Four Marriage in Pride and Prejudice

Ⅱ. Four Marriage in Pride and PrejudiceThe stories show the ordinary lives, feelings of the ordinary people. They were linked up in a harmonious order under the author's meticulous concepts. The work mainly describes four marriages. Two are the main and assisted by the other two assistant marriages. “Darcy and Elizabeth’s love and marriage is the main theme of this work. After undergoing many setbacks, Darcy’s arrogance and Elizabeth’s prejudice eventually eliminates, the lovers finally get married. T he marriage of Elizabeth’s sister Jane and Darcy’s friend Bingley is another clue. They deeply love each other, but they are multi—blocked, after their departure, Jane misses Bingley very much. The two marriages reflects the another point of view in positive way that marriage should be based on true love, which is the ideal marry in the author’s opinion. The stories seem to be the ordinary lives, feelings and persons linked up in a harmonious order under the others meticulous concepts. However, the marriage between Charlotte and Collins is a negative example with the marriage between Lydia and Wickham, which help to make the plots more tortuous and richer.”2.1 Collins and CharlotteIn Pride and Prejudice, when the homely and plain Charlotte decided to marry Collins, Her reflections were in general satifactory, without thinking highy either of men or of matrimony, marriage had always been her object, it was the only honourable provision for well-educated young women of small fortune. In fact what Charlotte asks is only a comfortable shatter, a higher social position and a better wealth. which she explains to Elizabeth, “I am not romantic, you know.I never was. I ask only a comfortable home; and considering Mr. Collins character, connections, and situation in life, I am convinced that my chance of happiness with him is as fair, as most people can boast on entering the marriage state.” (Austen, 113) For Collins, he is a man who does not know what love is at all. When Mr. Collins first proposed to Elizabeth, much to her mother's displeasure and her father's joy she firmly and promptly rejected him. He almost immediately transferred his affections to Elizabeth's best friend, Charlotte Lucas, who, twenty-seven and somewhat homely, accepted at once his offer of marriage. Collins’ decision to marry Charlotte is only because of Elizabeth’s refusal to him. What he needs is just a wife who helps him not to be a single man any more.2.2 Lydia and WickhamIn the novel, we known Lydia, Mr.Bennet's third daughter, she was spoilt by her mother, so she was very conceited and arrogant, and behave frivolously. Wickham, he has no other advantage except for his attractive physical appearance. In his opinion, love is lonly recreation. Due to he was trouble with a large debt, so he entices Lydia and get her love easily. When their love does not get the permission from the parents, then they elope. When Elizabeth hears the news, she believes that their love does not have happy end. Really, Wickham would not marry Lydia, because she was no charming and has nothing to attract him. He does not love her but the wealth of her family. The marriage was admitted on the condition of Darcy's help.2.3 Jane and BingleyJane was the oldest of Mr.Bennet daughter, a pretty girl of sweet and gentle disposition. Bingley was an immediate success in local society. At the first ball, Jane has a good impression of Bingley, and it is the same to Bingley. They were attracted to each other at once. After the ball,“When Jane and Elizabeth we re alone, the former, who had been cautious in her praise of Mr. Bingley before, expressed to her sister how very much She admired him.”(Austen, 11) For Bingley, he had an easily-led temper. He was so modest and pliable that he had no opinion about his ownmarriage. No matter how obvious his attachment to Jane was, he believed Darcy’s re presentation of Jane’s indifference was true. Because Mr. Bingley’s two sisters didn’t like Jane, they thought Mr. Bingley should choose Georgiana，she is Darcy’s sister as his wife. So they also disagree with Bingley about his marriage with Jane. Under the influences of his sisters and Mr. Darcy, Bingley began to doubt Jane’s affection to him. Finally, he thought Jane didn’t love him, so he left her without saying good-bye. Later, when all the misunderstandings clarified, he came back to Jane at Darcy’s assistance. Bingley’s indecisive character determines his happiness and results that his life was controlled by others. Later on a visit to Bingleys, Jane’s love affair with Bingley is advanced. Even Bingley is apparently on the point of proposing to Jane. Actually Bingly is attracted by Jane’s tenderness and beautiful appearance, while Jane is attracted by his gentle manner. They loved with each other.2.4 Darcy and ElizabethThe heroine of this novel, Elizabeth's love is very important. At the beginning, Elizabeth refused to accept Darcy pursue. Because in Elizabeth's eyes, Darcy is very cold and extremely proud, he is rich and has high social status, and he look down upon the middle-classe girls. In particular, he insulted Elizabeth Bennet, a girl of spirit and intelligence and her father's favorite. He refused to dance with her when she was sitting down for lack of a partner, and said in her hearing that he was in no to prefer young ladies slighted by other men. But