“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.” This is the iconic beginning to Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice that provides a quick summary of the entire plot of the novel. The preoccupation with a socially advantageous marriage in nineteenth-century English society reveals itself here, because, in claiming that a single man “must be in want of a wife,” the narrator reveals that the reverse is also true: a single woman, whose social options are limited, is also in want of a husband. This theme immediately lends itself well to the literary theories Feminist theory and Marxist Criticism. Austen's Pride & Prejudice explores the dependence of women on marriage in the pursuit of favorable social standing and economic security, which is why Feminist Theory and Marxist Criticism lends itself so well to this novel.
Austen’s Story
Austen's parents, George Austen (1731–1805), and his wife Cassandra (1739–1827), were members of the gentry, or people of good social position. For much of Jane's life, George Austen served as the rector of the Anglican parishes at Steventon, Hampshire, and a nearby village. From 1773 until 1796, he supplemented this income by farming and by teaching three or four boys at a time, who boarded at his home. Jane Austen was born in Steventon on December 16th, 1775. She came from a family of six brothers and one sister. Cassandra, her sister, was Austen's closest friend and confidante throughout her life. During her childhood, Jane taught herself enough sign language to communicate with George, her brother who was born deaf. From age seven until thirteen, the family and friends staged a series of plays in the rectory barn. Jane's eldest brother James wrote the prologues and epilogues and Jane probably joined in first as a spectator and later as a participant. Most of the plays were comedies, which is maybe how Austen's satirical gifts were cultivated. (Life and Works)
In 1783, Jane and Cassandra were sent to Oxford to be educated, where both girls caught typhus and Jane nearly died. Austen was from then on home educated, until she attended boarding school with her sister early in 1785. The school curriculum probably included French, spelling, needlework, dancing and music and drama. The sisters returned home before December 1786, because the Austens could not afford to send both the daughters to school. The remainder of her education came from reading, guided by her father and brothers James and Henry. (Life and Works)
Austen attended church regularly, socialized frequently with friends and neighbors and read novels, often of her own composition, aloud with her family in the evenings. Austen began her first full-length novel Elinor and Marianne. Without surviving original manuscripts, there is no way to know how much of the original draft survived in the novel published anonymously in 1811 as Sense and Sensibility. Austen began a second novel, First Impressions, in 1796. She completed the initial draft in August 1797, at age 21, and, as with all of her novels, Austen read the work aloud to her family as she was working on it and it became an "established favorite." (Life and Works)
In December 1802, Austen received her only known proposal of marriage. She and her sister visited Alethea and Catherine Bigg, old friends who lived near Basingstoke. Their younger brother, Harris Bigg-Wither had recently finished his education at Oxford. Bigg-Wither proposed and Austen accepted. However, by the next morning, Austen realized she had made a mistake and withdrew her acceptance. Later, in a letter to her niece, Austen told her that “anything is to be preferred or endured rather than marrying without affection." (Life and Works)
Historians believe that her father’s death in 1805 led to a depressive stage in Austen, which affected her writing. After his death, the Austens moved around and lived with family. During her time living in Chawton, Jane Austen published four generally well received novels. In October of 1811, through her brother Henry, the publisher Thomas Egerton agreed to publish Sense and Sensibility. Reviews were favorable and the edition sold out by mid-1813. Austen's earnings from Sense and Sensibility provided her with some financial and psychological independence. In January of 1813, Egerton then published Pride and Prejudice, a revision of First Impressions. He advertised the book widely and it was an immediate success, reaping three favorable reviews and selling well. (Life and Works)
Austen died in Winchester on July 18, 1817, at the age of 41. There is some disagreement as to her cause of death, but most historians believe it was from tuberculosis. Henry Austen arranged for his sister to be buried in Winchester Cathedral. The epitaph composed by her brother James praises Austen's personal qualities, expresses hope for her salvation, mentions the "extraordinary endowments of her mind", but does not really mention her achievements as a writer. (Life and Works)
Part of Austen's fame rests on the historical and literary significance that she was the first woman to write great comic novels. Austen had a natural ear for speech and dialogue, which reveals a character’s mood, including frustration, anger, happiness. (Life and Works) For example, in Pride & Prejudice, when Elizabeth Bennett rejects Darcy, her stilted speech and the elaborate sentence structure reveals that he has wounded her:
“From the very beginning, from the first moment I may almost say, of my acquaintance with you, your manners impressing me with the fullest belief of your arrogance, your conceit, and your selfish disdain of the feelings of others, were such as to form that the groundwork of disapprobation, on which succeeding events have built so immovable a dislike. And I had not known you a month before I felt that you were the last man in the world whom I could ever be prevailed on to marry.”
Because Austen's works were published anonymously, they brought her little personal renown. Though Austen's novels were republished in Britain from the 1830s and sold at a steady rate, they were not bestsellers. However, Austen had many admiring readers in the 19th century who considered themselves part of a literary elite: they viewed their appreciation of Austen's works as a mark of their cultural taste. (Life and Works) Since then, there is more scholarship on Austen using a diversity of critical approaches, including feminist theory and Marxist criticism.
