Review Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Pride and Prejudice is a romantic novel that combines the themes of marriage, wealth, class and self-knowledge to unleash an extravagant masterpiece. Since its immediate success after being released in 1813, it has remained one of the most well-known English novels. Written by famous novelist Jane Austen whom novels expound critique and comment upon the British landed gentry in the late 19th century. The book consists of a unique and complex structure, which adds to its appeal.

The novel centers around the lives and hardships of the Bennet family, which consists of a pair of parents and five daughters. The spotlight belongs to Elizabeth Bennet who can be perceived as the protagonist of the story. She also plays the role of the second child of her household. Through the situation of the time and environment, she is pushed to pursue marriage for economic conventions and security, while Elizabeth desires to marry from love. As the story proceeds, Mr. Darcy a wealthy gentleman acquires feelings for Elizabeth. Therefore he is very conceited with himself, which makes it hard for him to acknowledge his sentiments. The romantic conflicts center around Mr.Darcy’s pride and Elizabeth’s prejudices.

The development of the plot and heroes is well-conceived. The book is very detailed as it takes time to introduce and describe every new character. I have a lot of sympathy towards the female lead as she proves herself as a lovely and clever character. However, her hasty judgments often lead her to be deceived by lies, such as when she refused to marry Mr. Darcy since she thought he was egotistical and unpleasant and proceeds to scold him for trying to keeping his friend, Mr. Bingley and her sister, Jane away from each other. In reality, he only did so because he thought their romance wasn’t serious. She later comes to acknowledge his nobility. Her virtues enable her to raise her above her class-bound and evade the cunning society. I can re-find parts of myself in her and she is also a sympathetic character. The story is mesmerizing and captivating and reflects reality in the 18th century. The book goes beyond social and psychological realism revealing the harsh reality of the Regence Era. A memorable scene for me is the marriage between Charlotte, who is Elizabeth’s closest friend and Mr. Collins the inheritor of Bennet’s land. This cut shows the drastic difference between two best friends as one of the searches for true love and the other searches for economical support.

There wasn’t anything that I disliked in particular, however, the book was written 200 years ago, thus it is penned in archaic English. The syntax seemed oddly unrecognizable and made it hard to understand the plot at specific times. The vocabulary had a high degree of difficulty. Therefore I recommend reading this novel using an E-book such as Kinder since most E-readers apps come with an inbuilt dictionary. The novel also had a slow start, which may disinterest the reader and soon make him give up on the book.

To conclude the essay, Pride and Prejudice is a novel that connects us and lets the reality of the late 19th century to be passed down to further generations. The book takes us on a journey of love, reputation, class and family problems. A lot of the experiences of Elizabeth are part of our own daily lives in the 20th century. The book teaches us how to distinguish good and evil through the mistakes of the characters. I highly recommend this book to young adults, as there is a lot to learn from it. 

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