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关于<Pride and P reduce>之 What is true love 的探讨（修改中）
小组成员：刘思思 桂滢 宋佳昕 张冰冰
Austen's apparent reticence in matters of contemporary politics has often provoked comment from
critics. For most of her adult life, Britain was at war with France and experiencing casualties on an
unprecedented scale. Her brothers, Frank and Charles, served in the Royal Navy, in careers that
brought not only wealth and honour, but also constant danger. It is evident from comments in
Austen's surviving letters that she was far from ignorant of the international conflict; many readers
have therefore pondered over the relative absence of reference to current affairs in her fiction. The
question is particularly acute in Pride and Prejudice, at once the most military and the most witty
and effervescent of all the novels. Here the militia are embodied in force, and yet the regiment
billeted at meryton seems designed to provide dancing partners for the local community, rather
than protection against a foreign foe. It is hard to imagine Mr Wickham, Chamberlayne or Denny
engaged in action other than in the ballroom or at the card table.
When seen in the light of contemporary history, however, the anxiety generated by the militia
takes on further dimensions. By 1813, when Pride and Prejudice was published, the British army
was twenty times larger than it had been at the outbreak of the war. When the character of Mrs
Bennet had been sketched out in the 1790s, her ambition of getting her daughters married off had
probably seemed a relatively straightforward device to a young writer nurtured on
eighteenth-century drama and comic novels. 15 years later, British women had endured the deep
distresses brought on by prolonged hostilities- fear of food shortages, terror at the thought of
military invasion, and, worst of all, the experience of losing sons, husbands, fathers, brothers, and
friends in the conflict. The sensitivity of Mrs Bennet's nerves begings to seem more
comprehensible when the collective anxiety to which she has been subjected for so many years is
taken into account, while her matrimonial obsessions acquire an altogether darker tone. As the
death toll rose in successive campaigns against France, the numbers of eligible Englishmen were
inevitably declining. If the political economist, the Revd Thomas Malthus, articulated widespread
anxieties about the British population exceeding the nation's agricultural output, Mrs Bennet
expresses a peculiarly feminie nightmare relating to the increasingly inadequate supply of
husbands.
Jane Austen was a major English novelist, whose brilliantly witty, elegantly structured satirical
fiction marks the transition in English literature from 18th century neo-classicism to 19th century
romanticism.
Jane Austen was born on 16 December, 1775, at the rectory in the village of Steventon, near
Basingstoke, in Hampshire. The seventh of eight children of the Reverend George Austen and his
wife, Cassandra, she was educated mainly at home and never lived apart from her family. She had
a happy childhood amongst all her brothers and the other boys who lodged with the family and
whom Mr Austen tutored. From her older sister, Cassandra, she was inseparable. To amuse
themselves, the children wrote and performed plays and charades, and even as a little girl Jane was
encouraged to write. The reading that she did of the books in her father's extensive library
provided material for the short satirical sketches she wrote as a girl.
At the age of 14 she wrote her first novel, Love and Freindship (sic) and then A History of
England by a partial, prejudiced and ignorant Historian, together with other very amusing
juvenilia. In her early twenties Jane Austen wrote the novels that were later to be re-worked and
published as Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice and Northanger Abbey. She also began a
novel called The Watsons which was never completed.
As a young woman Jane enjoyed dancing (an activity which features frequently in her novels) and
she attended balls in many of the great houses of the neighbourhood. She loved the country,
enjoyed long country walks, and had many Hampshire friends. It therefore came as a considerable
shock when her parents suddenly announced in 1801 that the family would be moving away to
Bath. Mr Austen gave the Steventon living to his son James and retired to Bath with his wife and
two daughters. The next four years were difficult ones for Jane Austen. She disliked the confines
of a busy town and missed her Steventon life. After her father's death in 1805, his widow and
daughters also suffered financial difficulties and were forced to rely on the charity of the Austen
sons. It was also at this time that, while on holiday in the West country, Jane fell in love, and when
the young man died, she was deeply upset. Later she accepted a proposal of marriage from Harris
Bigg-Wither, a wealthy landowner and brother to some of her closest friends, but she changed her
mind the next morning and was greatly upset by the whole episode.
