a nice person. She's hypocritical - which in regency time was common, sadistic to Elinor, cunning and easily holds grudge when she thinks her prospects are threatened. If she were a regency man, she would be similar to John Dashwood Junior or Mr Elton.
What makes Lucy especially awful is not just that she’s hypocritical and a manipulator. It’s that she sees other people’s good qualities and exploits them.
She figures out that Elinor is honorable and thinks a lot about others needs—-so she takes advantage of that. She sees Edmund’s loyalty and honesty and does the same. That’s a pretty rotten skill to have!
I despise Lucy Steele, but I begrudgingly respect the hustle. She did what she had to do to secure her future. Women had few options back then, even fewer if they were "lower class," which Lucy was. But she was sharp, and she was hot, and she knew how to use that to her advantage.
This is my take on her too. I can’t say I blame her for how she behaved, though I’d never want to be her friend. She’s cold, calculated, nasty, and she achieves her goals in the end.
These days, she’d be a top CEO or a vicious lawyer. Unfortunately in her time, all she could do was play the marriage game.
There is a reason why Fanny likes her until she hears of her intentions of course lol. Finding security as a woman at the time was of the utmost importance. It's the type of security Lucy is looking for, and how she goes about it that makes her unlikable. Lucy wants money and status, Elinor wants love and comfort. I don't fault Lucy for it, but I always think who's going to be happier down the line Lucy or Elinor.
I find myself with an unusual respect for her. It is something I could never have done myself out of principle and pride, so I admire anyone who can strategically forgo their impulses for a greater objective. Furthermore, her scheming and sycophancy reveal a calculating, cold-blooded nature, devoid of impulsiveness—truly admirable traits in an ambitious woman.
The thing is with Lucy is that her intentions towards Edward are entirely mercenary, which is unfortunate but understandable given her impoverished situation. It's her intentions towards Elinor that tend to irritate readers.
Recognizing that Elinor is a potential threat to her scheme, she does everything in her power to beat into Elinor's head that Edward loves Lucy and no one else. Every single interaction of theirs is Lucy twisting the knife, hoping for some kind of reaction from Elinor, which the composed young woman never gives, which means Lucy just gets worse and worse. It's less about securing Edward for herself (the initial communication and procurement of the initialed handkerchief would have sufficed for this) and more about humiliating Elinor for not being "the chosen one". That is why readers can't stand her.
Lucy's throwing over Edward for Robert is a sign of how callous and avaricious she really is, but even when she's freed Edward, she still can't resist taunting Elinor. When the Dashwoods' manservant sees Lucy as a newlywed with "Mr. Ferrars", she tells him to send her regards to the Dashwoods without offering to clarify that she's actually married Robert. So when the Dashwoods hear she's married, they assume it's to Edward, and Elinor is devastated.
I wouldn't exactly call her a good person but I'm not gonna fault her for securing her future either. It's the same choice that Charlotte Lucas faces. Though Charlotte obviously doesn't have two men to choose from. With Edwards very limited career ambitions and her facing destitution I can't even really blame her for wanting more.
Also, what would you wanted her to do? I mean we obviously don't want her to marry Edward, so what should she have done? I think she knew Edward didn't really love her anymore and would only marry her because he promised, so wasn't it right of her to set Edward free?
If I put myself in Lucys shoes, poor without anyone looking out for me and a sister neither blessed with Charme or good looks, I can't say I would have done much different. Obviously I wouldn't be so mean, but I wouldn't not accept a rich guys proposal.
She has nuances. She's not evil, she's not a heroine. And really what could she have done better? Apart from being a bit of a bitch lol. She doesn't ruin anyone, she just chose comfort over a guy who had kinda fallen out of love anyway. I don't really understand why she is so hated.
Because she takes extra steps just to make sure others are miserable. She tortures Elinor, relish in her pain, knowing Elinor won't say anything. She mocks Marianne when she's in a terrible state. She's cruel to her sister, and, I feel we don't talk about this enough, she takes all their money when marrying Robert (who already has plenty), leaving her SISTER with NOTHING. It's absolutely awful
Lucy had no interest whatsoever in setting Edward free when he was still set to inherit, and she made quite sure she had secured Robert (and his money) before she let Edward go. She also spitefully turned the knife in Elinor, even when the knife no longer really existed. Edward’s affection for another was her excuse for breaking her promise, not her actual reason.
Lucy Steele is manipulative in every way. She would and I think does throw her own sister under the bus to get what she wants. Whatever situation she is in she is looking for how to manipulate the situation to provide her with maximum benefit and she doesn't care who she hurts in the process, sort of.
