Relationships And Marriage In Jane Austen's Pride And Prejudice

Jane Austen’s “Pride and prejudice” is a romantic novel that was considered between relationships and love between individuals. The novel pointed out why marriage is important to the majority of women during the 19th century. Austen revealed to the readers that love in marriage does exist during that time period. For instance, Charlotte Lucas marries an arrogant man for security due to the pressures of society placed on women in Austen’s era. George Wickham, known in the entire novel as a dishonorable man, married Lydia to ensure financial profit to him -self and Lydia agreeing to marry him knowing his background, but still decides to marry him. However, Elizabeth decided that if she ever gets married it will be because of love and she did.

Elizabeth was the main character that the author represented its main idea through her. Elizabeth is independent and insubordinate standing against society’s social norms of marriage. Unlike Lydia, her youngest sister, Elizabeth fights the social norms by believing in herself and in her feelings of marriage and love. Mr. Collins proposal to Elizabeth was countered by this “You could not make me happy, and I am convinced that I am the last woman in the world who would make you so” (Austen 104). When Elizabeth rejected Mr. Collins she did not just refuse him as a husband, she as well refused to be financially secured in her society. Going through the novel, the readers got introduced to the readers as rich, educated, and sophisticated. He earns 10,000 pounds a year which make him a very wealthy man. Mr. Darcy had his reputation set up: "the gentlemen pronounced him to be a fine figure of a man; the ladies declared he was much handsomer than Mr. Bingley, and he was looked at with great admiration for about half the evening" (Austen chapter 3). Mr. Darcy, a proud man, proposed to Elizabeth with an unromantic approach. He is driven by his feelings of superiority over Elizabeth and her family. Darcy’s initial proposal got rejected by Elizabeth.After many incidents that humiliated both characters to think wisely, Elizabeth comes to the conclusion that both she and Darcy are equal, not in class, but in manner, and