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$Title{Works of Jane Austen
Character Analyses and Critical Commentary}
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$Author{Austen, Jane}
$Affiliation{Instructor Of English, Rutgers University}
$Subject{elizabeth
darcy
marriage
bennet
moral
mrs
darcy's
wickham
elizabeth's
pride}
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Title:       Works of Jane Austen
Book:        Pride and Prejudice
Author:      Austen, Jane
Critic:      Fitzpatrick, William J.
Affiliation: Instructor Of English, Rutgers University

Character Analyses and Critical Commentary

Character Analyses

Elizabeth:

     "I must confess and I think her as delightful a creature as ever appeared
in print, and how I shall be able to tolerate those who do not like her at
least, I do not know." (From Jane Austen's Letters.)

     Although not so beautiful as her older sister Jane, Elizabeth is quite
attractive. Her striking eyes and flashing wit denote a personality every bit
the match for Darcy's. She has inherited her father's sense of humor and
irony, but without his cynicism. Her ability to see humor in Darcy's
slighting her, her disregard for decorum in tramping off through the mud to
visit her sister, her critical and witty conversation, reveal a vigorous and
intelligent young woman superior to, and without the pretense of, the
society around her. Much of the story is seen through her searching
intelligence. She is constantly reacting to the self-revelations of others,
and in so doing reveals the positive standard of morals and good sense. Her
judgment of Mr. Collins and Charlotte, her embarrassment at her family's
crudities, her appreciation of Pemberley - her high moral standards, good
manners, and taste - distinguish her from Longbourn. This makes Darcy's
victory over his pride easier - socially more rational - than it might
otherwise have been.

     We must not forget that Elizabeth is "not yet one and twenty." This
somewhat accounts for her lively, "impertinent" spirits, for her pride in her
own wit and perception, and for her susceptibility to Wickham's charms. She
has not yet had much experience in life and, in a way, the novel is the story
of the completion of her education. She has more to learn than she thinks she
has, and the reader delights in the irony that at the moments when she is
triumphing in her wit - during the several dialogues with Darcy in the first
half of the book - she is most deceived about the effects of her sharp
remarks.

     Her prejudice has two aspects: it is against Darcy because of his insult
to her and his pride; it is for Wickham because of his attractiveness and
attentions to her. Events force her to turn her critical scrutiny inward, and
she reveals her honesty and courage and flexibility by forthrightly facing
the truth about herself and others. This constantly busy intelligence is
Elizabeth's salient trait. It becomes a virtue that transcends class lines.
It is Elizabeth's consciousness of her own superiority that permits her to
stand up proudly to Lady Catherine and to reject Darcy's insulting proposal.
Yet, with all her intellectual and moral superiority and her proud
independence and unconventionality, she is not marked with the egotism we see
in most of the other characters. Her concern for her family, her attempt to
step into the gap caused by her father's abdication of his responsibility,
again reveal a maturity worthy of Darcy.

     In Elizabeth we see action guided (at last) by reason, informed by
self-knowledge. She is the model of prudent behavior, and her marriage is
the measure of the others in the book.

Fitzwilliam Darcy:

     "Mr. Darcy soon drew the attention of the room by his fine, tall person,
handsome features, noble men; and the report that was in general circulation
within five minutes after his entrance, of his having ten thousand a year.
Till his manners gave a disgust which turned the tide of his popularity; for
he was discovered to be proud; to be above his company, and above being

     Darcy enters the plot almost accidentally, through his friendship with
Bingley. Everyone (including Darcy) is busy with the romance of Bingley and
Jane, when all the time below the surface the real drama is taking place in
the half-suppressed and halting growth of Darcy's and Elizabeth's love for
each other. Darcy's character is a challenge to the perceptiveness of all the
other persons in the novel. The many different interpretations of his
personality establish him as one of those "intricate" characters Elizabeth
says are most amusing. Along with Elizabeth and Mr. Bennet, he is capable
of thought and self-scrutiny. His true complexity and moral worth is
revealed gradually and is a correlative to Elizabeth's own essay in
self-discovery. Almost alone of all the characters is he variously
interpreted. The reader is not given a complete picture directly, but rather
Darcy is presented as seen by Elizabeth, Bingley, Georgiana, Wickham,
Caroline, Mrs. Bennet, Mrs. Reynolds, Meryton, Lambton.