on future occasions, however, Darcy began to admire Elizabeth in spite of himself. At a later ball Elizabeth had the satisfaction of refusing him a dance. Bingley's sister Caroline, who was eager to marry Darcy and shrewdly aware of his growing admiration for Elizabeth, was especially loud in her ridicule of the Bennet ter, Elizabeth herself became Caroline's particular target. Darcy admitted to himself that he would be in some danger from the charm of Elizabeth, if it were not for her interior family connections. When Wickham said about Darcy down, making Elizabeth more of his misunderstanding of the deep. However, by the fact that Darcy is a good man. When Lydia and Wickham eloped, Darcy find them and help them. When Lydia came home as heedless as ever, she told Elizabeth that Darcy had attended her wedding. Elizabeth, suspecting the truth, learned from Mr. Gardiner that it was indeed Darcy who brought about the marriage by giving Wickham money. Finally, Elizabeth changed her impression of Darcy, she was more favorably inclined to him than ever before, hoped his coming meant that he still loved her, but he gave no sign. Soon afterward Lady Catherine paid the Bennets an unexpected call. Hoping her own daughter to Darcy, she had charged down with characteristic bad manners to order Elizabeth not to accept his proposal. Unluckily for her own purpose, repeated to Darcy the substance of her conversation with Elizabeth, and he knew Elizabeth well enough to surmise that her feelings to ward him had greatly changed. He returned to Netherfield Park, they fell in love with each other and became engaged.They have an happy life.(Ⅲ．Jane Austen's Views on Marriage in Pride and Prejudice This thesis focuses on marriage in British women writer Jane Austen’s novel, Pride and Prejudice. The topic is elicited out by the first sentence of this novel, “It is a truth universally acknowle dged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.” (Jane Austen, 2003: 1) Firstly, state what does a marriage mean to a woman with analyzing on what was the social status of women at Jane Austen’s time. Secondly, give a deta iled introduction s about fourmarriages in this novel and finally analyze these marriages and reach the conclusion that a marriage should be based on true love, financial stability, mutual attraction, and happiness.3.1 On the Basis of Mutual Attraction and Mutual UnderstandingMutual attraction is the most important in the authoress's views. One who betrays his or her heart will never own ture love that is beyond money and social position. This element is what Austen puts a great deal of emphasis on. The heroine in the fiction, Elizabeth, is a loyal follower of her own affection. She encourages Jane to pursue true love with Bingley, and has a disgust for Caroline's overflowing flattery of Darcy for the purpose of marrying the latter whose fortune and position are a great appeal to herself, regardless of the young gentleman's affection. In face of Mr. Collins's proposal, Elizabeth refuses him without hesitation, for her cousin wants to marry her just because he thinks Elizabeth is fit to be his wife and this union is his bestowment to the Bennets. Elizabeth is committed to her ture feelings, because there is no mutual atrraction between them. She believes happiness marriage is grounded upon mutual attraction. That's why she is so surprised at Charlotte's engagement to Collins whose character is an odd combination of servility andself-conceit, let alone lacking self-independence, while Charlotte is wise and quick. Though, afterwards, Elizabeth is informed of the reason why her best friend makes such as a decision, she feels intolerable to learn to ignore the existence of someone who may live with her all life long with no affection for the sake of a modest living. So we know that the mutual attraction is very important in marriage. The marriage between Elizabeth and Darcy typically shows that we should not simply judge a person from the first sight of appearance and impression. It takes time to understand each other completely. Elizabeth and Darcy both show their prejudice on the first sight without further communication. But Darcy cannot risist his affection to Elizabeth. And a sequence of events that connected with them provide them chances to know each other, so that the misunderstanding between them was got rid of and their relationships grew sounder. The marriage between Lydia and Wickham is the counter example of the first-sight love. They were attracted by the appearance and impulsive sex desires. Lydia didn’t know Wickham at all that he was immoral and owe debt to his neck. Their marriage was proved unhappy at last. Love should base on mutual understanding, and understanding takes time. Hasty marriage results in unhappy marriage3.2 The Importance of Ture LoveElizabeth is the ideal image for women as well as the most charismatic person in the novel. She is Bonnet’s second daughter, an active, intelligent and smart girl. She has a middle-class family background and has not been affected by the formal education belonging to those aristocraticyoung girls, so she isn't good at music and painting, but she has read many books which make her knowledgeable and perceptive. The most important aspect is that she is a lady with dignity and upbringing. Darcy is a man with tall figure and good manner. He is handsome, rich and powerful. So