Pride and Prejudice – A Review

In this past summer I had the pleasure of reading Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen for the second time.

Jane Austen lived in England from December 16, 1775 to July 18, 1817. She never married and lived with her family until her early death. She was the seventh of eight children. She had one older sister, Cassandra and six brothers. Her father was the rector of the parish in Steventon for about 40 years. She wrote several other works including, Mansfield Park and Sense and Sensibility. All of her works, published in her lifetime, were done so anonymously. The author of the books was known as “a Lady”. Pride and Prejudice was Miss Austen’s second published novel.

Miss Austen first wrote Pride and Prejudice between 1796 -1797. It was then titled First Impressions. It was offered for publication under this name but the offer was declined. Miss Austen later revised First Impressions and in 1813 the book was published under the title of Pride and Prejudice. The original book and some copies today were written in three volumes bound into one book. The first volume contained 23 chapters and the last two contained 29 chapters each. Most publications of this book are now printed with one volume containing 81 chapters. The Pride and Prejudice I read was an Oxford Illustrated. It was published as like as possible as the original publication of 1813.

Pride and Prejudice focuses on the Bennett family: the cool and sarcastic Mr. Bennett, the silly and nerve suffering Mrs. Bennett, the well thinking Jane, the playful Elizabeth, the studious Mary, the easily led Catherine and the ridiculous Lydia. Mrs. Bennett is determined to get all of her five daughters married to rich men. There is a problem however: at a time when money, connections and position mean a great deal in marriage, Mr. Bennett’s property is entailed to his cousin, not left to his daughters. On marriage none of the girls would be able to bring their new husbands money or connections and their position in society, though not very low, was not very high either. The majority of the book focuses on Jane and Elizabeth. Jane finds a man to love and loses him. Elizabeth enjoys hating Mr. Darcy for his behavior to towards another man – until she receives some shocking revelations. The book ends with one of the best of endings.

One aspect of this book that I really liked was Jane’s habit of always thinking the best of people even in the worst of circumstances.

This is a book I would highly recommend.

Rebekah ~ The Lord’s Daughter