     As a member of the great landed gentry and of noble descent on his
mother's (Lady Anne Fitzwilliam) side (and having been spoiled as a child),
Darcy embodies the pride of his superior social status - thus the objection to
Elizabeth's low connections. But although events force Darcy to modify his
snobbish identification of social desirability and social status, his pride
is revealed to have a stronger root in his consciousness of being the
possessor of superior intelligence and will. This makes him contemptuous of
the trivial socializing that amuses his friends, and disdainful of Caroline
Bingley's vulgar pursuit. He has the virtues of his social position; he is
liberal and honorable - and in the end, humble as well. Love humbles him and
makes him worthy of love.

Jane:

     The eldest of the Bennet girls has two distinguishing characteristics:
she is very beautiful, and she is very unperceptive (or, to put it more
gently, she is so pure of heart and mind that she will go to any length not
to believe evil of any one). On the most superficial level, the plot is the
story of the romance of Jane and Bingley; but actually, their story provides
only the occasion for the real interest of the novel. Jane and Bingley exhibit
neither pride nor prejudice. The themes of social status arise only indirectly
in their case. Choice for them is never problematic. Their function rather is
to show how people can suffer from the pride and prejudice, the egoism, greed,
and snobbery of others.

Bingley:

     As he admits in a conversation with Elizabeth, Bingley's character is
not at all intricate. His distinguishing trait is readiness "to yield to the
persuasion of a friend." Indeed, the mechanics of the plot turn largely on
Darcy's ability to control his friend. Bingley's fortune (100,000 pounds) has
brought him none of the snobbery so prominent in his sisters. He enjoys the
trivial social affairs his friend finds so boring. Mr. Bennet satirizes his
mild manner when he warns him and Jane that their servants will answer
their gentleness with wholesale theft.

Mrs. Bennet:

     "Her mind was less difficult to develop. She was a woman of mean
understanding, little information, and uncertain temper. When she was
discontented she fancied herself nervous. The business of her life was to get
her daughters married; its solace, visiting and news." (I)

     Mrs. Bennet fails by all relevant criteria. According to the standards of
society, she is inconsiderate, ill-mannered, and vulgar. As a parent she is
partly responsible for the superficial characters of her three younger
daughters. Lydia is clearly in her mother's mold. Mrs. Bennet thinks of
marriage mainly as a means of social and economic advancement - although she
seems contented enough just to have her daughters married to anyone. She
has no feminine charm. Her dull mentality and duller moral sense cannot
distinguish Collin's worthlessness. Next to marriage, her great preoccupation
is the entail on her husband's estate, which she talks of incessantly.
With such prospective mothers-in-law as Mrs. Bennet and Lady Catherine, one
wonders if Darcy might not have done better to remain a bachelor - in spite
of Elizabeth's evident merit.

Mr. Bennet:

     "Mr. Bennet was so odd a mixture of quick parts, sarcastic humour,
reserve, and caprice, that the experience of three and twenty years had
been insufficient to make his wife understand his character." (I) "Captivated
by youth and beauty, and that appearance of good humour that youth and beauty
generally give, he had married a woman whose weak understanding and illiberal
mind had very early in their marriage put an end to all real affection for
her." (XLII)

     Mr. Bennet possesses an estate that yields him an income of 2000 pounds
per year. But his inheritance must pass through the male line, and since
he has no sons, on his death his estate and his home (Longbourn House),
will go to Mr. Collins his cousin. For his wife, this is the most important
fact about her husband. He doesn't seem to be at all concerned about it.
Having committed the tragic imprudence of marrying a woman beneath him in
every respect, he has retired to the privacy of his library, his country, and
his self-entertaining irony. ("For" what do we live but to make sport for our
neighbors and laugh at them in our turn.") Mr. Bennet is a country gentleman
who, although he married the daughter of an attorney, is acceptable in
polite society (recall Elizabeth's retort to Lady Catherine, "I am the
daughter of a gentleman"). Thus, it is not as if Darcy were marrying,
say, the daughter of an attorney. Although distinguished by his wit and
penetrating irony which sees through the sham of those around him, Mr.
Bennet must be accounted to have withdrawn imprudently from his daughters'
education, to have washed his hands of responsibility. He has, further,
failed to save from his income in order to provide for his daughters when
he is gone. The catastrophe of Lydia's escapade forces him for a moment to
face the truth of his familial failures. Elizabeth is the only one of his
daughters with whom he is on any degree of intimacy. Next to her, he is the
liveliest character in the novel, and the reader is continually grateful for
his cynical and satirical irony.

