"Sense and Sensibility" by Jane Austen is based upon the workings of the mind. Though on the surface one might call it romance novel, it's not at all. The main plot of the story is about Marianne and Elinor finding husbands, but that is not the theme or point of the book. Jane Austen is making fun of society in this book. She uses Marianne to describe the people who are senseless and go on nothing but there feelings; and she uses Elinor to describe people who act like they have no feelings and do everything sensibly and logically.

"Marianne was afraid of offending and said no more on the subject; but the kind of approbation which Elinor described as exited in him by the drawings of other people was very far from the rapturous delight which in her opinion, could alone be called taste. Yet, though smiling within herself at the mistake, she honoured her sister for that blind partiality to Edward which pronounced it."

-Pg 34 of Sense and Sensibility

This paragraph in the book shows that part of Marianne's character is she thinks she knows better than her sister. She thinks she knows exactly how a person should be and that's that. She also thinks that Edward and Elinor are not a good enough match for each other because they don't share the same passions and she doesn't see how they can truly be in love.

In the beginning of the book Elinor is in love with Edward and we the readers know that but he doesn't. She does not show her emotions at all, so he has no way of knowing how she feels about him so he doesn't really show how he feels about her. Though they do spend a lot of times together, she still never confesses her feelings for him; so he never confesses any feelings for her. Then she is so surprised to find out he has been engaged to some other girl all this time, when maybe he wouldn't have had he known she cared about him so much. Even when she left Barton Park her goodbye to him was the same as her mother's goodbye to him.

If you read this book thinking it was a romance novel you would miss the whole message Jane Austen is trying to get across.