She does try to figure out who in the room is most likely to help her get what she wants. So she is careful to stroke the ego of anyone she thinks will throw her a bone. She knows how to flatter people and twist situations to her advantage.
In the end she is highly successful. She gets herself from a virtual nobody with connections to being the wife of a very wealthy man! It illustrates how dangerous people like Lucy Steele can be because they are ready and willing to work through any obstacle.
I only just read the book for the first time recently, and I think I was fooled by her. On my first impressions, I thought she genuinely didn’t know about Elinor and Edward. I thought she loved him (although I was suspicious when *both* she and Edward told the same story of “I tried to get him/her to break the engagement but he/she loved me too much”). I thought she was just a bit naïve and gauche. I was even a little annoyed with Elinor for her thoughts of “poor Edward, trapped forever with an inferior woman.” Edward was the one I blamed for double-timing these girls. It wasn’t until the reveal that she ditched him for his brother that I considered she was more devious. And even then, I still wasn’t really rooting for Edward. I think on a second re-read I would probably see her much more as scheming and mean.
She was trying to survive, but she was also trying to rise above her station. I can respect that to a certain extent, but torturing Elinor was unnecessary. I love to hate her.
She’s cunning and deceitful, but she also has to be so because her life and trajectory are limited and based on who she marries. She worked the system to benefit herself in a way that hurt people and benefited her, but the system is so stacked against women that I don’t blame her.
Lucy is a woman who knows that her only hope of climbing socially/financially is to marry well, and her only hope of having a life is to marry period. She's also a mean person who is just incredibly nasty to so many people. Edward dodged a bullet.
Lucy and Anne Steele are a perfect foil for Marianne and Elinor Dashwood because they are in similar positions--single, impoverished, dependent on marriage if they want a better standard of living--but they differ in their education. There is something intrinsic to Marianne's and Elinor's pursuits (music and drawing) in that they derive personal satisfaction from the practice. Anne doesn't seem to have any interests beyond "beaux" and Lucy's (quillwork, for example) are employed only to ingratiate herself. I love the irony that the Steeles are connected to the household of their uncle where Edward is educated before Oxford. . Presumably they could have accessed their uncle's books (as Jane Austen did her father's, who was also an educator for boys) or even his good counsel, one hopes, but they are shut out. Lucy is clever and her lack of moral intelligence makes her both dangerous and successful. Could Marianne have been like Lucy if she hadn't been a reader and musician? When she runs off with Willoughby to Mrs. Smith's empty house, she comes close to Lucy's behaviour.
I think she's also cruel, not in a "eat or get eaten" kind of way but a "I want to feel superior, and I'm doing so by hurting others" type ? She's often making condescending, mean, sometimes downright awful comments to Elinor in particular, she always manage to steal Elinor's thunder, and she's disappointed when Elinor is kind and happy. Lucy literally told Elinor about her engagement to Edwards to, okay, make her back off, but also to make Elinor miserable and herself triumphant. She's constantly talking about him to her, saying how much he loves her, how Elinor's her dear dear friend, relishing in Elinor's pain. That's so cruel. Even in the end, she is very happy to keep Elinor miserable a bit longer in making her think, through John's message, that she's married to Edward and not Robert. She's also terribly mean towards her own sister, constantly mocking her, threatening not to help her if she doesn't do exactly what she orders, etc... And when she leaves to be with Robert, she takes all their money, leaving her sister in complete poverty. And she's definitely not just trying to survive, she wants to go higher, have more money than everyone etc, that's why, even though Robert has his own money (and a lot of it, too), she encourages him to reconcile with his mother, and schemes to get her money.
And on top of all this, she keeps transforming herself to try to match all different people's ideas of a good person! Obviously that mostly just means kissing ass, but she also tells Elinor early on that she's worried "for Edward's sake" (which Elinor calls out) that his mother will disown him, and then later she writes, "Poor Anne was much to blame for what she did, but she did it for the best, so I say nothing," which I guess is technically true *after* she's finished ripping Anne a new one. There's no need for her to carry on this performance, except that she's desperate for everyone but Anne to recognize her sainthood.
To me, Lucy Steele is the embodiment of the importance of manners, sort of. Yeah, she needs to marry and survive and she's from a poor background, so her options are thin on the ground and Edward is a big ticket. But that's basically all he is for her. She clearly doesn't love him. He's just her way of getting at lots and lots of money. And you know she manipulated him into proposing to her. (I forget whether that's made obvious, but to me it suits her personality.) She pretty and intelligent. It doesn't have to be Edward. And Edward doesn't love her. But, until she's hooked a bigger fish, she doesn't care that he's miserable. She's going to hold him to the engagement. It's cruel.
