Emma
Isabella Knightley
Emma's elder sister
Emma's gentle older sister, a devoted mother who worries about her children's health as her father worries about his own.
Isabella is Emma's elder sister and Mr. Woodhouse's elder daughter. She is married to John Knightley, who is Mr. Knightley's brother, and she is a loving and fretful mother. Like her father, she is anxious about health and draughts.
Her marriage connects the Woodhouses and the Knightleys, a link that the story uses to bring the two families close. She lives away from Hartfield with her family, and Emma and her father look forward to her visits.
In the story
Contains spoilers.
Isabella has a small place in this telling. Her marriage to John Knightley is part of what ties Emma to Mr. Knightley's family and makes the final match feel natural.
She is one of the family members whose happiness is part of the story's gentle ending, when Emma marries her brother-in-law's elder brother. Her own concerns, mainly her children's health, echo her father's, and they show how alike the Woodhouses are.
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