Even though there are many characters in this book, there are only two important ones - Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy. These two characters are the only ones in the book that have any depth to them. Every other character in the book is extremely one dimensional and their entire existance seem to revolve around Elizabeth and Darcy. For example, Mrs. Bennet is the same throughout the book. She is loud, obnoxious, pushy, and embarassing. We, as readers, are never offered any look into her emotions or character - but that's the point. Austen treats her and others as simple characters because that is all they're needed for. Mrs. Bennet is reduced to a characiture of a pushy mother because that is all that's needed from her. She helps Elizabeth in Chapter 42 by helping her realize that her mother and father are completely miss matched. She then decides she will not end up like them. Mrs. Bennet's attitude and disposition are one of the reasons Darcy tells Mr. Bingley to forget about Jane. All of the characters are used to set the stage for events that happen to Elizabeth and Darcy. Jane talks to Elizabeth, but she never offers her any good advice. Jane is there simply to provide a way to introduce Darcy and she, like her mother, show Elizabeth how not to fall in love.
When I first started reading this book, I didn't understand that the characters were intentionally shallow and annoying. Mrs. Bennet, Miss Bingley, Lydia, Kitty, Lady Catherine, and Mr. Collins are all very aggrevating characters and are also extremely one dimensional. Others are simply boring: Jane, Mr. Bingley, Mr. Bennet, and Miss Lucas are there simply to move the plot along. At first I thought the book was just boring and filled with these stupid characters. It wasn't until our first class discussion that I began to see the book differently and it wasn't until Mr. Darcy's letter that I fully understood that everyone except for Darcy and Elizabeth are intentionally shallow. We are meant to dislike Mr. Collins and Lady Catherine because we are supposed to know that Elizabeth hates them.
Mr. Darcy's letter brought everything together for me. It acted like a roadmap for why each character was written into the story. Mr. Wickham intentionally tries to make Elizabeth dislike Darcy; the entire Bennet family acts as a reason for Darcy to take Mr. Bingley out of the country;, Miss Lucas marries Mr. Collins as an example of a mismatched couple. These are just a few examples. Every character and every event in the book lead up to the events of Chapters 43 and 44 when Elizabeth finally starts to move past her prejudiced views of Darcy and begins to fall in love with him. I still find the book to be a little long and wordy, but I've never seen characters used solely as foreshadowing and this, more than anything keeps me interested in the story.
posted by rcunning @ 3:29 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home