Letters and Letter Writing as Seen in Pride and Prejudice
Quite frequently in her novels, Jane Austen uses letter writing between characters to explain past events and the exact nature of people's roles in them. It is these letters that always offer great insight into a character's true nature; which, often times, is not what it appears to be. It is this tactic that is consistently prevalent in her 1813 novel, Pride and Prejudice.
Throughout the course of the novel, Mr. Darcy, Mrs. Gardiner, and even Mr. Collins all write letters, and each reveal their personalities and sincere thoughts through them. It is in fact the letter writing that initially contributes, and ultimately results, in the union of hero and heroine at the end of the story. For each enlightens the reader to the truth about confused circumstances as well as hidden feelings toward other characters that would otherwise be left unsaid.
The first significant example of letter writing that allows for some conclusions to be made about a specific character's persona occurs when Mr. Bennet receives a foolish letter from the Reverend Mr. Collins, who will inherit Longbourn after Mr. Bennet's death because he is the nearest male relative. In his letter, Mr. Collins proposes a visit to Longbourn and hints at a further proposal of marriage to one of the Bennet daughters. The reader quickly learns of this man's nature because of the contents of his letter as well as Mr. Bennet's reasoning behind his acceptance of the proposal. Mr. Bennet makes fun of his unusual writing style and pomposity, and also makes snide remarks to his family about him. Ultimately, Mr. Bennet agrees to the visit because he wants to laugh at Mr. Bennet's expectations.
Austen's strategy of presenting the qualities of a person by way of indirection is clearly seen here. The odious letter from Mr. Collins prepares the reader to dislike him even before he arrives. Without even meeting this man, his personality is learned by the excessive verbiage, pompous flattery, and self-pride evident in his letter. It is Elizabeth who is extremely perceptive about Mr. Collins' letter because (after hearing it ) she immediately wonders if he can be a sensible man. And as the story unfolds, it is Mr. Collins' every action that will prove her belief to be true.
Although the letter written by Mr. Collins allows f...
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...acking she is in morality or social consciousness. Elizabeth's realization emphasizes the importance of Mrs. Gardiner's letter because it proves that the letter not only reveals her aunt's own endearing qualities, all the while enlightening Elizabeth to the truth, but also because it offers insight into the flighty personalities of some of the other members of the family.
In Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen uses letters to reveal the innermost thought of her characters as well as to express their personalities. These letters communicated style, intelligence (or lack there of), and insights into character development. Mr. Collins' foolish letter revealed the blatant ridiculousness of his nature, while the letter of Mr. Darcy offered the sincere qualities of his persona that had never before been seen. And Mrs. Gardiner's letter did illustrate traits we had seen before, but also helped Elizabeth to figure out how she felt about Mr. Darcy. Whatever each letter accomplished, they are all critical to the structure of the novel. For without them, Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth would have never gotten together, and neither character's pride nor prejudice would ever have been realized.
William Blake focused on biblical images in the majority of his poetry and prose. Much of his well-known work comes from the two compilations Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience. The poems in these compilations reflect Blake's metamorphosis in thought as he grew from innocent to experienced. An example of this metamorphosis is the two poems The Divine Image and A Divine Image. The former preceded the latter by one year.
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was born in 1892 in Bloemfontein, South Africa. He was raised in Birmingham, England in a poor Roman Catholic family. Tolkien had fought in World War l (1916). After the war, he became a professor of English at Oxford (1925-1959). When his children were young, he would tell them tales about an imaginary place called “Middle-Earth”. Oxford urged him to write these tales down and he did. He published the first ones in 1954-1955 and made a very successful series.
... had been told of his faults by someone he did not care for, it is doubtful whether he would have ever made an attempt at changing himself. Elizabeth also might not have done so. Austen might also be trying to say that it is important to see when you are wrong. Many people would deny their shortcomings in the face of an accusation, but if Darcy and Elizabeth had done so they never would have been able to come together. Both of these are good messages to take out of the story, and no doubt there are many more to be found in Pride and Prejudice.
Each of Jane Austen’s characters in her novel, Pride and Prejudice, experiences a significant character development. Whether the change occurs by self-realization or through the assistance of another character varies from each individual character. For Austen’s leading man, Mr. Darcy, his character improvement is documented through his two marriage proposals to Elizabeth Bennet and her subsequent first rejection of his proposal. His first proposal demonstrates his extreme arrogance, elitism, and blindness to his many flaws. While his latter proposal shows not only the recognition of his deficiencies, but the overall improvement in his mentality. Mr. Darcy’s two proposals, though having the same intended end result, are completely different
Darcy, the illusion that Mr. Wickham had built surrounding himself was now shattered: “How different did everything appear in which he was concerned.” Elizabeth now realizes her mistakes, which her prejudice was built and hopefully will never fall for such deceit again. Mr. Darcy is not the only one who is haughty, Elizabeth’s pride takes a massive blow after reading the letter, “she grew absolutely ashamed.” Realizing her mistakes will make Elizabeth grow as a person as she realizes how despicable she was, and has learned from her mistakes. Elizabeth had always thought she had the perfect judgement, but in fact she was horribly blind: “Till this moment I never knew myself.” Elizabeth now sees that she has flaws and it got in the way of her judgement rendering it blind. It is in maturity that people see their flaws; now Elizabeth has to make sure the same mistakes does not happen again. It was only after her prejudice of Mr. Darcy was finally gone that Elizabeth realized her true feelings towards him: “She explained what it’s [the letter] effect on her had been, and how gradually all her former prejudice has been removed.” After reading the letter, Elizabeth was able to realize her flaws as a character and grow into maturity and because of that she was able to see her true feelings about Mr.