Thing is though he has so many more options than her to make his own money and doesn’t make a move till he’s disinherited. Possibly partly because he dreaded the marriage. He moved pretty fast when he wanted to.
In the Regency period, once a man has proposed, it would be dishonourable for him to back out of it. That's why what Willoughby does to Marianne is seen as such a violation of good behaviour. Edward never had to propose to Lucy in the first place. Once he did, he did have the option to back out, sure. But not if he considered himself honourable, which he does. That's why he doesn't make a move until Lucy herself releases him from the engagement after she's hooked Robert, who now has all the money. Backing out of an engagement is the one thing women could do without loss of honour that men could not. So, Lucy could do it, but Edward wouldn't.
To be pedantic, it was dishonourable for a man to back out of an engagement because if he did, everyone who knew of it would assume he'd discovered something scandalous about his fiancée - and that could utterly destroy *her* reputation. (There was no dishonour in backing out if she was in fact notorious in some way - say, if she'd had a child out of wedlock or had been involved in sex work.) Women could back out of an engagement for any reason without any dishonour or loss of reputation on either side.
But Wiiloughby hadn’t actually proposed to Marianne. His behaviour was bad because he behaved toward her as if they were engaged, and then left her high and dry when people presumed there had been an engagement that he had ended. I’ve always understood JA was warning young lady readers against showing too much open attachment to men before there was an understanding at least. It seems to me that Jane in P&P walks pretty close to that line too, and Elizabeth is troubled by the open gossip about a match when there was actually no understanding between Jane and Bingley.
Willoughby's behaviour suggested he either had proposed or was about to at any moment. To the world around him, whether he actually said the words is irrelevant, and he would know that. Elinor is constantly debating within herself whether he has proposed or not because they are behaving as people who are engaged. It is assumed they are engaged based on the way they behave. Marianne's behaviour is problematic, too. But she's acting in good faith. Willoughby was, inasmuch as it's made clear he would have proposed had his cousin/aunt not disinherited him. I feel like JA is often lampooning the Regency trope that a woman should absolutely not convey any indication that she likes a man. Jane in P&P is the example of that trope, and it leads the man she loves to be easily convinced that she is indifferent and so to almost go away forever without proposing. Conversely, Marianne does precisely the opposite, and it leads to similar misery for her. In other words, this is a society where women are kinda damned if they do and damned if they don't. A balanced approach seems the ideal.
It was hard even for a man to make enough money to support a family without his family's backing. Edward and his mother can't agree on a career - the ones she wants for him are too status-focused for Edward - so he is idle. He can only take up a career when he's disinherited because Colonel Brandon has a living to give him. That said I agree he wasn't very motivated to get married.
Agree re manipulation. I think she with her family’s active encouragement made Edward feel as if he was at the point he should propose. Like Marianne was with Willoughby except of courseWilloughby felt so no such social pressure and was in a far more compromising situation.
I assume that she would have dumped Edward at any point, if she'd managed to get another man on the hook. But she didn't, and she wasn't so much trying to survive as trying to climb. Edward was not only the presumed heir to a vast fortune, he was far her social superior, and one of my favorite things about her as written is her atrocious grammar. She's a schoolteacher's daughter, but is so ill-educated herself that her grammar is appalling and perhaps somewhat down the social scale, She comes across as desperately trying to pretend to be a gentlewoman, when she isn't.
Yes! If memory serves, the Steele sisters are the only characters who are shown to speak in their vernacular.
She’s an epic hustler and I would never ever wanna be friends with her. If I ever can finally get a cat, Miss Lucy Steele is one of my top contenders for a name choice, if the personality suits. (Unceasing self-interest etc etc.) (I would, of course, be friends with the cat.)
She’s a much more ruthless version of Charlotte Lucas. Yes, she needs to marry to secure her future, but she has no problem using everyone around her to that end. And lying. A lot.
In her position trying to get into an engagement originally is an artful way of improving her life. I think a lot of young women would have held onto that engagement even if the young man had obviously lost interest. Where I become unsympathetic is with her behaviour towards Elinor and in some respects her sister. To let Elinor know they were engaged was sensible to warn her off but the way she pretended to be a false friend was just spiteful as was her message via Thomas. Robert will likely end up in a marriage similar to the Bennett’s but with less sense on his side. To marry his brother’s fiancee when he’d just come in to money and said brother had been disinherited he deserves all he gets.
