Pride and Prejudice

Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen, was published 200 years ago. Though it was is one of the most famous and beloved novels in British history, I had never read it before, but I took care of that. I must say that it delighted me intermittently, but the style was difficult to adjust to, and I wasn't overwhelmingly entertained by it.

I had read only one other of Austen's novels, Sense and Sensibility, which I had similar difficulty with. As with that novel, Austen's main focus is the navigation of social mores during the Georgian era, most specifically, the pursuit of marriage by young woman in the gentry. Though this may seem frivolous today, it was a life or death matter back then, since women couldn't inherit property.

That is the case with the Bennet sisters. There are five--most prominent is Elizabeth, who is the center of the plot. She is the second sister, and a lively and witty twenty-year-old. Her father, known only as Mr. Bennet, is a country gentleman (one of the things about these books is that people never seem to work) who prefers to tend to his books. Mrs. Bennet, less nobly born, concentrates on marrying off her daughters. None of them can inherit the estate, and it will go to Mr. Collins, their cousin.

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife," the book begins, but this statement really is a mirror of the center of the action, as while men may look for wives, women are keenly presenting themselves as such. The action begins with the arrival of the eligible bachelor Mr. Bingley, who rents an estate near the Bennet's Longbourn. He and Jane, Elizabeth's elder sister, seem to be a match. His friend, Mr. Darcy, makes a very bad first impression at a ball. He is the "pride" of the title: "His character was decided. He was the proudest, most disagreeable man in the world, and every body hoped that he would never come there again."

The "prejudice" of the title refers to Elizabeth, who forms an instant impression of Darcy based on little information. Here we have the seed for many a romantic comedy to come--the couple who initially dislike each other, but by the end are happily wed.

Parts of Pride and Prejudice went by for me in a stupor, as I had a hard time keeping track of who was involved with whom and who was visiting whom (transportation being what it was, when people paid visits they stayed for a while). But every once in a while the language exploded off the page, and I was riveted. One of those occasions was the chapter when the pedantic Mr. Collins sets his cap at Elizabeth, but she will have none of him. He refuses to take no for an answer, and the result is comic gold. Austen describes him thusly: "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."

Another is late in the book, when Mrs. de Bourg, the richest lady in the county, visits Longbourn. She is Darcy's aunt, and had planned to marry him off to her daughter. She has gotten wind that Darcy has proposed to Elizabeth, and in a magnificently taut chapter, puts it to Elizabeth that she will not marry him. Elizabeth shocks Mrs. de Bourg by standing up for herself.

Eventually Elizabeth accepts Darcy's proposal, as she realizes he did a great thing for her sister, who had eloped with an army officer. No one can believe it, as they all thought she hated him. "Jane looked at her doubtingly, 'Oh, Lizzy! It cannot be. I know how much you dislike him.'"

But it is to be, and in a lovely scene with her father, she maintains that she does love him. For 1813, when marrying for love was still something of a novelty, it has a special resonance.

Pride and Prejudice has earned a place in the hearts of many a reader, being the runner-up in a poll of best British books (running second to The Lord of the Rings). I liked it okay, and understand it's appeal, it's just not my kind of thing. It has been adapted many times for the screen, and over the next few weeks I'll take a look at a few of those adaptations.