Feminism Theory
Regarded as the first philosophical feminist work, Mary Wollstonecraft wrote A Vindication of the Rights of Women in an effort to explain her beliefs on why men and women should be treated as equals. Considered as a Feminist theorist, Wollstonecraft would probably cringe at how some people would define feminism, because Wollstonecraft didn’t believe that women are better than men or call for men to be subservient. She purely called for equality. In fact, she also wrote A Vindication of the Rights of Men. A Vindication of the Rights of Women is a revolutionary work published in 1792, which is less than twenty years after the United States was founded. (Wollstonecraft) Because of the time period’s culture, Wollstonecraft was pitting herself against some pretty closed-minded people who really believed that men and women were two different species.
In her writing, Wollstonecraft laid out a public education system that would give girls and boys equal and free education. This is a system that’s around in much of the world today. She also believed that women should be allowed to have careers in politics and medicine and be able to speak their minds without fear of being called “masculine” or undesirable. Wollstonecraft thought that women’s interest in looking pretty and dressing up is mostly from nurture, not nature. She also talked about it being unfair that women are shamed for having sex before marriage but men weren’t. (Wollstonecraft) This work is over 200 years old, but some of these issues are still relevant today.
Published in 1813, Pride & Prejudice was published in a time period and culture close to that of Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Women in 1792. Pride & Prejudice depicts a time where a woman’s reputation was everything. A woman was expected to behave in certain ways and stepping out of line made a woman vulnerable to ostracism. Women were second class to men and could not retain property on their own, which was a major problem for the Bennet family because there were no male heirs for after Mr. Bennet. The daughters needed to marry well in order to take care of their family. Later in the story, one of the younger sisters named Lydia runs away with a man unattended. Because she is unmarried with little hopes of being married, this situation could soil the reputations of ALL the Bennet sisters and ruin their chances at marrying. This wouldn’t have been as big of a deal if the genders were flipped (Austen).
Brown argues whether or not Austen was a true feminist. He looks at whether or not Austen’s works can be described as “feminism” or a negativity towards “womanhood.” In her culture the assumption was that “ideal’ womanhood means emotional fulfillment through sexual “dependency” and motherhood. Austen loathed the idea of being dependent in love, possibly due to her poor relationship with her mother, and she disliked children, possibly because “envy of the maternal role is to be expected in a childless woman” (Brown).
After deciding she’s a feminist, Brown likens Austen to her predecessor Mary Wollstonecraft. He believes they shared similar themes and “questioned certain masculine assumptions in society.” In Pride & Prejudice, Austen points out the imbalance in the education of women and the relationship between education and marriage. Brown discusses the scene in Pride & Prejudice at Netherfield where the characters discuss “female accomplishment.” The upper class talked of standards for a truly accomplished female, including “a thorough knowledge of music, singing, drawing, dancing, and the modern languages, to deserve the word; and besides all this, she must possess a certain something in her air and manner of walking, the tone of her voice, her address and expressions, or the word will be but half-deserved.” (Austen) Notice that all of these “accomplishments” are purely decorative for the hopes of attracting a man? I didn’t see any knowledge of calculus or economics in there. Elizabeth Bennet laughs at their impossible standards. “I’ve never beheld such a woman.” (Austen)
In an entry in the International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature, Chang examines the feminist significance of Elizabeth Bennet, protagonist of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. According to Chang, the feminist view found in Pride and Prejudice is “well-supported in literary criticism yet little discussion has focused on Elizabeth’s feminism as seen in the prominent contrast to her female foils within the novel, namely Caroline, Jane, and Charlotte.” Each of these women conforms to the gender norms of Regency England, while Elizabeth “artfully challenges gender inequality.” (Chang) As other women adapt their views to increase their chances of marriage, Elizabeth persistently refuses to submit to society’s norms. In fact, in refusing Mr. Collins’ hand, she risks the chance of never being asked again and dying an old maid, which is social suicide. Defying traditional gender norms, Elizabeth asserts her feminist perspective by helping to shape Mr. Darcy’s moral character to match her own. Elizabeth inspires Mr. Darcy to set aside the pride he has in the higher class in society in order to win her affections and take her hand in marriage. (Austen) Chang points out that maybe Elizabeth’s character is not feminist in isolation, but is understood only in contrast to her female foils: Caroline, Jane, and Charlotte.
