Sense and Sensibility
Colonel Brandon
Marianne’s patient admirer
A grave, kind officer of thirty-five who loves Marianne quietly and acts on it when it counts.
Colonel Brandon is thirty-five, serious and quiet, and he listens to Marianne play without raptures, which is why she respects him. He is melancholic and deeply compassionate, a loyal friend and a gentleman who thinks before he speaks. He is the only person at Barton Park who hears her music itself.
Marianne teases that he is old enough to be her father. Elinor sees that he is intelligent and honorable. Brandon hides an old sorrow, and he has reason to distrust the charming young man who sweeps Marianne off her feet. He has a gentleness that he rarely shows, and a habit of quietly doing what needs to be done. He listens to Elinor and trusts her, and he is the one person who can answer Marianne’s troubles with real knowledge. His patience is the reverse of Willoughby’s show.
“I will bring your mother to you, Miss Dashwood, or perish in the attempt.”
In the story
Contains spoilers.
Brandon is called away from the Whitwell picnic by an urgent letter. In London he sees Marianne’s decline and, once Willoughby’s letter arrives, tells Elinor why he has known his character for months: Willoughby seduced and abandoned Brandon’s young ward Eliza, daughter of the woman he once loved. He fought a duel with him.
Brandon offers Edward the living of Delaford. When Marianne’s fever worsens at Cleveland, he rides thirty miles through a storm to fetch Mrs. Dashwood. Over the following seasons Marianne comes to see his steadfast goodness, and they marry at Delaford.
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