Pride and Prejudice

Maybe the most popular of the six novels, Pride and Prejudice appears at first hand as a very complex story involving “too many characters” and even “being boring”, depending on opinions. It is absolutely NOT the case! The plot must be considered into the context of the 19^th century. It was initially entitled First Impressions. However after the publisher's rejection, Austen revised her manuscript to build up Pride and Prejudice as we know it today.

The novel is mainly about two sisters, Jane and Elizabeth Bennet and how they manage to reach happiness in life and love. One day, the Bennets' routine is agitated when they hear the news that the wealthy Charles Bingley - and Co.- moves in a neighbouring place, Netherfield Park. Mrs Bennet sees automatically an opportunity to marry one of her five daughters. Marriage and social expectations were rather an important subject matter in the 19^th century society, and especially to Mrs Bennet because of the entail. This was a law stating that land and money must go to a male heir. In other words, the five Bennet daughters would have nothing if their father died prematurely. When they all meet at a small ball, Charles and Jane are directly attracted to each other whereas the temporary tensions between Darcy - Bingley's closest friend - and Elizabeth begin. These tensions began when he rejected her when Bingley suggested him to dance with her. But you will see that the feelings of either Darcy and Elizabeth will change a lot as the story develops. Later, a man called Mr Collins, who is Mr Bennet's cousin and heir, visits the family and purposely wants to marry one of the five girls. He chooses Elizabeth, who refuses him. Out of pique he decides to marry Elizabeth's friend, Charlotte Lucas. From now on will begin states of frustration, love, deceptions and socially improper behaviours from which I leave details aside in order not to spoil your future reading of the book. Nevertheless it is interesting to note that in Jane Austen's novels, “all is well that ends well” as Shakespeare would have said.

Obviously both Darcy and Elizabeth express pride and prejudice throughout the novel, just as many characters do. Darcy is proud of his social class and is prejudiced against the Bennets' conduct. Elizabeth's pride is attacked when Darcy refuses to consider her at the first ball because of her social origins and she is prejudiced against his reserved and arrogant manners that she frankly dislikes. Her prejudice against him is even more amplified when she hears about his conflict with George Wickham, a militia officer encountered in their small village. But it is mostly their first impressions that matter (and remember how the novel was entitled firstly), impressions that will be revised while all the characters will know each other better.

To me the novel does not make a case for moral values, what you should think or not, what you should do or not. The most important feature is the way characters manage to fulfil their inmost desires. Pride and Prejudice is also a great description of the period, full of realism. One of Jane Austen's particularities was to examine what surrounded her, and thus we can find a certain verisimilitude in her novels. In addition to that, we can notice several instances of irony in the characters, in their behaviour but also in some dialogues conducted by Mr Bennet or Elizabeth for example. Hence the fact that dialogues are very important and reveal a lot about characterization. Speeches enable the reader to learn more about characters and it is a way for the reader to form his own opinion upon the situation, the characters' mind and their behaviour. We can see that this emphasis is shown right from the incipit as the novel begins with a dialogue. Moreover, Jane Austen often read her works to a restricted audience, hence the importance of the orality of her text.

This story, though deeply rooted in a specific period of History, keeps on captivating many readers throughout the centuries. Besides, if you want to see an adaptation, I eagerly recommend that you see the one made by the BBC in 1995, which remains the one and only faithful adaptation to the novel. [Colin Firth will always be my Mr Darcy!]