Last Pride and Prejudice Essay: Clash of the Classes

Richard Pho

Mr. George

Honors World Literature

18 March 2011

Clash of the Classes

            Abiding in eighteenth century hierarchical England, Jane Austen is criticized for a being a classist due to her literary works.  Austen’s novel, Pride and Prejudice, epitomizes the effects of social hierarchy on Longbourn, England.  Austen signifies class absurdity by revealing how the novel revolves around social, moral, and economic stability.  The theme of class reflects upon the reputation of the middle and upper classes.  Though the characters and their decisions, Austen personifies social adversity as she manifests the solution to overcoming these barriers.

            Austen utilizes juxtaposing diction to convey the social classes’ personality and the reputation that follows them.  Jane Bennet is described cordially as humble, pretty, good-natured, and agreeable.  Austen implements pleasant sounding diction to validate her affection for the middle class.  These words highlight the significant difference between the middle and upper classes.  In the beginning, Mr. Darcy appears to be a bit robotic. He always has a monotone response and does not want to associate with people out of his social class.  Mr. Darcy appears programmed with certain characteristics emblematic of the upper class: a precise point that Austen endeavors to convey.  He is characterized as handsome, and the “proudest, most disagreeable man in the world” (Austen 11).  His haughty personality personifies the upper class’ stereotype of being egotistical.  Looking at the contradicting diction used to describe the two social classes, the word “handsome” is repetitively used to show a more connotative meaning about the classes.

            Austen describes people associated in each class to be “handsome”.  The denotation of the word “handsome” is “having an attractive, well-proportioned, and imposing appearance suggestive of health and strength” (dictionary.com).  The denotation applies to a plethora of characters in the novel.  Looking at the middle class, Jane is both beautiful on the inside and the outside.  Looking at the upper class, both Mr. Darcy and Mr. Bingley appear to be prim and proper.  Austen wants her audience to interpret the connotation of the word “handsome” as being one of high social status.  Throughout the novel, only members of the upper class have been described to be handsome, regardless of their gender.  Mr. Darcy describes Elizabeth as one “tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me” (Austen 12).  Clearly, Mr. Darcy is not talking about her countenance because he could have used the word “pretty” or “attractive”.  Mr. Darcy is not tempted by Elizabeth because she belongs to a lower social class.  There is an impediment between the social classes, ultimately creating social asperity.

            The novel depicts two social classes that dispute over the concept of power.  Austen exploits different characters to convey the absurdity of this hierarchical society.  From the beginning of the novel, Charlotte Lucas and Elizabeth Bennet quarrel over the men in their society.  Charlotte views the men as power wielders. Women only achieve social recognition through the men they marry.  Charlotte believes “in nine cases out of ten, a woman had better show more affection than she feels” (20).  The emphasis on the word “more” demonstrates how women need to show affection even if they do not care for the man.  From Charlotte’s perspective, the sole goal is to marry rich: a prevalent goal of Longbourn’s women.  On the contrary, Elizabeth believes that men need to work for the women they desire to marry.  Their juxtaposing beliefs reveal Austen’s perspective on the corruption of the classes.  In this time period, the upper class males withhold all of the power because they are the only ones capable of passing on their social distinction.  The middle class wants to marry someone prestigious to increase their status.  Unfortunately, the upper class does not want to decrease their status.  Austen establishes this bitterness when Caroline Bingley persuades Mr. Bingley not to have a connection with Jane Bennet, although she has the beauty of an upper class citizen. Caroline is afraid “with such a father and mother, and such low connections, [she is] afraid there is no chance of it” (32).  The antecedent of “it” is the chance of Jane marrying and achieving social recognition.  Caroline displays a condescending tone to show that Jane may never get married in her life because of her social status.  Austen gives Caroline a condescending tone to construe the upper class’ avarice. With the fight for power, there transpires a conflict, similar to the social oligarchy depicted in George Orwell’s 1984.

            1984 depicts a social struggle between the proles and the inner party, similar to a struggle between the middle and upper classes of Longbourn, England.  Oceania’s hierarchical society preserves a division of power, keeping the lower class immobile to maintain supremacy and strength.  Divided by the classes’ wealth, a tension propagates between the middle and lower classes to rise and overthrow the ruling upper class: “Of the three groups, only the Low are never even temporarily successful in achieving their aims” (Orwell 202). O’Brien gives Winston a book containing the party’s three slogans.  In “Ignorance is Strength”, the lower class always attempts to achieve power.  Despite all of their arduous struggles, they are always pushed back down to the bottom through restraints such as Newspeak, doublethink, and the thought police.  Similar to 1984, the middle class must pass through the stubbornness of the upper class. Austen believes that the classist society demonstrates that the upper class embodies characters we hate because they solely care for power and wealth.  The characters we care for are at the bottom and they have difficulties rising up.  Austen conveys that the lower class need to obtain the trust of an upper class member to achieve such success or else social achievement is implacable. 

