ANALYSIS OF PRIDE AND PREJUDICE

Analysis of Pride and Prejudice

Analysis

Introduction

The novel Pride and Prejudice was written by a very talented novelist, Jane Austen. It provides a sensory reality of the relationships and family lives of the eighteenth and nineteenth century world. In many of her writings, she focuses and elaborates on the value of relations and marrying. Through her writings, the readers see an elaboration of such a social order which offers narrow expectations for the female. Such a society is observed in the sight of a vigorous and insightful young heroine. Packed up with both intellect and hilarity, Austen's novels at the same time provide a pragmatic depiction of relationships between men and women. (Johnson, 1990)

A critic says that it happened for the first time in English literature that, outside Shakespeare, the general public has got to meet heroine who are convincing, possess brains, and have the aptitude to form their own opinion in an ambitious and witty manner. Often called a “comedy of manners,” Pride and Prejudice balances laughter and compassion as it tells the story of two people undergoing a rigorous self-examination. The novel takes place in England in the early 1800s, during a time known as the Regency period. The novel, Pride and Prejudice, is composed in the 19th century and according to the principles and beliefs of this age. It was primarily written in Longbourn which is a country town of the Hertfordshire and is located a mile away from Meryton and also at a distance of twenty-four miles from London. It is a well-organized regional city, packed up with landed gentry and unaware of the far-reaching changes happening outside the bounds of its narrow, confined vision. In the novel, Austen creates universal questions regarding the complexity by which a person preserves his eccentricity and liberty in the world of societal restrictions. She also highlights the way these defined ideas shape people's relations.

The story unfolds with the Bennet family involving the family of Mr. Bennet with his wife Mrs. Bennet and their beautiful and pleasant five daughters. Jane Bennet is the eldest daughter and is beautiful, introverted, quiet, tender and pleasant; later, she loves and marries Mr. Bingley. Elizabeth, the second daughter, is energetic, intellectual, amusing and sensible. She does not like Darcy in the beginning but afterwards, fall in love with him. Marry is their third daughter, who is dull, tasteless, simple, vain, silly, and is too unnatural. Catherine is the fourth daughter, and is nearly an insignificant person in the whole. Lydia Bennet is the fifth and youngest of all. She is stupid, inconsiderate, unprincipled, flirtatious, and loudmouthed and scatter brained; she is also the most favorite daughter of her parents. In the later part of the story, she runs away with George Wickham who is a good-looking, military officer. (Teachman, 2003)

Other characters include Mr. Bennet, the mother of five daughters and a matchmaker. She is a woman of mean understanding, little information, and unpredictable temper and keeps embarrassing her elder girls for their ...