After the death of Mr Austen, the Austen ladies moved to Southampton to share the home of Jane's
naval brother Frank and his wife Mary. There were occasional visits to London, where Jane stayed
with her favourite brother Henry, at that time a prosperous banker, and where she enjoyed visits to
the theatre and art exhibitions. However, she wrote little in Bath and nothing at all in
Southampton.
Then, in July, 1809, on her brother Edward offering his mother and sisters a permanent home on
his Chawton estate, the Austen ladies moved back to their beloved Hampshire countryside. It was
a small but comfortable house, with a pretty garden, and most importantly it provided the settled
home which Jane Austen needed in order to write. In the seven and a half years that she lived in
this house, she revised Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice and published them ( in 1811
and 1813) and then embarked on a period of intense productivity. Mansfield Park came out in
1814, followed by Emma in 1816 and she completed Persuasion (which was published together
with Northanger Abbey in 1818, the year after her death). None of the books published in her
life-time had her name on them — they were described as being written "By a Lady". In the
winter of 1816 she started Sanditon, but illness prevented its completion.
Jane Austen had contracted Addisons Disease, a tubercular disease of the kidneys (see Jane
Austen's Illness by Sir Zachary Cope, British Medical Journal, 18 July 1964 and Australian
Addisons Disease Assoc.). No longer able to walk far, she used to drive out in a little donkey
carriage which can still be seen at the Jane Austen Museum at Chawton. By May 1817 she was so
ill that she and Cassandra, to be near Jane's physician, rented rooms in Winchester. Tragically,
there was then no cure and Jane Austen died in her sister's arms in the early hours of 18 July, 1817.
She was 41 years old. She is buried in Winchester Cathedral.
Pride and Prejudice
Pride and prejudice are displayed in every character pertaining to the novel in some form or
another. It is pride of those of a higher economic status which genuinely withholds prominent
relationships of those who are of lower economic status. Darcy's pride causes him to look down on
those who are in a lower social class, due to his mentality that he supersedes those who are not
within his social circle. Given that Elizabeth Bennet is of a lower class than Darcy, this places
immediate restrictions to their relationship. Elizabeth also displays significant pride. Though not
influenced by economic status, Elizabeth is most proud of her ability of perception: although it is
her ill perception which causes her to misjudge Darcy and also Wickham. When Elizabeth hears of
Wickham's accusations of Darcy, she trusts the negative perception of him, and mistakenly views
Darcy's confidence as conceit.
Prejudice also corresponds with character pride. Prejudiced judgments are woven within society in
the novel, especially pertaining to reputation, economic status, and women's inferiority to men.
Immediate prejudiced judgments are consistently being developed for all characters; the wealthy
are snobbish, the not-so-wealthy are impolite, the eldest daughter will be the first to marry, and
unmarried women-over-thirty will never marry. However these judgments are not always negative.
If one family member is seen to have good standing with wealthy society, the rest of the family
also acquires this image. Unfortunately on the contrary, if one family member demonstrates
societal deviance, as Lydia Bennet did with Wickham, the whole family is perceived to hold the
same negative reputation. Many prejudiced judgments are due to a character's pride, or their pride
causes social prejudice.
Critic A. Walton Litz describes the relation of pride and prejudice for the characters of Elizabeth
and Darcy, stating "in Pride and Prejudice one cannot equate Darcy with Pride, and Elizabeth with
Prejudice; Darcy's pride of place if founded on social prejudice, while Elizabeth's initial prejudice
against him is rooted in pride of her own quick perceptions."
Quote
found
online
and
taken
from
http://www.gradesaver.com/classicnotes/titles/pride/themes.html
Class
Associated with pride and prejudice is class. The high-class society maintains a very proper and
restricted way of life, while the middle-class is viewed clearly as inferior. Since the Bingleys and
Darcys are wealthy, they are assumed to be snobbish, and withhold the highest expectations, as
these are the prejudice judgments of the high class. However, since the Bennet family is more
middle-class, the higher class views some of Mrs. Bennet's behaviors as uncivilized and rude.