Marxist Criticism
In his book Marxism and Literary Criticism, Marxist theorist Eagleton argues: “Marxist criticism is not merely the ‘sociology of literature,’ concerned with how novels get published and whether they mention the working class. Its aim is the explain the literary work more fully; and this means a sensitive attention to its forms, styles, and meanings. But it also means grasping those particular forms, styles, and meanings as the products of a particular history.” I really liked this as a short summary of his ideas when it comes to Marxist criticism, because this theory isn’t meant for purely surface level studying but more for deep, critical thinking. Just because a novel mentions social class does not mean it falls under this theory. It’s about looking deeply into a particular piece of literature by observing everything and looking at the time period and culture of the time. It’s about finding what the author is truly trying to say about social structures, which is why I think this theory lends itself so well to Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice.
In the novel, people within Austen’s society worry about decorum, social propriety, and gentility maintaining itself against the “inroads of vulgar tradespeople.” (Daiches) Throughout many of Austen’s novels is a perpetual quest for eligible marriage. However, Austen writes with ruthless clarity about what she observes and records the economic realities underlying this societal dance. “In a society where wealth came mostly from landed property, which descended through the male heir, the fate of well-brought-up woman was to find a suitable husband or retire forever into the outer darkness.” (Daiches) Mr. Bennet needed to marry off all his daughters otherwise they would suffer an awful fate of gentility without money, which is an idea that haunts most of Austen’s novels. (Austen) No one wanted to end up as a shabby old maid.
At the Meryton Ball in chapter 3, Bingley suggests to his good friend Mr. Darcy that he should dance with Elizabeth Bennet instead of just standing around. The wealthy Mr. Darcy sees the people of Meryton as inferiors so he dismisses this idea by saying in a condescending manner, “she is tolerable; but not handsome enough to tempt me.” (Austen) Of course, Elizabeth overhears this entire exchange so she labels Darcy as a prideful and rude man with a superiority complex. This negative impression will linger until halfway through the novel, until Darcy’s true character is revealed. When Darcy changes his mind about Elizabeth and initially proposes marriage, he mentions in his proposal that he loves her and is going to look over her class“inferiority” and wants to marry her anyways. Unfortunately, Darcy spends more time emphasizing her lower rank and “unsuitability” than he does complimenting her and proclaiming his love. (Austen) Obviously, Elizabeth, already full of contempt for him for rejecting her at the ball, breaking up Bingley and her sister Jane, and alleged mistreatment of Wickham, rejects him on the spot.
I always read Pride & Prejudice as an escape novel. Every year at Christmas time, I read it to escape to a different culture and time period where women wore long dresses, read books all day, and attended the town ball at night. However, looking at this novel through the Marxist theory lense has made me realize that this isn’t an escapist novel at all, it’s an incredibly realistic novel from that time period. This is funny to me because Austen was writing Marxist ideas before Marx was even around (Marx). As I read the novel, I notice that she points out the time period’s social and economic behavior with an ironic smile. Austen talks about this behavior through her characters, not simply as an author lecturing her audience about injustice.
I applied Marxist theory to Elizabeth Bennet’s best friend Charlotte Lucas. She accepts the hand of someone she loathes, the frustrating and oblivious Mr. Collins, because she knows that if she doesn’t accept this offer then she may never receive another offer of marriage. Charlotte doesn’t want to become an unmoneyed old maid in an upper class society, because it is a fate too tragic for her to even think about. However, Elizabeth had no problem rejecting Mr. Collins’ hand only days prior. She knew the risks but refused to marry someone she didn’t truly love.
Conclusion
While growing up, I dreaded reading classic books in class. They used difficult language and the plot lines were unrelatable to me. In my AP English course in high school, I was assigned to read Pride & Prejudice. My teacher took a day to explain context and even showed us the 2005 movie adaptation, starring Keira Knightley and Matthew Macfadyen, as we read to help us understand what was going on. I read the entire book in one night. I just couldn’t put it down. My perspective and appreciation for classic books was changed forever. After reading it several times since then, I have picked up on so many other themes that Austen wrote into this famous novel. In Pride & Prejudice, Austen subtly points out injustice within her society in an ironic and comedic way. According to Jane Austen, “The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.”
Works Cited
Austen, Jane. Pride & Prejudice. N.p.: n.p., 1813. Print.
Brown, Lloyd W. . "Jane Austen and the Feminist Tradition." University of California Press
28.3 (1973): 321-38. JSTOR. Web. 17 Apr. 2017.
Chang, Hui-Chun. "The Impact of the Feminist Heroine: Elizabeth in Pride and
Prejudice." International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature 3.3
(2014): n. pag. Web. 21 Apr. 2017.
Daiches, David. "Jane Austen, Karl Marx, and the Aristocratic Dance." The American
Scholar 17.3 (1948): 289-96. JSTOR. Web. 21 Apr. 2017.
Eagleton, Terry. Marxism and Literary Criticism. N.p.: Psychology Press, 2002. Print.
Marx, Karl. The Communist Manifesto. Harmondsworth, Middlesee: Penguin , 1967. Print.
Wollstonecraft, Mary. A Vindication of the Rights of Women. N.p.: n.p., 1792. Print.
"Life and Works of English Author Jane Austen." Jane Austen. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Apr. 2017.