Charlotte Lucas:

     She is plain, and twenty-seven, and can look forward to a life as a
governess or to living, not very comfortably, dependent on her parents. Like
Caroline Bingley, Charlotte serves as a foil for Elizabeth. Whereas Caroline's
desperation leads her to a vulgar pursuit of Darcy, Charlotte's poor prospects
for a life of material comfort lead her to pounce on Mr. Collins as soon as
Elizabeth casts him off. She appears to do this with full awareness of his
deficiencies. This proves she has the intelligence to be Elizabeth's friend.
Her deficiency is a moral one, as Elizabeth explains in Chapter XXIV. The
calculating way she chooses a mate balances Lydia's impulsive, animal motive.
As Elizabeth instructs us, a prudent choice in marriage balances natural
attraction and rational reflection. Charlotte loses her balance.

Reverend William Collins:

     "Mr. Collins was not a sensible man, and the deficiency of Nature had
been but little assisted by education or society, the greatest part of his
life having been spent under the guidance of an illiterate and miserly father;
and though he belonged to one of the universities he had merely kept the
necessary terms, without forming at it any useful acquaintance. The subjection
in which his father had brought him up had given him originally great humility
of manner; but it was now a good deal counteracted by the self-conceit of a
weak head, living in retirement, and the consequential feelings of early and
unexpected prosperity. A fortunate chance had recommended him to Lady
Catherine de Bourgh when the living of Hunsford was vacant; and the respect
which he felt for her high rank, and his veneration for her as his
patroness, mingling with a very good opinion of himself, of his authority
as a clergyman, and his right as a rector, made him altogether a mixture
of pride and obsequiousness, self-importance, and humility." (XV)

     Collins is the correlative to, and justification of, the snobbishness
of the upper classes. Indeed, he partakes of this snobbishness and social
pride in his very servility. His complete lack of self-consciousness permits
the ironies that make him perhaps the most comic figure in the book. His moral
confusion and pretentiousness are reflected in his overelaborate speech and
style of writing. As the first of Elizabeth's suitors, he represents the kind
of marital compromise that trades all natural feelings for economic security.
His rude and pompous proposal is strangely like Darcy's in his firm conviction
that she has no choice but to accept him. But despite his comic absurdity, the
dullness and self-importance of this unimportant man, his moral density (his
Christianity seems a mere masquerade - recall his advice about Lydia) have a
sinister and uncomic cast. The smell of evil is about him, like Wickham.
Collins has great importance in the plot. Twice he brings Elizabeth and Darcy
together: first, at Hunsford; second by telling Lady Catherine about Jane's
forthcoming marriage to his friend, thereby intimating that her nephew might
be interested in Elizabeth.

Lydia:

     "Lydia was a stout, well-grown girl of fifteen, with a fine complexion
and good-humored countenance; a favorite with her mother, whose affection had
brought her into the public at an early age. She had high animal spirits, and
a sort of natural self-confidence, which the attention of the officers, to
whom her uncle's good dinners and her own easy manners recommended her, had
increased into assurance." (IX)

     Lydia is the youngest, the tallest, the boldest, the most vulgar, and the
most imprudent of the sisters. There are indications that her superficial and
flirtatious character is not unlike what her mother's was at her age.
Completely non-moral, she has not sense of remorse or shame; on the contrary,
she triumphs at her living with Wickham before marriage. Her marriage, based
on physical attraction merely, is doomed to failure. Her elopement, however,
serves a useful purpose for it gives Darcy the occasion to come gallantly to
the aid of the Bennet family and to show how he can swallow his pride and deal
with the hated Wickham, all for the love of Elizabeth.

George Wickham:

     His appearance was greatly in his favor. Brought up and educated by
Darcy's father, Wickham has acquired the taste for a life of leisure but none
of the self-discipline and moral integrity that characterize Darcy. As Lydia's
affections are completely undiscriminating, held by no moral check so is
Wickham's pursuit of a woman with a fortune. He easily shifts his attentions
from Elizabeth to Miss King, and is persuaded to marry the girl he ran off
with only by the promise of money and a commission in the Army (which Darcy
obtains for the man who tried to destroy his reputation). Like Lydia he has no
morality - hence no prudence. He soon tires of his wife. The nervous fright in
his manner when Elizabeth confronts him with her knowledge of the truth
symbolizes the man's general ineffectuality.