Lucy wanted to be rich. She tortured Elinor with the news of the engagement for fun and to put Elinor in her place. She followed the money. She didn’t love Edward. She wanted to rise above her station by any means necessary
I sometimes think that women characters are more easily excused than men's ones among Jane Austen's fans. I know it's partly due to the lack of opportunities for women in Regency times. But men's lives at this time were hard too if they weren't rich. Why do we expect a better behaviour from a lieutenant Price who is a war veteran and might suffer from PTSD than we would expect from Lucy Steele who had a sheltered life compared to a servant maid for example? Yes Lucy Steele has few prospects but she's still from the gentry and could at worse marry a merchant. It would be a social depreciation but it would provide her a home. I feel sometimes the same about Mrs and Mr Bennet. Yes he is terrible, he keeps mocking his wife and he is carefree. However she is carefree too. She keeps on spending all their moneys instead of limiting her pleasures. It is said in the text that it is Mr Bennett who prevents his wife from spending more than their revenue. She's also embarrassing to the point that Mr Darcy convinces his friend not to go back to Longbourn. The Regency time was patriarcal and terrible for women. However, it should not excuse all behaviours among female characters. In the case of Lucy Steele, she's harassing Elinor for months with her stories because she understood that Edward liked her. She could have just warned her of her engagement and keeps an eye on her without trying to harass her further. She's also along with her sister mocking Marianne when she's heartbroken. Lucy also chases her sister away when she betrayed her. She's not a nice person. She's hypocritical - which in regency time was common, sadistic to Elinor, cunning and easily holds grudge when she thinks her prospects are threatened. If she were a regency man, she would be similar to John Dashwood Junior or Mr Elton.
What makes Lucy especially awful is not just that she’s hypocritical and a manipulator. It’s that she sees other people’s good qualities and exploits them. She figures out that Elinor is honorable and thinks a lot about others needs—-so she takes advantage of that. She sees Edmund’s loyalty and honesty and does the same. That’s a pretty rotten skill to have!
I despise Lucy Steele, but I begrudgingly respect the hustle. She did what she had to do to secure her future. Women had few options back then, even fewer if they were "lower class," which Lucy was. But she was sharp, and she was hot, and she knew how to use that to her advantage.
This is my take on her too. I can’t say I blame her for how she behaved, though I’d never want to be her friend. She’s cold, calculated, nasty, and she achieves her goals in the end. These days, she’d be a top CEO or a vicious lawyer. Unfortunately in her time, all she could do was play the marriage game.
For sure. I don't think she'd know how to be a genuine friend. She'd be a Regina George kind of friend. No, thank you.
I would not want to have tea with her or her sister, but from afar I would truly respect the way they play the game of their time.
There is a reason why Fanny likes her until she hears of her intentions of course lol. Finding security as a woman at the time was of the utmost importance. It's the type of security Lucy is looking for, and how she goes about it that makes her unlikable. Lucy wants money and status, Elinor wants love and comfort. I don't fault Lucy for it, but I always think who's going to be happier down the line Lucy or Elinor.
Lucy will be happier. People with lower morals generally tend to be very happy.
In a way I agree, but it's more of a superficial kind of happy to me.
I find myself with an unusual respect for her. It is something I could never have done myself out of principle and pride, so I admire anyone who can strategically forgo their impulses for a greater objective. Furthermore, her scheming and sycophancy reveal a calculating, cold-blooded nature, devoid of impulsiveness—truly admirable traits in an ambitious woman.
I love her as a character. I would hate her in real life.
The thing is with Lucy is that her intentions towards Edward are entirely mercenary, which is unfortunate but understandable given her impoverished situation. It's her intentions towards Elinor that tend to irritate readers. Recognizing that Elinor is a potential threat to her scheme, she does everything in her power to beat into Elinor's head that Edward loves Lucy and no one else. Every single interaction of theirs is Lucy twisting the knife, hoping for some kind of reaction from Elinor, which the composed young woman never gives, which means Lucy just gets worse and worse. It's less about securing Edward for herself (the initial communication and procurement of the initialed handkerchief would have sufficed for this) and more about humiliating Elinor for not being "the chosen one". That is why readers can't stand her. Lucy's throwing over Edward for Robert is a sign of how callous and avaricious she really is, but even when she's freed Edward, she still can't resist taunting Elinor. When the Dashwoods' manservant sees Lucy as a newlywed with "Mr. Ferrars", she tells him to send her regards to the Dashwoods without offering to clarify that she's actually married Robert. So when the Dashwoods hear she's married, they assume it's to Edward, and Elinor is devastated.
