Summary
Pride and Prejudice revolves around the Bennet family,
which consists of Mr. and Mrs. Bennet and their five daughters. Mrs. Bennet is
desperate to marry off her daughters, as it was crucial in the 19th
century to have one’s daughters married, or else the unmarried girls would be
deemed as shameful and useless to the family. The eldest daughter of the family
is Jane, follows her is Elizabeth, and the novel focuses on mainly those two
sister as well as the love stories they live later on. Comes into their lives
Mr. Darcy, who is about to rent an estate nearby the family, along with his
friend Mr. Bingley, and those gentlemen find interest in the two eldest Bennet
daughters. Although Elizabeth and Darcy fall victims of misjudgment and
prejudice, they eventually come to understand that they are both in love with
each other. Similarly, as Jane and Mr. Bingley catch feelings for each other,
they have to face and dodge some obstacles to finally settle together.
Main themes related to English society
Class and social status are two of the dominant themes in the novel,
as much as they were dominant in England back in the 19th century. Pride
and Prejudice highlights the prejudice and the judgment that arise due to
the difference in people’s social status or class. For instance, consider
Darcy’s pride in his class and his prejudice against Elizabeth’s family because
of the reality that they are of a somewhat inferior class. Darcy says, “Could
you expect me to rejoice in the inferiority of your connections? To
congratulate myself on the hope of relations, whose condition in life is so
decidedly beneath my own?” (Ch. 34, Pg. 240)
Consider also Mr.
Collins constant bragging of his relationship with Lady Catherine. Mr. Collins
in that way is revealing how class conscious he is, he also reveals that being related
to a member of the aristocratic society then he is more worthy of respect and
admiration. “I have more than once observed to Lady Catherine that her charming
daughter seemed born to be a duchess, and that the most elevated rank, instead
of giving her consequence, would be adorned by her. — These are the kind of
little things which please her ladyship, and it is a sort of attention which I
conceive myself peculiarly bound to pay.” (Ch. 14, Pg, 83)
Another very
prominent theme in the novel is women—or how society treats women. Austen
criticizes the pressure put on women and the standards that a woman needs to
meet in order to be deemed as womanly. During the conversation that takes place
between Darcy, Elizabeth, Mr. Bennet and his sister, Darcy claims that a lady
must posses certain skills (which are not so few, actually!) to be viewed as
womanly. Darcy says, “no one can be really esteemed accomplished, who does not
greatly surpass what is usually met with. A woman must have a thorough
knowledge of music, singing, drawing, dancing, and the modern languages, to
deserve the word; and besides all this, she must possess a certain something in
her air and manner of walking, the tone of her voice, her address and
expressions, or the word will be but half deserved.” (Ch. 8, Pg, 47) Austen
then cleverly utilizes Elizabeth to mock those stereotypical judgments of women
by teasing Darcy at his knowing very few women, Elizabeth says, “I am no longer
surprised at your knowing only six accomplished women. I rather wonder now at
your knowing any.” (CH. 8, Pg, 48)
Weaknesses and
strengths
One
of the weaknesses of the novel, I find, is how much silly and funny some of the
characters are, to the point where it feels pretentious and overall funny. One
of the characters I mean is Mrs. Bennet for instance. They way she portrays
herself, or from another perspective the way Austen uses Mrs. Bennet as very
desperate and hungry for money and marriage to her daughters is just silly.
On the other hand, one strength that
the novel posses is the character’s ability to realize and recognize their own
faults and mistakes, and openly admit them. For instance, Elizabeth in one of
the chapters says, “But vanity, not love, has been my folly…” (Ch. 36, Pg. 259)
when she reads Darcy’s letter explaining his sentiments against Wickham after
she had misjudged him for being greedy and unjust.
Conclusion:
personal reflection on the writing style of Austen
Apart
from the fact that the novel discusses prevalent and important social issues,
Austen makes her novels too good to be true, in other words the happy endings
in her novels—take for instance Persuasion as well as Pride and
Prejudice—are a little unrealistic. Moreover, in comparison to other writers
who belonged to the same era, e.g., Charlotte Bronte, the air that Austen
creates with her novels is far more optimistic and bright than other novels
such as Jane Eyre or Villette. Those novels by Bronte create an
air of suspense and tragedy rather than being all happiness and butterflies.
Though Austen creates somewhat
unrealistic plot(s), it is inevitable to have a couple of laughs at her witty
writing style and at her use of sarcasm to tease some of her characters.
Austen, for instance, makes fun of how insensible Mary Bennet is, by saying… “Mary
wished to say something very sensible, but knew not how.” (Ch. 2, Pg, 7) In
other words, Austen’s writing style is identifiable by its sarcasm and humor.