Luckily, both Elizabeth and Darcy are able to oversee personal pride of these judgments to
develop a loving relationship.
The status of class is deeply shown through the characters of Mr. Collins, whose exaggerated yet
sycophantic behavior towards Lady Catherine could easily and quickly annoy the reader. Mr.
Collins is definitely the character with the most extreme case of classism. Although the characters
of Miss Bingly and Miss Hurst also portray hierarchical social prejudice attitudes, since neither
woman wishes to associate with any person considered to be a lower stature. Along the same
beliefs, Mr. Darcy believes in the hierarchy of class as well; however, he luckily is able to
overcome these beliefs, at least to an extent, once he meets Elizabeth.
The middle and high classes within society are portrayed with an extreme, clear-cut view in the
novel. From the beginning of the novel, it is evident that class will play a significant role, blatantly
through character economic status as well as through symbolism. For example, the novel opens
with the gossip of a new, single, wealthy young man who has recently moved into Netherfield
Park, an estate known amongst the town from the previous wealthy families who have lived there
before. Extending this example, Mrs. Bennet wishes one of her daughters to marry this young man,
not because she has met the man before, but because she wishes her daughters to marry into
wealth. Using the relationship of Darcy and Elizabeth, Austen makes the point that love, strength,
and happiness are more powerful than differences among individual lifestyles.
Family
Austen demonstrates the significant impact a family has on an individual’s life mainly through the
example of the Bennet family. Since family is responsible for educating and teaching morals to the
children in the family, the five daughters in the Bennet family face a very difficult upbringing,
especially given the ignorance and idiocy of Mrs. Bennet, and adding the sarcasm and immediate
feelings of irritation with Mr. Bennet, who seems to find great satisfaction in belittling his wife.
Considering their parents have not provided the girls with much education and morals, it is lucky
for Jane and Elizabeth that Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner take a toll in providing the two girls with
education and guidance. Had the Gardiners not provided them with studies and personal values,
the girls would have faced more difficulty in the future.
For example, Lydia, who has not been as fortunate in receiving extra guidance, makes a decision
which greatly affects her social status and the status of the family, as well as the family’s overall
reputation within the town. Attempting to help, Elizabeth advises to her father to prohibit Lydia
from going to Brighton, however her father did not follow her advise and allowed Lydia to go,
since it would be easier than having to listen to Lydia complain. Unfortunately, this led to Lydia’s
elopement with Wickham, and the whole family would have to pay the price.
Gender
Gender plays a contributing factor to the novel on various levels, the most obvious being the
differences in privileges and expectations between men and women. Austen set the time of the
novel to take place during the 19c, when the men had greater power and contribution to society as
a whole, and the women were viewed more as reserved, gossipy, and highly held by reputation.
Given that there were very few schools during this time, and only the wealthy could afford to
attend school, the few schools there were did not permit women to attend; therefore women were
expected appear and behave with a certain manner, and easily became a social outcast if any
societal deviance was displayed: just as Lydia displayed deviance during her elopement with
Wickham, and Elizabeth displayed with her consistent bold, quick-wit.
The novel clearly brings in the aspect of the gender differences in both bold and subtle aspects. On
the bold side, during Austen’s time, a man’s primary role is to be the provider: work, propose an
engagement for a wife, earn the family’s only income, make final decisions, physically and
fiscally support and protect the family, and provide a home, food, and clothing. On the other hand,
women were to tend to the children, cook the meals, do the shopping and sewing, and uphold the
daily routines for the family, primarily tending to the husband’s needs. However, it is Austen’s
clever use of subtle gender differences which tend to go unnoticed. For example, the novel
mentions a few cases when characters are traveling. During this time period, it was unacceptable
for women, or a woman, to travel alone. It is very subtle instances such as this which help the time
period of Austen’s work come alive.