he is the ideal husband of most girls. But he has grown up in the surroundings with strong sense of power, so he always is selfish and arrogant, and he has a critical look at each individual, except the family members., he is not concerned about anyone else, and looks down upon anyone else. Therefore, when he first arrives in the village, he finds all the persons are far away from those imagined .Although every girl there is young and lovely, he has no interest to anyone except Elizabeth. At first he doesn’t put an eye on Elizabeth. Gradually, he has to admit that Elizabeth is beautiful, distinct and popular, although he insists that Elizabeth hasn't the same social status as him. Darcy is rational because he has a strong sense of power, which agrees on the reality at that time. Although he expresses his love to Elizabeth, he couldn't help showing his arrogance, which makes Elizabeth have misconception and prejudice on Darcy. Darcy loves Elizabeth, but looks down upon her social status. He considers that he has been lowing himself and doing something against his will, personalities and even moral standard. He thinks that his marriage would certainly succeed and Elizabeth is waiting for him to propose marriage. Therefore, even he is irresistible to the flooding feelings, and condescends to Elizabeth, he still remembers the gap between them. Clearly, the rational aspect of Darcy’s personality performs on the realities of society.When Darcy talks about his feelings of love, he also expresses the arrogance of these feelings in details, which results in the arousing resentment of Elizabeth; she rejects his marriage proposal, and angrily accuses his insolence.The rational aspect of the heroine Elizabeth shows her clear, calm and actually stressful personality. Compared with her stupid mother, the smooth and lazy father, the shallow-minded, self-willed sister with feather head, Elizabeth is one with ideal mind. She is elegant like her sister Jane, but more intellectually superior unlike her sister being easy to be favorable. She also advises her sister to see through the stupidity and nonsense of those camouflage honest persons. Elizabeth is unique, because she has a deep understanding of all the things around her. In fact both she and Da rcy are extremely sensitive to the social status. Different from Darcy, Elizabeth doesn’t have superiority about her family background and status. Instead, she feels deeply ashamed for her sister’s being lack of fairly education and her mother's rudeness a nd stupidity. Compared with her moderate and generous sister Jane, she is smarter and even more profound. She has a clean understanding about her own social status, which is due to the psychotically sedimentary deposits because she is in a inferior position for long time. Because of this, she resists extremely against the arrogance of Darcy, and she tries her best to protect herself from being hurtled by Darcy's commanding attitude. She believes that she must make him understand that she is not woozy, which reflects her belief to deal with the emotional entanglements with Darcy, as well as her constant patter with Darcy and the prejudice on Darcy. It superficially seems to be shared by the traditional psychological requirement that everyone needs to be respected mutually. Mutually speaking, this is another form of expression about the awareness of status. Perhaps, to some extent, Darcy has more romantic temperament than Elizabeth, it is because he is better positioned than her. Elizabeth refuses the stupid priest Collins and challenges wealthy Darcy, all of this is actually the resistance of the prevailing marriage at that time. The ultimate failure makes Darcy wake up. He is aware of his own short-comings. He accepts Elizabeth’s criticism, and faithfully corr ects the shortcomings and mistakes. He is no longer arrogant and has a real love with Elizabeth. With therevealing of the truth, Elizabeth’s prejudice on Darcy becomes deeper. Until when Elizabeth refuses Darcy’s long love letter, she experiences the fier ce shock. After undergoing a period of painful and profound thought, she could not help but to shout how despicable she is, she believes she is the excellent one in the family, she is skillful and always despises her sister’s dress. In order to satisfy her own vanity, she always treats people with an irrelevant suspicion and confusion. How shameful it is! But this shame serves her right. Even if she really falls in love with someone, she should not be so blind to meet this flunking stage. She is stupid not only in love, but in the vanity. When she first knows them two, one loves her and makes her feel happy, and the other treats her in a cold manner, which makes her angryAll these cause her prejudice and ignorance, when she encounters their affairs. She would not be able to distinguish the right and the wrong. She could be considered to be knowledgeable at last. When we see the blame from heart, we find her shortcomings and the courage that she could face herself directly. It is her bringing that plays a role; she starts to give up the bias caused by self-esteem, truly and seriously understand Darcy. Elizabeth wouldn't believe the shameless lies about Darcy said by Han and eliminate the misunderstanding and prejudice. She finally falls in love with Darcy. When the sister asks how she would love Mr. Darcy, Elizabeth replies that