Week 7 Response

"Her novels are rich in detail of the status symbols and cultural markers of her society: the estates, lands, houses, cottages; the coaches, carriages, barouche-landaus, hatchments, lozenges, liveries; the silks, satins, muslins, pearls, amber crosses, rings, and beads. As a sensitive and informed commentator on class, that huge topic of the nineteenth century, Austen shows up amply how such things matter. She also shows us how they should not matter too much." (Class, 130)

"...[Mr. Darcy] was looked at with great admiration for about half the evening, till his manners gave a disgust which turned the tide of popularity; for he was discovered to be proud, to be above his company, and above being pleased; and not all his large estate in Derbyshire could then save him from having a most forbidding, disagreeable countenance, and being unworthy to be compared with his friend." (PP, 49)

It is apparent from the first few pages of the novel that Pride and Prejudice is focused around not only the idea of marriage, but also social status, and how marriage and social status are related. Because she is a realist author, Austen does a good job of capturing the differences in social class with the many characters she has in her novel. I find it particularly interesting to look at Darcy, Bingley, and Elizabeth when it comes to social class. Both Elizabeth and Bingley are aware that social class does not matter; when given an offer for marriage from Mr. Collins, Elizabeth turned him down in favor of a marriage because of love. She was given the opportunity to obtain her father's estate after his death through marriage to Mr. Collins, and indeed it might've been a good choice if she had been interested in obtaining some sort of social status, but instead, she would've rather married for love. The same is true of Mr. Bingley, who falls in love with Jane, despite her social status. Darcy, though, is quite the opposite of the other two. He refuses to even dance with the ladies at the ball because he believes himself to be too good for them. In fact, he even convinces Mr. Bingley to stay away from Jane because of her social status (and her obnoxious family). While no reasons are actually given for the differences in thought besides social status itself, some inferences may be able to be made. Darcy has spent his whole life in this way, with his money and his estate, and so it is possible that he is used to living his life that way. Bingley is new to the whole status thing, having won his money through trade, and so he doesn't really let the idea of class get to him. He is perfectly content with marrying Jane until Darcy comes along and convinces him otherwise. And for Elizabeth, well, I think she is just pushed too much by her mother all the time to actually want to marry for status. Mrs. Bennet is constantly talking about marrying her children off to gentlemen with money, and so Elizabeth is surrounded by it enough to become sick of the talk.