Mrs. Gardiner:

     A dear friend of Elizabeth, who obviously matches her in intelligence,
breeding, and culture. Her desire to visit Pemberley is what gives the romance
a second chance. Her great tact (in Lambton) in refraining from inquiring
about Elizabeth's relationship with Darcy is a striking contrast to Lady
Catherine's and Mrs. Bennet's vulgar inquisitiveness.

Edward Gardiner:

     Mrs. Bennet's brother (a London businessman) is living proof that a man
who soils his hands in "trade" making profit can be a man of some taste,
discrimination, and culture. He helps to teach Darcy to discard his
prejudices. Darcy's standards are all right; but he must learn that they are
within the reach of people like the Gardiners.

Mrs. Louisa Hurst:

     Bingley's sister occupies herself with her brother's affairs. Her husband
is worthless and lazy. She does not betray the vulgarity of her sister,
Caroline, but agrees with her ideas about Darcy and her brother and matches
her in snobbery and pretentiousness.

Mr. Hurst:

     "He was an indolent man; who lived only to eat, drink and play at cards."
One may assume that Hurst comes from the upper social strata, and he seems
the cliche of the typical lazy, good-for-nothing, fatuous aristocrat.

Sir William Lucas:

     Though inoffensive and generally kind, his snobbery and affectation are
satirized in the book. Since he made a small fortune in business and has been
knighted almost by luck (V), his snobbery is insecure (like Caroline's) and he
reveals this in his fawning over Lady Catherine. He shows the shallowness of
this standards when he is happy that his daughter marries Collins. Lady Lucas
is just like her husband. Although, as she anticipated, her daughter is
destined to acquire the Longbourn estate, the Bennets will go on to Pemberley.

Mr. And Mrs. Philips:

     Mr. Philips is an attorney is Meryton who married the boss' daughter
(Mrs. Bennet's sister). He and his wife are favorites of Kitty and Lydia and
provide a meeting place for them and the officers. They clearly have not risen
above the level of manners of Mrs. Bennet.

Mary Bennet:

     She has inherited her father's taste for reading but not his
intelligence. Her pompous and sententious platitudes help to round out the
repulsiveness of the Bennet family. Her father apparently enjoys making fun
of her.

Kitty Bennet:

     Though older than Lydia, she is really a smaller edition of her - giddy,
superficial, officer-crazy. She goes to live with Elizabeth and Darcy and
gradually improves.

Lady Catherine De Bourgh:

     Darcy's aunt is a small-minded, arrogant, proud, and vulgar woman. Her
moral stature is perhaps more emphatically revealed in her busy-body poking
into the affairs of everyone around her than in her officious attempt to
prevent Elizabeth's marriage to Darcy. Her vulgarity and bad manners help to
teach Darcy - to prepare him for the realization that his "connections" also
leave something to be desired. Ironically, she is the instrument of bringing
Darcy and Elizabeth finally together (by telling him of her talk with
Elizabeth.

Caroline Bingley:

     She is a kind of counterpart to Elizabeth, her chief rival for Darcy's
heart. Although her characterization of the Meryton pretentiousness ("The
insipidity and yet the noise; the nothingness and yet the self-importance of
all these people") is indeed accurate, she is herself the embodiment of the
most snobbish pretense. Eager to forget that her family originally made its
fortune in business, obvious and vulgar in her pursuit of Darcy and her
disparagement of Elizabeth, she sets off, in her genteel crudeness Elizabeth's
innate gentility. Her pride has no security, and her prejudice helps to make
her the instrument of Jane's separation from Bingley. As the author presents
it to us, her desire for marriage with Darcy rests merely on his being a "good
catch." Though attractive and intelligent, she never emerges as a person in
her own right, but rather exists as a kind of upper-middle-class analogue of
Sir William Lucas.

Colonel Fitzwilliam:

     He obviously likes Elizabeth very much and, under other
circumstances, would very likely have proposed marriage. But as a younger son,
he has not inherited the bulk of his father's estate and thinks it prudent
to seek a woman who can help support him in the manner to which he has become
accustomed. Elizabeth meets him after she has been so quickly attracted to
Wickham, and perhaps the superiority of his manners helps to prepare her to
reject Wickham for Darcy.