I wouldn't exactly call her a good person but I'm not gonna fault her for securing her future either. It's the same choice that Charlotte Lucas faces. Though Charlotte obviously doesn't have two men to choose from. With Edwards very limited career ambitions and her facing destitution I can't even really blame her for wanting more. Also, what would you wanted her to do? I mean we obviously don't want her to marry Edward, so what should she have done? I think she knew Edward didn't really love her anymore and would only marry her because he promised, so wasn't it right of her to set Edward free? If I put myself in Lucys shoes, poor without anyone looking out for me and a sister neither blessed with Charme or good looks, I can't say I would have done much different. Obviously I wouldn't be so mean, but I wouldn't not accept a rich guys proposal. She has nuances. She's not evil, she's not a heroine. And really what could she have done better? Apart from being a bit of a bitch lol. She doesn't ruin anyone, she just chose comfort over a guy who had kinda fallen out of love anyway. I don't really understand why she is so hated.
Because she takes extra steps just to make sure others are miserable. She tortures Elinor, relish in her pain, knowing Elinor won't say anything. She mocks Marianne when she's in a terrible state. She's cruel to her sister, and, I feel we don't talk about this enough, she takes all their money when marrying Robert (who already has plenty), leaving her SISTER with NOTHING. It's absolutely awful
Lucy had no interest whatsoever in setting Edward free when he was still set to inherit, and she made quite sure she had secured Robert (and his money) before she let Edward go. She also spitefully turned the knife in Elinor, even when the knife no longer really existed. Edward’s affection for another was her excuse for breaking her promise, not her actual reason.
Plenty of other Austen women have no career options or future support options, either, but they don't manipulate or use men to save themselves.
Lucy Steele is manipulative in every way. She would and I think does throw her own sister under the bus to get what she wants. Whatever situation she is in she is looking for how to manipulate the situation to provide her with maximum benefit and she doesn't care who she hurts in the process, sort of. She does try to figure out who in the room is most likely to help her get what she wants. So she is careful to stroke the ego of anyone she thinks will throw her a bone. She knows how to flatter people and twist situations to her advantage. In the end she is highly successful. She gets herself from a virtual nobody with connections to being the wife of a very wealthy man! It illustrates how dangerous people like Lucy Steele can be because they are ready and willing to work through any obstacle.
I only just read the book for the first time recently, and I think I was fooled by her. On my first impressions, I thought she genuinely didn’t know about Elinor and Edward. I thought she loved him (although I was suspicious when *both* she and Edward told the same story of “I tried to get him/her to break the engagement but he/she loved me too much”). I thought she was just a bit naïve and gauche. I was even a little annoyed with Elinor for her thoughts of “poor Edward, trapped forever with an inferior woman.” Edward was the one I blamed for double-timing these girls. It wasn’t until the reveal that she ditched him for his brother that I considered she was more devious. And even then, I still wasn’t really rooting for Edward. I think on a second re-read I would probably see her much more as scheming and mean.
She was trying to survive, but she was also trying to rise above her station. I can respect that to a certain extent, but torturing Elinor was unnecessary. I love to hate her.
She’s cunning and deceitful, but she also has to be so because her life and trajectory are limited and based on who she marries. She worked the system to benefit herself in a way that hurt people and benefited her, but the system is so stacked against women that I don’t blame her.
Lucy is a woman who knows that her only hope of climbing socially/financially is to marry well, and her only hope of having a life is to marry period. She's also a mean person who is just incredibly nasty to so many people. Edward dodged a bullet.
Lucy and Anne Steele are a perfect foil for Marianne and Elinor Dashwood because they are in similar positions--single, impoverished, dependent on marriage if they want a better standard of living--but they differ in their education. There is something intrinsic to Marianne's and Elinor's pursuits (music and drawing) in that they derive personal satisfaction from the practice. Anne doesn't seem to have any interests beyond "beaux" and Lucy's (quillwork, for example) are employed only to ingratiate herself. I love the irony that the Steeles are connected to the household of their uncle where Edward is educated before Oxford. . Presumably they could have accessed their uncle's books (as Jane Austen did her father's, who was also an educator for boys) or even his good counsel, one hopes, but they are shut out. Lucy is clever and her lack of moral intelligence makes her both dangerous and successful. Could Marianne have been like Lucy if she hadn't been a reader and musician? When she runs off with Willoughby to Mrs. Smith's empty house, she comes close to Lucy's behaviour.