Monday, March 19, 2012

In Pride and Prejudice, which characters in the novel share Elizabeth’s views of marriage and which characters reflect society’s perspective?

In Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth views marriage as a total committment of body and soul and that is the reason for marrying.  Other characters display opposite views. Mr. Collin's approaches marriage as a business agreement where he will provide for his wife, but there are no emotions involved.  Since he has been given a parish by Lady Catherine de Bourgh, she wants him to get married and represent the church in a proper manner.  He goes from Jane to Elizabeth and finally ends up with Charlotte.  Charlotte feels that no marriage could ever be truly happy and to marry was the only solution to rescuing a woman from a life of poverty.

Mrs. Bennet is only concerned with marrying off her 5 daughters.  She knows that they have no inheritance from the father, because it has to go to a male, so the only chance for the Bennet girls is to get married.

Darcy marries for love also because he doesn't fall for Miss Bingley and her lavish, rude comments about the negative characteristics of Elizabeth in an effort to win his affection.  Also he does not fall for Georgianna and her witty remarks to win his affection.  He has loved Elizabeth from the start.

Jane and Bingley are truly in love.  They had to overcome a lot of intereference from Caroline, Georgianna, and to a point, Darcy, but Darcy thought Jane didn't really love him and he was trying to avoid a possible doomed marriage.

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