Marriage
Marriage is apparent from the first sentence in the novel when Austen writes, “It is a truth
universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a
wife." Generated from societal tradition, women of these times did not work. They were to marry
at a young age, spend time to plan the wedding, and then move from their parents' home to their
husbands, so that they could run a household and raise a family. On the contrary, if a woman did
not marry, she would live at home with her parents and they would provide for her until they no
longer could, leaving only then a brother or uncle to provide for her.
Examining Mrs. Bennet’s marriage with Mr. Bennet, the couple models an unjust marriage for
their daughters. While the two may love each other, Mr. Bennet’s apparent disparage towards his
wife, even though Mrs. Bennet is too ignorant and/or uneducated to see it, leads their daughters
voiding the option of marrying for love.
Austen ties marriage to several different characters throughout the novel, with each character
containing separate intentions. Mrs. Bennet express her cultured, determined and desirous
intentions for her five daughters to marry, aspiring each is cared for in a financially stable home
for the future; sadly, Mrs. Bennet does not care if her daughters are in love with their husbands, so
long as their life together is financially well-off. While Mrs. Bennet strives for social acceptance,
Lydia Bennet almost deteriorated the Bennet family's societal reputation from becoming
Wickham's lover out of wedlock.
Having entirely different marriage intentions, Charlotte Lucas' beliefs represent the
common-societal woman; Charlotte marries because of her fear of aging. Since she is older than
most typical unmarried women of this time, she readily accepts Mr. Collins' marriage proposal,
even though she knows she does not love him, but hopes to learn to love him in the future. When
Elizabeth hears the news of Charlotte's engagement, she does not understand Charlotte's
acceptance, leaving Charlotte to explain her fear of never receiving another marriage proposal in
the future. As a headstrong feminist, Elizabeth then clarifies that her marriage intentions comprise
of marrying for nothing other than only true love.
Pemberley
Darcy’s estate, Pemberley, is significant to the novel in a literal and figurative sense. Literally,
Elizabeth visits the house at the point in their relationship where she is just beginning to find a
fondness in Darcy. At the very beginning of her arrival, Austen expresses Elizabeth’s feelings of
excitement of being “the mistress of Pemberley.” Once she visits the estate, the beauty and
essence of the property and house begin to win her over, as does Darcy.
Figuratively, the novel represents its owner as well as Elizabeth’s feelings for him. When the novel
states that they enter in at one of its “lowest points,” Austen is referring to Elizabeth’s first
impression of Darcy, which was not a positive one. However, then the novel begins to explain
Elizabeth’s thoughts of the half a mile ride up to the estate, admiring every glimpse along the way.
Furthermore, Austen’s passage describing as they first approached the house explains her every
thought and feeling of Darcy.
“It was a large, handsome, stone building, standing well on rising ground, and backed by a ridge
of high woody hills; -- and in front, a stream of some natural importance was swelled into greater,
but without any artificial appearance. Its banks were neither formal, nor falsely adorned. Elizabeth
was delighted. She had never seen a place for which nature had done more, or where natural
beauty had been so little counteracted by an awkward taste. They were all of them warm in their
admiration; and at that moment she felt that to be mistress of Pemberley might be something!”
The description of the house itself also describes Darcy: handsome, the fact that it is “standing
well” refers to his wealth and confidence, the stream “without any artificial appearance”
resembling Darcy’s personal character of good nature, the swelling of the stream refers to Darcy’s
arrogance, and the fact that the banks were not formal or falsely decorated refers to Darcy being
“neither formal, nor falsely adorned”. Elizabeth’s comforted, delighted, admiration is more than
simply her feelings for Pemberley, it is also her feelings for Darcy. Furthermore, when Elizabeth
comes across Darcy on the Pemberley property, she is crossing a small bridge, signifying the
bridge their love will build over their past struggles.
the themes of pride and prejudic
abstract: in this article, we attempt to show the themes of pride and prejudice. firstly i will show
something about the author jane austen and pride and prejudice. then the main themes of pride and
prejudice: love, reputation, class, courtship and pride. the last part of the paper shows that this
great novel not only attracted thousands of readers in austen’s time, but also gave a special feeling
to today’s people.