Austen observes through the female characters of Pride and Prejudice that the perfect woman, by 19th century standards, doesn’t seem to exist, and when she does there is some degree of misfortune in her path. She explores this notion chiefly through satire and irony, as the type of woman the female characters strive for is not always the most desirable. Through indirect characterization and tone, it becomes apparent that each female character is characterized positively or negatively, which allows for each character’s conclusion to be fully explained and understood.
England, under James 1st rule was a vastly altered period compared to our now modern society. So many of the values held during this time, have now been discarded and forgotten. Jane Austen grew up in the Romantic period and experienced a world which was divided, whether through education, class, status, fashion, abilities, gender and etiquette. Her novel, Pride and Prejudice is counted as one of the great classics of English Literature. Austen engrosses readers to live in her world for a time and experience a society filled with matchmaking, romance, marriage and gossip. Every one of her characters is so distinctive and has a clearly outlined caricature. Each of their diverse values conveys a different thinking of the time. Pride and Prejudice is preoccupied with the gentry and most of the social aspects which consumed these people’s lives. There were so many expectations of how you would behave in public, but of course not all of these were upheld. Elizabeth Bennet, Mr Darcy, Mrs Bennet and Charlotte Lucas are four characters which keep such strong beliefs about the social norms. These characters are expressed so descriptively and through their personalities readers can learn just how the numerous social standards were received.
The letter is the significant turning point in the novel. That is when Elizabeth changes, after reading Darcy's letter. By writing the letter, Darcy looks inward and tries to figure out the mistakes that were made. The letter serves as
Within the novel, Jane Austen’s exploits of irony are shown linked throughout Emma’s notions of love and the real within her own society. Emma’s lack of education on the concepts of love is quite evident within her apathy towards Frank Churchill as her opinions are deeply rooted within her own affections, as she states, “Emma continued to entertain no doubt of her being in love. Her ideas only varied as to the how much. At first, she thought it was a good deal; and afterwards, but little. She had great pleasure in hearing Frank Churchill talked of; and for his sake, greater pleasure than ever in seeing Mr. and Mrs. Weston; she was very often thinking of him. But, on the other hand, she could not admit herself to be unhappy, nor, after the first morning, to be less disposed for employment than usual; she was still busy and cheerful; and, pleasing as he was, she could yet imagine him to have faults,” (Austen 264). Emma’s sketch of Harriet is another illustration of irony surrounded by Emma’s arrogance as it does not portray an accurate depiction of Harriet as Emma has altered ...
Blake, William. “Infant Sorrow.” Songs of Experience. The Literature Network. The Literature Network, n.d. Web. 19 Jan. 2014.
In Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy both go through dramatic changes in their attitude towards each other. Darcy is devoted to Elizabeth, but denies it because of her family and her lower status. Elizabeth believes Darcy to be arrogant and interfering. Through conversations these characters have, their true regard for each other is discovered. Austen effectively uses dialogue to develop the change in the principal characters’ moral temperament, and also to advance significant concerns in the novel such as marriage and wealth-based status.
William Blake uses his two compilations of poems, The Songs of Innocence (1789) and The Songs of Experience (1794) to present two opposing pictures of human divinity and human corruption in his two poems “The Divine Image” and “A Divine Image.” In these two poems Blake uses several techniques and literary devices to transmit his thoughts on the ideal and more realistic views of human nature.
William Blake was one of England’s greatest writers (Tejvan) in the nineteenth century, but his brilliancy was not noticed until after he was deceased. Blake was very much a free spirit who often spoke his mind and was very sensitive to cruelty. At the age of twenty five he married a woman named Catherine Boucher. They created a book of all Blake’s poems called Songs on Innocence, which was not very popular while he was alive. On the other hand Blake’s other book of poems, Songs of Experience, were much more popular. These two collections are so magnificent because it is two different forms of writing successfully written by one man. Two major poems written by William Blake were “The Tyger” and “The Lamb”. The Lamb is from Songs of Innocence while The Tyger is from Songs of Experience, they may share different perspectives on the world yet they both complement one another very well. Blake believed that life could be viewed from two different perspectives, those being innocence and experience. To Blake, innocence is not better than experience. Both states have their good and bad sides. The positive side of innocence is joy and optimism, while the bad side is naivety. The negative side of experience is cynicism, but the good side is wisdom (Shmoop Editorial Team). The Tyger and The Lamb are two completely different styles of poems yet it wouldn’t have the same affect on a reader if one poem didn’t exist.
The biographies about Jane Austen describe the facts of her life in a step-by-step manner. They tend to be repetitive since she did not leave behind a rich fabric of day-to-day life. Yet Jane Austen is known not because of the factual details of her life; she is not remembered two hundred years after her death because she had six siblings and was a wonderful aunt to her nieces and nephews. Rather, Jane Austen is remembered because of what she wrote, her "ouvre." Only through reading her literature does one get a taste of the real Jane Austen, the Jane Austen who dreamed and made plans for the future that failed to materialize. Therefore, I have attempted to describe the life of Jane Austen by interpreting her novels and picking three main characters who I feel most closely serve as her alter ego. A writer writes from his or her own experiences; only by analyzing Jane Austen's characters do we get an understanding of the true author.
When first picking up Pride and Prejudice, one might observe some symptoms of the theme in question; One might feel prejudiced and think, “This is that stupid Kierra Knightly love story isn’t it?” or “This is going to be so long, wordy, and boring.” just by word of ear, and perhaps a glance at the novel. Jane Austen initially wrote Pride and Prejudice as form of entertainment for her family when she was a teenager. If one thinks of this novel as one written by a young girl as a form of satire to entertain her family, it holds some pride and prejudices in a way. As I read this novel I saw myself becoming as dynamic as Darcy Or Elizabeth in my opinions of the characters. This novel is a story about love and relationships in general, and how