Georgiana:

     One might have difficulty believing that Darcy's young sister is capable
of an action very like Lydia's (XXXV). She is the very opposite of her proud
brother. In fact, she is self-effacing and shy. In a book crowded with strong
female personalities, she does not make the most vivid impression. Her near
rashness perhaps also helps prepare Darcy to forgive Elizabeth her family's
scandal.

Mrs. Reynolds:

     The housekeeper performs a function that the curious reader will discover
in Chapter XLIII.

Miss De Bourgh:

     This wraith, as weak as her mother is strong, was no match for Darcy's
bold personality. Her poor mother never had a chance to "unite the two
estates."

Critical Commentary

     Pride and Prejudice is the representation of the conditions and processes
of prudent action in choosing a mate, within the context of the code of
civilized behavior in society, and told in the form of a romantic comedy
ending in marriage.

Physical Structure: Romantic Comedy Plot.

     On the simplest level of the action, we have the story of the course of a
romance that ends happily in marriage. Actually, there are several romances
and marriages (sub-plots) dominated by the most important and influential
story of Darcy and Elizabeth. Accordingly, the story is articulated (organized
into parts-structure) into a repetitive sequence of the lovers coming
together and separating, as various obstacles are posed and removed until,
finally, they are united in marriage. Thus, the various partners are
introduced to each other in the first part (which ends with Charlotte Lucas's
marriage in Chapter XXXVI). This first part (or act) consists in the first
meeting and the first parting of the two main pairs of lovers, Jane and
Bingley, Elizabeth and Darcy. The former relationship dominates the
speculation about marriage in this first part, while the latter appears to be
a mutual antagonism - although Darcy's strong attraction to Elizabeth hints at
more to come. This part opens with the promise of marriage as Mrs. Bennet sets
off about her "business" of getting her daughters married; and it closes with
the removal of Bingley and his party to London. Elizabeth and Collins are
brought together briefly and separated permanently by her refusal of his
proposal. Wickham and Elizabeth also come together in what will prove to be
another false match. (The only fruit of the action of the first part, then, is
the union of Charlotte and Collins.)

     The second part (XXVII-XLI) is marked by the meeting of Darcy and
Elizabeth at Hunsford Parsonage and at Rosings, his proposal, and their angry
parting as she turns him down. This part also includes the separation of
Wickham and Elizabeth. Jane journeys to London, but though near him, does not
meet Bingley.

     The third part is marked by the third meeting of Elizabeth and Darcy, at
Pemberley and Lambton, on her trip to Derbyshire with her aunt and uncle, Mr.
and Mrs. Gardiner. Although her meeting with Darcy promises to be "fruitful,"
it ends in their third parting. Lydia has met and run away with Wickham at
Brighton and Elizabeth must return home (XLVII).

     The fourth part is dominated by the story of Lydia and Wickham, who are
finally married through Darcy's efforts (LII).

     The fifth part begins with the return to Netherfield (and to the sisters)
of Bingley and Darcy, and ends, this time not with their parting, but with the
double marriage of Jane and Bingley, Elizabeth and Darcy.

     Each of the five parts can be symbolized by the physical setting where
the main action takes place: (1) Longbourn, Netherfield, Meryton (the two
sisters and the two friends spend several days together at Netherfield); (2)
Hunsford and Rosings; (3) Pemberley and Lambton; (4) London (although what
the reader witnesses is the reaction to Lydia's running away); (5) Longbourn.
After marriage, the triumphal setting is again Pemberley.

     Of course, each part is itself a complex whole, and, since the author
carefully interweaves all the various happenings, the plot may be divided
in a number of ways. One might, for example, see three main movements, with
the last a happy repetition of the unhappy first. The middle section (Darcy
and Elizabeth, Hunsford and Pemberley) is enclosed by two "bad marriages":
Charlotte and Collins (XXVI), Wickham and Lydia (LII). Suspense is generated
by the obstacles to the union of the two elder Bennet sisters with Darcy and
Bingley.

Moral Structure: The Marriage Map.

     The subject of the story is marriage; but the theme is prudent conduct in
getting married - prudent choice in finding a mate. In other words, this
romantic comedy has a moral and spiritual significance beyond the "comic"
narrative interest of a simple love story. The facts of the story - the
events, the actions of the characters - solicit the reader's judgment of the
moral worth of what the characters do and, therefore, are.