she should date from the day she see the beautiful lane manor park. The statement seems to refer to the property of Darcy. Therefore, Jane doesn't want the sisters to be kidding. In addition to referring to the specific manor, she also refers the new Darcy seen in the garden. In other words, Darcy changes the attitude of being arrogant and rudest, and this is the reason why Darcy wins Elizabeth’s heart and love. We can imagine that if Da rcy doesn't change his mind, even if other misunderstandings have been resolved, they would not fall in love forever.3.3 The Importance of Financial FoundationAlthough Mrs. Bennet has been described as a comedy character in the work gaining a lot of sarcasm and derision, her universally acknowledged truth－all the wealthy bachelors want to marry a lady, has been proved to be truth which proves another fact that it's the wealth and the number of the wealth that decides the fate of life and marriage. Charlotte knows that the marriage without property would eventually move toward disappointment and suffering. Even if the couple loves each other deeply at first, when Collins, known as a social climber, is rejected by Elizabeth, he immediately turns to fall in love with Miss Charlotte. Although Collins is an inborn fool, his love could not move the heart of a woman, Charlotte accepts him, because her purpose is to get married. Almost all the girls born in a poor family without good education always regard marriage as the only decent way, although marriage might not necessarily bring happiness to them. She manages to arrange one of the most reliable way by marriage, thus she would not be exposed to the cold temperatures and suffer hunger in the future. She now gets a storage room. Charlotte is like a rodman catching a fairly plump fish－Collins. But if he doesn’t meet a setback from Elizabeth, and the encouragement of Charlotte, I am afraid that he would not be so willing to propose marriage to Charlotte. The man like Bentley who has fairly numerable money need a beautiful wife, the poor man needs a wife with a huge wealth, like Wickham; It was lucky for Charlotte that she could gain the marriage with Collins although their marriage is not happy at all.In these marriages, it was quite interesting that the women without property really get married with those rich bachelors. However, the happiness brought by marriage to them has not accompanied the husband. In marriage, money is very important. Austin objects such marriage simply based on money. Collins is the heir of Bonnet family; h e doesn’t know what love is. Hewould state some of the inappropriate remarks at any time. Charlotte gets married for money. Eventually she gets nothing more than a rich man, though she has economic security. She doesn’t care about her husband's accompanying and love. She encourages him to clean up the garden more. She sets his living-room in the small house absent of even a small number of sunshine. When her husband makes gaffe in front of their friends, she ignores and turns a deaf ear. Such arrangement f or the story is a perfect irony for” the truth universally acknowledged” at the beginning of the novel. The author expresses great sympathy to the tragic fate of the women at that time and those who had to marry because of economic restraints by the description of the marriage of charlotte. Austen understands completely that the social environment makes man obey not only in material but in psychology, which improved that Austin is a rational author that she prefers true love to survival. Miss Bingley also e xtremely objects the marriage between her brother and Bennet’s eldest daughter Jane. She hopes her brother to marry Darcy’s sister Miss Geovgiana in order to make herself to have the same status.(Ⅳ. The Causes of Jane Austen's View on Marriage4.1 Jane Austen's Living EnviromentWomen’ position in the first half of the 19th century was very low. Jane Austen was born at that time, feminism was not paid attention to by common people. Practically, everyone believed that men were superior sex. Women were considered not only lower than men, but also were very different. The purpose of their lives was marriage, their only proper sphere was the home, while men had all the rest of the world to show their talents. British women had few rights, few opportunities to change their life. At that time, meekness and sacrifice, were the key points for an excellent woman. According to Ilannah More, “to a woman moral excellence is the grand object of education; and of moral excellence, domestic life is to woman the a ppropriate sphere.” For gisborn, too, a woman’ role must be centered on the home, and according to him her main resposibilities involve “contributing daily and hourly to the comfort of husband, of parents, of brothers, and sisters…in the intercourse of domestic life.” Before marriage, a woman must sacrifice for her family. People believed that an virtuous woman was never seperated from her family. Girls in the upper middle-class or in the better-off families, needn’t do housework and had been left with a great deal of time. They may stay at home , study unstematically, for example singing songs, drawing pictures and taking care of the family issues. And they have time to take parties, play cards, and chat with friends. While the situation in poor families is completely different. Girles around 12 or 13 had to leave