> key words: pride, prejudice, theme
>
> 1.the author and pride and prejudice
> 1.1.the author
> the english author jane austen lived from 1775 to 1817. her six novels are northanger abbey,
sense and sensibility, pride and prejudice, mansfield park, emma, persuasion.her novels are highly
prized not only for their light irony, humor, and depiction of contemporary english country life,
but also for their underlying serious qualities. she was the founder of the novel which deals with
unimportant middle class people and of which there are many fine examples in later english
fiction. she is also sparing of describing the internal thoughts and emotions of male characters
(thus in pride and prejudice, much of darcy's admiration for elizabeth bennet is expressed by
means of convenient conversations with caroline bingley).
> 1.2. information about pride and prejudice
> first published in 1813, pride and prejudice has consistently been jane austen's most popular
novel. it portrays life in the genteel rural society of the day, and tells of the initial
misunderstandings and later mutual enlightenment between elizabeth bennet (whose liveliness and
quick wit have often attracted readers) and the haughty darcy. the title pride and prejudice refers
(among other things) to the ways in which elizabeth and darcy first view each other. the original
version of the novel was written in 1796-1797 under the title first impressions, and was probably
in the form of an exchange of letters.
>
> 2.the themes of pride and prejudice
> 2.1. love between darcy and elizabeth
> as in any good love story, the lovers must elude and overcome numerous stumbling blocks,
beginning with the tensions caused by the lovers’ own personal qualities. elizabeth’s pride makes
her misjudge darcy on the basis of a poor first impression, while darcy’s prejudice against
elizabeth’s poor social standing blinds him, for a time, to her many virtues. of course, one could
also say that elizabeth is guilty of prejudice and darcy of pride?the title cuts both ways. austen,
meanwhile, poses countless smaller obstacles to the realization of the love between elizabeth and
darcy, including lady catherine’s attempt to control her nephew, miss bingley’s snobbery, mrs.
bennet’s idiocy, and wickham’s deceit. in each case, anxieties about social connections, or the
desire for better social connections, interfere with the workings of love. darcy and elizabeth’s
realization of a mutual and tender love seems to imply that austen views love as something
independent of these social forces, as something that can be captured if only an individual is able
to escape the warping effects of hierarchical society.
> austen does sound some more realist (or, one could say, cynical) notes about love, using the
character of charlotte lucas, who marries the buffoon mr. collins for his money, to demonstrate that
the heart does not always dictate marriage. yet with her central characters, austen suggests that
true love is a force separate from society and one that can conquer even the most difficult of
circumstances.
> 2.2 reputation ___a woman’s reputation is of the utmost important
> pride and prejudice depicts a society in which a woman’s reputation is of the utmost importance.
a woman is expected to behave in certain ways. stepping outside the social norms makes her
vulnerable to ostracism. this theme appears in the novel, when elizabeth walks to netherfield and
arrives with muddy skirts, to the shock of the reputation-conscious miss bingley and her friends.
> at other points, the ill-mannered, ridiculous behavior of mrs. bennet gives her a bad reputation
with the more refined (and snobbish) darcys and bingleys. austen pokes gentle fun at the snobs in
these examples, but later in the novel, when lydia elopes with wickham and lives with him out of
wedlock, the author treats reputation as a very serious matter. by becoming wickham’s lover
without benefit of marriage, lydia clearly places herself outside the social pale, and her disgrace
threatens the entire bennet family.
> the fact that lydia’s judgment, however terrible, would likely have condemned the other bennet
sisters to marriageless lives seems grossly unfair. why should elizabeth’s reputation suffer along
with lydia’s? darcy’s intervention on the bennets’ behalf thus becomes all the more generous, but
some readers might resent that such an intervention was necessary at all. if darcy’s money had
failed to convince wickham to marry lydia, would darcy have still married elizabeth? does his
transcendence of prejudice extend that far? the happy ending of pride and prejudice is certainly
emotionally satisfying, but in many ways it leaves the theme of reputation, and the importance
placed on reputation, unexplored.