     Throughout the book, various characters offer their own notions of what
constitutes right action - prudence, good judgment - in the context of getting
married. And the author, in turn, comments on or criticizes these different
standards by holding up the results of their "prudence" to the moral scrutiny
of Elizabeth's earnest judgment and the contrasting example of her own choice.
The context, of course, of judgment and action is always marriage.

     For example, Mrs. Bennet defines prudence in economic terms primarily.
Although at times it appears that for her any marriage is a prudent marriage
(XLIX, L, LI), in the main, success in marriage is a matter of pounds of
income per year (see especially I and LIX). It is this attitude that makes her
vulgarity and insensitiveness not merely comic, but shocking and at times
disgusting. And Mrs. Bennet is representative of the generality of persons who
consider the gaining of a son-in-law in terms of the acquisition of "property"
(I). Now, according to this "economic" view, Mrs. Bennet herself has made an
eminently "prudent" marriage (Mr. Bennet has an estate with an income of 2,000
pounds per year). But the portrait of her marriage is that of a mis-mated
couple whose union has long consisted merely in their residing under the same
roof - and, even then, Mr. Bennet remains in the seclusion of his library. If
there is more to marital relationship than a legal contract and more to
prudence than economic security, then Mrs. Bennet's thinking about marriage
can hardly lead to success.

     There are two characters in the book whose choices exemplify Mrs.
Bennet's notions of prudent choice. Charlotte considers marriage as "the
only honorable provision for well-educated young women of small fortune
. . . their pleasantest preservative from want" (XXII). Again, for a
twenty-seven-year-old girl of no distinctive beauty, the marriage to a
country parson with a good "living," must be counted an economic success. But
we discover (XXX) that Charlotte chooses her sitting room with the idea of
avoiding her husband. And Charlotte's acceptance is contrasted with
Elizabeth's refusal. Mr. Collins is not only ridiculous, he is morally
deficient (see especially LVII). And when, to Jane's suggestion that
Charlotte's choice was only prudent, Elizabeth replies that this is not "a
proper way of thinking," that selfishness is not prudence, the notion of what
really constitutes prudent choice in marriage becomes clarified (XXIV).

     What Mrs. Bennet leaves out, and what Wickham and Charlotte leave out,
are the moral worth of the prospective mate and one's personal feelings for
him. Mr. Collins is a ludicrous egotistical oaf. Charlotte has "sacrificed
every better feeling to worldly advantage" (XXII). To marry him is to forfeit
one's emotional and intellectual integrity; and this is not prudent; this is
not the way to success in marriage.

     As one can ignore spiritual and moral and emotional concerns for the
sake of "worldly advantage," so can one ignore higher values by merely giving
in to impulse and emotion. Thus, Lydia's marriage, like her father's before
her (see XLII), is thoughtless - lacking in judgment-imprudent.

     But the measure of true prudence in choosing a mate does not consist
merely in the happy combination of material and emotional needs. "A marriage
of true affection," a proper exercise of judgment, will reflect two concerns:
personal (peculiar) needs - emotional preference, compatibility of
personality (L) - as well as more practical considerations; and normative
(objective) requisites, measured by the dual social norms of morality and
good breeding. Emotion leads judgment; judgment guides feeling (XLVI); and
judgment should be informed by a knowledge of good morals and the standards
of good manners, taste, and sense. (It will be well here to recall that
among the most important things in Darcy's favor are his good taste and
courtesy, his liberality and charity [XLIV]. On the other hand, not all of
Wickham's charm can redeem the wanton immorality that turns Elizabeth
against him.)

     The book, thus, becomes a study of success and failure in getting
married. It is a kind of map that assigns each marriage its proper moral
location in relation to the true north of prudent choice. This is found to
lie beyond the materialistic pressures of economics (Mrs. Bennet, Wickham,
Charlotte), social duties (Mr. Collins), and sex (Lydia, Mr. Bennet). Real
happiness is possible only if it is rational (XLIX); and it is rational only
as a result of the recognition of the full range of individual needs and of
the objective moral and social worth of one's choice. Elizabeth's example
(and Darcy's, Bingley's, Jane's) instructs the reader in the meaning of
prudence in this field of human action.

Action: Moral Growth And Self-Knowledge.