home to work as servants in order to surport the family, for at that time,parents often have a lot of children and they have ability to surport all the children. Marriage is the only choice for gir ls to relieve from the old family and change their fate. So mothers’ duties was to get their daughters married to high-class. While the marriage market was not always good for them. Sometimes, they got married just because the want the establishment of marriage but not love. Such things was clearly reflected in Pride and Prejudice. As the first sentence of Pride and Prejudice: “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”, Jane has cl everly told us: that the main subject of the novel will be courtship and marriage, she has established the humorous tone of the novel by taking a simple subject to elaborate and to speak intelligently of, and she has prepared the reader for a chase in the novel of either a husband in search of a wife, or a women in pursuit of a husband. Jane Austen was born into a supremely happy and resourceful family. Jane and her family lived in Steventon. Steveton Rectory stood at the foot of the lane which leads up to the simple medievalchurch of St Nicholas. Steventon is still a samll rural village, surrounded by fields and woods, in a valley between two main roads. Because away from the cities, Jane's life has been clame. Her parents were never wealthy, but they family atmosphere of harmony and friendliness. Jane and her elder sister Cassandra were inseparable friends from childhood. Their sisterly affection for each other could hardly be exceeded, so Jane is a very heavy emotional person.(4.2 Jane Austen's Emotional LifeJane Austen, a lively and popoular young women, never settle down with a husband. She never married, but it does not mean that she refused the marriage. She always on the look-out for a husband, assessing each young man who came her way. But she known, as a parson's daughter with no hope of a dowry, she knew that however attractive she may have been to the opposite sex, she had only a slender chance of finding a husband in fairly restricted circle of acquaintances in Hampshire. Jane had grown into attractive and lively young woman and was popular guests at private parties, Assembly Room dances and country house balls. There she would meet her friends and the usual string of dancing partners. At Christmas 1795 a good-looking man appeared. His name is Tom Lefroy, was the nineteen-year-old nephew of the Revd George Lefroy, of the rectory at Ashe, a few miles north of Steventon. They flirted, enjoyed meeting at different parties over Christmas and may indeed have felt the strength of sexual attraction. Once, Jane was very attracted to Tom Lefroy, as Jane implies in a letter to her sister, their interest in each other was noticed and remarked on. But finaly, he jilted Jane, because Jane did not have a dowry. When Tom Lefroy came to Hampshire he was in no position to get entangled with Jane. In 1797 Tom Lefroy went back to Ireland to be called to the Irish Bar; he took the opportunity to become engaged to Mary Paul. Therefore, Jane missed her marriage. Another young man she came to know in Kent is Edward Bridges, the brother of her sister-in-law Elizabeth. Edward Bridges was believed to have proposed and been turned down by Jane Austen. Jane Austen once promised to married with Harris Bigg Wither, but during the night- Jane changed her mind. Because Jane and Harris had known each other since childhood. Jane may have been tempted by the prospect of settling down in a fine house with a well-to-do husband. After she discovered it was wrong to marry for money. When Jane saw that far too many women were burdened with child-bearing, and lost their heath, their looks and sometimes their lives. So she dicide that writing was far more important to her than the security of a home.Ⅴ. ConclusionThrough the description of the four marriage in Pride and Prejudice, we can s ee Jane Austen’s views on marriage. Successful marriage should be based on mutual attraction and mutual understanding, even the importance of true love and the necessity of financial foundation. From the novel, we know about the women’s life in the 19th ce ntury. Although Jane Austen wrote the novel in 19th century, but her views are also suitable for the mordern marriage. Nowdays, people show various attitudes toward marriage, for example, some young ladies who are very attractive like to marry a rich men, regardless of his quality personality; or some young men want to marry rich women, even though the women are much older than them. So these people are confined to pursuit of money and meterial enjoyment. If we want to have really happy marriage, we should hold a right and cautious value judgement to marriage.Bibliography[1] Austen，Jane. Pride and Prejudice. New York: Bantam Dell ,2003.[2] Bu Yayun. Irony In Pride and Prejudice. HuZhou: Journal of HuZhou Teachers College, 2001.[3] He Shenying. A Perfect Marriage Wants True love as well as Money.Yuxi: Journal of YuXi Teacher College, 2001.[4] Lefroy,Helen. Jane Austen. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, 2002.[5] 简·奥斯丁著，张隆胜.译.《傲慢与偏见》. 北京：北京燕山出版社，1995.[6] 吴伟仁. 《英国文学史及选读》. 北京: 外语教学与研究出版社, 1988.[7] 张中载. 《当代英国文学论文集》. 辽宁：外语教学与研究出版社, 1996.[8] 朱虹（编）. 《英国小说的黄金时代》.北京：中国社会科学出版社, 1997.[9] 朱虹（编）. 《奥斯丁研究》.北京：中国文联出版公司, 1985.[10]王守仁. 《英国文学选读》. 北京: 高等教育出版社, 2005.(责任编辑：cari)。