Laughable Issues and Lessons in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice Essay Sample free essay sample

â€Å"Who wouldn’t want to be Elizabeth Bennet? † is possibly one inquiry that a reader of Pride and Prejudice would normally inquire. As Jane Austen’s favored heroine. her â€Å"liveliness of head. † independency. humor and vivacity are a delectation to many. The best of it all is that she is able to pull the tall. fine-looking rich Darcy. Truly. who does non desire to be her? Yet. if one looks at the universe of the novel. one can non deny that Regency England is non a really friendly topographic point for adult females. Beyond Austen’s orderly fencings were wars. revolutions and a huffy male monarch opinion England. It was a disruptive clip that called for sense every bit good as esthesia. Jane Austen exhibits both these features good in all of her novels. Elinor Dashwood ofSense and Sensibilityis a idol of this every bit good as Elizabeth Bennet. Although Elizabeth does come in Netherfield Park with a boggy half-slip. We will write a custom essay sample on Laughable Issues and Lessons in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice Essay Sample or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page she does non traverse the boundary lines of properness like her three younger sisters. Sense is good employed in the novel through sarcasm. Darcy himelf notes the incompatibility and power of Elizabeth’s dry linguistic communication: â€Å" [ †¦ ] you find great enjoyment in on occasion professing sentiments which in fact are non your own† ( 134 ) . Irony refers to how a individual. statement. circumstance or state of affairs is non how it seems to be. The best illustration of this is really the novel’s well-quoted first line: â€Å"It is a truth universally acknowledged. that a individual adult male in ownership of a good luck must be in privation of a wife† ( 1 ) . In world. adult females are by and large the 1s looking for work forces to be their hubbies or son-in-laws. That statement fundamentally summarizes the premiss of the novel and the quest of the Bennet sisters. That is besides true for Lizzy as she finds love and luck in the class of the novel. As the novel progresses. this sarcasm will intensify. In this essay. the mode of which issues such as the adult female inquiry. category mobility and matrimony are ironically laughed alternatively of subversively protesting about them will be explored. peculiarly in Elizabeth Bennet’s experiences. Even in the novel’s first sentence. one could see the ends of adult females in society at that clip. The end of about every adult female so was to get married a rich adult male and do her girls marry rich work forces. Womans were merely intended to delight work forces. In one drawing room conversation at Netherfield. Caroline Bingley lists the features of an complete adult female: must hold a thorough cognition of music. vocalizing. pulling. dancing. and the modern linguistic communications. to merit the word ; and besides all this. she must possess a certain something in her air and mode of walking. the tone of her voice. her reference and looks [ †¦ ] ( 29 ) . All these features are the features of a perfect hostess. Mr. Darcy adds to this: â€Å"the betterment of her head by extended reading† ( 29 ) . All of these remarks seem to divert Elizabeth as she replies to both: â€Å"I am no longer surprised at your cognizing merely six complete adult females. I instead wonder now at your cognizing any† ( 29 ) . That shook the Bingley sisters’ nervousnesss. Not merely did that comment imply that they are non complete adult females but besides it inquiries their very impression of complete adult females. The inquiry of woman’s individuality does neither arise in the novel that much nor is it answered. but like in that peculiar conversation. it is questioned. Marriage. as antecedently mentioned. is one of the chief topics of the novel as it follows the matrimony conquerings of the Bennet sisters. In Regency England. matrimony is normally a concern dealing. Few people marry for love. Many marry for security like Charlotte Lucas in get marrieding Mr. Collins. Before that event. readers are given a glance of Charlotte’s positions on matrimony: Happiness in matrimony is wholly a affair of opportunity. If the temperaments of the parties are of all time so good known to each other. or of all time so similar before-hand. it does non progress their felicitousness in the least. They ever contrive to turn sufficiently unlike afterwards to hold their portion of annoyance ; and it is better to cognize every bit small as possible of the defects of the individual with whom you are to go through your life ( 16 ) . Of Charlotte’s matrimony to Mr. Collins. Elizabeth could merely â€Å"meditate upon Charlotte’s grade of contentment† ( 122 ) . For Elizabeth. felicity in a matrimony such as that is impossible. as she has day-to-day cogent evidence of that in the matrimony of her parents. There are non many happy matrimonies in the novel. Class mobility is interrelated with matrimony in the novel. Womans are non the lone 1s to get married rich but besides work forces like Mr. Wickham. since one could travel up the societal ladder done matrimony as some people do through trade like Mr. Bingley. Unfortunately. characters such as Lady Catherine like â€Å"to have the differentiation of rank preserved† ( 124 ) . The blue Lady Catherine and Mr. Darcy show their clasp on other categories through assorted workss. As Lady Catherine controls Mr. Collins so does Darcy act upon the noveau riche Bingley in interfering in Bingley’s relationship with Jane. Darcy’s construct of pride is linked to his category. The construct of pride in the novel is linked to honour and responsibility. Elizabeth herself acquiescences: â€Å"you have chosen your mistake well† ( 43 ) . Though Elizabeth and the novel’s readers could laugh at Mr. Collins fawning over Lady Catherine or Ms. Bingley seting herself on show for Mr. Darcy. category struggle is obvious. Jane’s matrimony to Bingley and Elizabeth’s matrimony to Darcy in the terminal does small to harmonise the relationship between these categories. Elizabeth laughs at those issues but as she experiences them she can non deny that those issues are existent in her universe. At the center of the novel. she learns that she is blinded by bias. so that she could non truly approach the issues that surround her every bit objectively as she thought: How despicably have I acted! [ †¦ ] I. who have prided myself on my understanding! —I. who have valued myself on my abilities! who have frequently disdained the generous candor of my sister. and gratified my amour propre. in useless or blameworthy misgiving. —How humiliating is this find! [ †¦ ] But amour propre. non love. has been my folly. [ †¦ ] Till this minute. I neer knew myself ( 159 ) . Her sense of vision was questioned. so she had to reconsider her sentiments of about everything. When Lydia was invited by Mrs. Foster. she objects to her father’s determination. seeing Lydia’s shame more clearly. In Derbyshire. she comes face to confront non merely with â€Å"his beautiful evidences of Pemberley† ( 286 ) but besides the world of his category. She came to recognize that â€Å"to be the kept woman of Pemberley must be something† ( 185 ) . Lydia’s elopement with Wickham merely became the concluding blow to her. coercing her to earnestly see her connexions. Given all of Elizabeth’s experiences. the modern reader would likely inquire if these lessons are still applicable in the 20Thursdaycentury. since many chick-lit authors such as Helen Fielding draw inspiration from this novel. Possibly one could state â€Å"yes† to that. There is still a grade of bias in all manners of instruction. even in this post-Holocaust universe. But at least. in this epoch. many people are more cognizant of bias and its effects than in Jane Austen’s clip. The issues mentioned here are taken more earnestly. Truly. issues such as the adult female inquiry. category mobility and matrimony are found ironically absurd in this novel. But after reading this novel. the reader. like Elizabeth. is besides forced to oppugn his sense of vision and bias. As the reader considers this. one might non believe this issue of bias laughable at all. Plants Cited — .Pride and Prejudice. Ed. James Kinsley. Oxford: Oxford UP. 1998.