> 2.3.class boundaries and prejudice
> the theme of class is related to reputation, in that both reflect the strictly regimented nature of
life for the middle and upper classes in regency england. the lines of class are strictly drawn. while
the bennets, who are middle class, may socialize with the upper-class bingleys and darcys, they
are clearly their social inferiors and are treated as such. austen satirizes this kind of
class-consciousness, particularly in the character of mr. collins, who spends most of his time
toadying to his upper-class patron, lady catherine de bourgh. though mr. collins offers an extreme
example, he is not the only one to hold such views. his conception of the importance of class is
shared, among others, by mr. darcy, who believes in the dignity of his lineage; miss bingley, who
dislikes anyone not as socially accepted as she is; and wickham, who will do anything he can to
get enough money to raise himself into a higher station.
> mr. collins’s views are merely the most extreme and obvious. the satire directed at mr. collins is
therefore also more subtly directed at the entire social hierarchy and the conception of all those
within it at its correctness, in complete disregard of other, more worthy virtues. through the
darcy-elizabeth and bingley-jane marriages, austen shows the power of love and happiness to
overcome class boundaries and prejudices, thereby implying that such prejudices are hollow,
unfeeling, and unproductive. of course, this whole discussion of class must be made with the
understanding that austen herself is often criticized as being a classist: she doesn’t really represent
anyone from the lower classes; those servants she does portray are generally happy with their lot.
austen does criticize class structure but only a limited slice of that structure.
> 2.4.courtship __those between darcy and elizabeth and between bingley and jane
> in a sense, pride and prejudice is the story of two courtships?those between darcy and elizabeth
and between bingley and jane. within this broad structure appear other, smaller courtships: mr.
collins’s aborted wooing of elizabeth, followed by his successful wooing of charlotte lucas; miss
bingley’s unsuccessful attempt to attract darcy; wickham’s pursuit first of elizabeth, then of the
never-seen miss king, and finally of lydia. courtship therefore takes on a profound, if often
unspoken, importance in the novel. marriage is the ultimate goal, courtship constitutes the real
working-out of love. courtship becomes a sort of forge of a person’s personality, and each
courtship becomes a microcosm for different sorts of love (or different ways to abuse love as a
means to social advancement).
> 2.5. two ways of pride: positive and negative
> the two major themes of jane austen's pride and prejudice are summed up in the title. the first
aspect can be traced in the actions and statements of all of the work's major and many of its minor
characters. pride is the character flaw that causes elizabeth bennet to dislike fitzwilliam darcy
upon their first meeting. she perceives in him a cold aloofness that she attributes to his own
inflated opinion of himself. yet elizabeth herself also suffers from the same flaw; her pride in her
own ability to analyze character is such that she refuses to reevaluate darcy in the face of evidence
in his favor.
> the concept of pride can be defined in two ways: positive and negative. possessing positive or
right pride is to have self-respect, honor, and integrity. on the other hand, wrong or negative pride
is defined as showing arrogant or disdainful conduct and haughtiness. mr. fitzwilliam darcy
displays the positive side of pride while mr. bennet possesses wrong or negative pride, and a lack
of pride itself in some cases. darcy is responsible for his sister, himself, his estate, and his family
name. he takes pride in these things and does anything he can in order to protect them. but mr.
bennet who is responsible as a father of five daughters, a husband, and the holder of reputable
conduct in the family, does not take pride in his family or his responsibility; mr. bennet instead
ridicules the members of his family and in turn does not control their unruly actions.
>3.conclusion
pride and prejudice was the representative work of jane austen. it gave a vivid expression of the
reactionary and traditional country life and people’s minds during 18th centuries and 19th
centuries in britain to us. this great novel not only attracted thousands of readers in austen’s time,
but also gave a special feeling to today’s people. in order to make much more people know the
book, the paper shows the main idea of the pride and prejudice