] I don't really think of him as being introverted, but rather that his reserve is partly a choice and partly to do with the great burden of worry he has been carrying about his young Eliza going missing. I also think that, like Marianne, he had never expected that it could be possible to fall in love a second time, and his regard for her has come upon him almost unwillingly. In the movie S&S2, the screenplay diary describes Brandon as a man who has been frozen for 20 years and now having the painful sensation of 'feeling' again after all that time.

Okay, point well taken, I can definitely chalk up his reserve to that. But it makes me wonder: is he *truly* in love with Marianne as strongly as he believes himself to be, or is his thawing simply due to the fact that she reminds him of the first Eliza? And I wonder also if her age has something to do with it--how old are we to assume that Eliza was when he loved her and she was given to his brother?

In a way, I think he and Marianne are well-suited. He is sensible to a degree (his reserve shows that at the very least), but like Marianne, he seems to tend to go overboard a little in the love department--20 years to get over one woman, just to fall for another one just as immature and emotionally unstable? Seems a little extreme to me.

--Is that too harsh? I think I might want to be talked out of my opinion, but currently it's the way I see him. Food for thought anyway, I suppose...