     Although it is the moral structure imbedded in the plot that gives the
story its importance, it is the sense of watching living persons that accounts
for our interest. In Pride and Prejudice the sensuous portrait that puts us
in touch with a recognizable life is Elizabeth - her bristling consciousness,
her passionate scrutiny of others and herself, above all her mistaken
judgments and eventual recognition of her own folly and real feelings.

     Elizabeth is manifestly superior to the people in her environment. She
sees the intellectual and moral surrender of her intimate (and presumably
sensitive) friend, Charlotte. She is embarrassed by the vulgarity of her
family, shocked by moral lapses all around her. She sees through sham and
pretension (e.g., Bingley's sisters and Lady Catherine). But she, too is
vulnerable to mistaking appearances for reality. Her active intelligence can
founder on her own pride and prejudice; it can be dulled by flattery and the
charm of fine manners and good looks ("There was truth in his looks." XVII).
In Elizabeth, we see that prudence is a function of awareness. And the drama
and excitement of the book consist in watching a girl with the wit to know,
move through the trial and error of ordinary experience to a kind of
perfection of awareness.

     When Elizabeth comes to see that she has been wrong about Wickham and
Darcy, when she indicts her own folly and ignorance (XXXVI and XL), this
growth in self-knowledge is at the same time a moral growth, for she is now
able to tell the true order of feelings and events (XLIV). She can take the
measure of the reality around and in her because she has uncluttered her
perception by an honest self-scrutiny ("Until this moment I never knew
myself"). Where before her judgment was (understandably) defective (what
was so plain to Caroline Bingley never occurred to her), now she can act in
magisterial self-possession. This movement from self-deception to
undeception is the dominant action in the book, as it is the substance of
what Elizabeth "does."

     As all of the characters are united in the physical business of the
marriage mart, so there is an analogy of action, of movements of the spirit
or mind. Darcy and Mr. Bennet must also unburden themselves of ignorance.
Darcy's pride and arrogance have kept him from treating Elizabeth with the
respect she deserves. Mr. Bennet has refused to acknowledge his familial
duties. Each must confess his moral blindness (XLVIII and LVIII). These three
most interesting and "intellectual" persons thus represent analogous examples
of the same psychological process - the attainment of the conditions of
prudence, the unburdening of the mind of those obstacles that stand between
it and reality.

     Even those characters who remain fixed in their ignorance are united to
the action by their failure ever to come into self-awareness. Their view of
reality, of marriage, is distorted because they are, and they are unable to
think, to grow, to face up to themselves. These static characters, however
"comic," become interesting only through their relations with the characters
who change. Because of these, we say that the novel represents life as it is,
that it mirrors the change - moral growth or decay - that makes choice
problematic - uncertain, mistaken, difficult. The wisdom that is prudence is
not innate. It is acquired in the formal education in the lore of one's
civilization and in the random education of personal experience. This latter
dynamic process - the acquisition of practical wisdom through reflection on
personal experience in society - is the mimetic content of Pride and
Prejudice.

Criticism:

     It is frequently said of this novel that the author failed to incorporate
several of the characters (e.g., Lydia, Wickham, Darcy) into the sympathetic
presentation that characterizes the portrait of Elizabeth. It is no doubt true
that the novel would be richer if we saw (rather than heard about) Darcy's
"conversion," if we knew intimately (from the inside, as we know Elizabeth's)
Lydia's and Wickham's experience. And so on. But, though the scope of the
novel is limited to the presentation of Elizabeth's consciousness, it must be
admitted that the minor characters (if not Darcy) are nonetheless alive.
Lydia's portrait is no less vivid for not being intimate. It has also been
objected that Darcy's initial rudeness to Elizabeth is out of character.
Perhaps it is. But it is so early in the novel that the reader tends to
accept it as a postulate to get the action under way. Jane Austen certainly
limited the experience she portrayed to the familiar and even the ordinary
(see Introduction). If the reader wishes to know the experience of, say,
blasphemy, or the diabolic ego, or religious and philosophical experience, he
may turn to Dostoevsky. If he wants an invitation to participate in the
feelings of "romantic," sub-human, pre-moral, pre-civilized archetypes, let
him go and read Emily Bronte. To find fault in Jane Austen's limitation of her
subject it is necessary to examine her treatment of her subject - her moral
vision, her sense of reality, and her narrative skill. But this task has yet
to find a master.