Achieving trust is a difficult task due to the prejudice that the upper class has towards their social inferiors.  Lady Catherine and Elizabeth argue over Elizabeth’s social status. Lady Catherine feels that Elizabeth is inferior because she is one out of “five daughters brought up at a home without a governess” (141).  Lady Catherine implies that the lower class is dirty because, without having a governess, Lady Catherine considers people raised unlike herself as paltry.  Through all of Lady Catherine’s impudent comments, Elizabeth is victorious in defending her honor and her family.  Though this may only be one quarrel in the novel, the concept of marriage elicits more disparity.

            The importance of marriage seems to build around the concepts of wealth and status, bringing forth proposals to improve one’s social ranking.  The first proposal was from Mr. Collins.  Mr. Collins is not a member of the upper class, but he likes to think of himself as one.  In proposing to Elizabeth, he displays characteristics not in any typical proposal.  He claims he needs a wife for his profession, because someone told him he should get a wife, and because she needs money.  Mr. Collins lacks love in his proposal.  His proposal is a bit mercenary: a characteristic of the upper class.  Mr. Collins solely wants to improve his social image by getting married, disregarding the true objectives of matrimony.  Austen utilizes marriage to convey how this is the only way one can advance in their classist society.  Austen finds this absurd because one should not feel obligated to marry in order to advance in life, especially if one does not like their significant other.  Charlotte prudently marries Mr. Collins because she knows she cannot progress in life without his social status, even though she has no emotional connection with him.  Even if there is emotion in a marriage, Austen portrays that some marriages revolve around the idea of increasing one’s reputation.  With the relationship between Lydia and Wickham, Lydia truly cares for him because he is a handsome male of the militia.  Wickham makes it seem like he likes Lydia, but his true motives are mercenary.  Regardless of whatever the marriage may be for, they all end up being related to social status.  Austen believes that the world of the protagonists may have class absurdity, but the protagonists are able to override social standards.

            Through the marriages of the protagonists, Austen proves that love and happiness overcome class adversity and prejudice.  The protagonists seem to flip the negativity of marrying for social advancement.  In result, they bring back the true meaning of marriage.  Mr. Darcy, Mr. Bingley, Elizabeth, and Jane all break through their social barriers, resulting in two happy marriages.  Through the adversity of marriage, these characters persevere through the challenges to demonstrate that marriage is not solely for the purpose of recognition.  Looking at Mrs. Bennet’s senselessness, she sends Jane to trek to the Bingley’s so she would get sick and be forced to stay with the Bingleys.  Mrs. Bennet’s intentions were to get her daughter to marry a wealthy man, but she did not consider the concept of love and happiness.  With those concepts, Jane was able to marry the man of her dreams.  She did not care if he was rich or not; Jane and Bingley just seem to have an emotional connection.  Elizabeth and Darcy’s relationship has been complex since the beginning, with different prejudices against one another.  In the end, these dynamic characters disregard their social labels, and look at the characteristics that brought them together.  Through the affection the protagonists have towards one another, Austen conveys how their classist society is absurd and if one were to disregard reputation and wealth, greater fortunes can be discovered.

            Although Austen displays her disdain for class absurdity, she portrays a resolution by making her protagonists excel over the social restraints.  Through Austen’s juxtaposing diction, she demonstrates a parallelism in people’s characteristics.  Words such as “handsome” convey both physique and social status.  Conflicts arise between the social classes involving power.  In order to obtain power, one must be joined through matrimony with a person of higher social status.  The world of the novel is self-absorbed in achieving recognition by disregarding the true meaning of marriage.  The protagonists take that concept of marriage and convey how true happiness and love can shatter social adversity.  Austen illustrates that classicism is making their society crazy, because they are all absorbed with obtaining wealth.  The audience can agree that wealth is the true incentive of the social classes, but only the least prejudiced people can achieve true happiness.  Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth are the wealthiest characters in the novel.  Everyone knows money cannot buy happiness, but happiness can come along with money. 

Works Cited

Austen, Jane. Pride and Prejudice. New York: Signet, 1980. Print.

Orwell, George. 1984. New York: Signet Classic, 1950.

"Handsome | Define Handsome at Dictionary.com." Dictionary.com | Free Online Dictionary for English Definitions. Web. 15 Mar. 2011. <http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/handsome>.