How does Jane Austen portray pride in the novel ‘Pride and Prejudice’?

For my English coursework I have decided to consider the question: How has Jane Austen portray pride in the novel Pride and Prejudice? This question asks about mostly characters and their self-respect, dignity and pride there are many different meanings of pride here are a few: 1. Inordinate self-esteem, unreasonable conceit of one's own superiority. 2. Insolence, arrogance. 3. Sense of dignity, self-respect and proper self-esteem. 4. Generous elation or satisfaction arising out of some accomplishment, possession or relationship. 5. A source of such elation. 6. The acme, the highest point, the best condition. I will approach this question by going through, firstly the characters with types of positive and negative pride and then the characters with comic and changing pride. Pride can be classed as a positive concept. A positive form of pride in Jane Austen's novel would, I think be Lizzy. Lizzy is very proud of her family despite how sometimes they might embarrass her. For example, the way Lydia and Catherine act when there out at dinner. â€Å"Catherine and Lydia had been fortunate enough to never be without partners, which was all they had yet learned to care for at a ball†. This would suggest how flirtatious Lydia and Catherine are. Another quotation to suggest this would be: â€Å"I am astonished that you should be so ready to think your own children are silly†. This is written in Caroline Bingley's letter to Mr Bennet. A second example of this is the way Mrs Bennet talks to Mr Darcy, because of holding a grudge against him when he first arrived at Longbourn (Darcy would dance with no-one but the Bingley sisters, either because the weren't pretty enough or of a lower class). â€Å"You know how I detested it, unless I am particularly acquainted with my partner† My last example would be when Lydia ran off with Wickham. This is the stage in the story where the Bennets have realised what Wickham's really like and about his sinister character. Lizzy also never looks down on anyone and I think she may believe in equality. Being headstrong and sometimes quite arrogant may let Lizzy down a little, but Lizzy speaks her mind and the way she feels when confronted or confronting showing her pride in her family and friends. For example when Collins proposed to Lizzy, she would none of it and turned him down three times. When telling her that no one else would take pleasure in engaging with her she stood strong and said she had never been treated in such an abominable, rude and UN-gentlemen-like manor. An example of Lizzy speaking her mind, When she turned Collins proposal down the first time, as it was fashionable to turn the first proposal down, but the second or third should've been accepted. This displayed how much Lizzy detests Collins. I think Liz zy was quite prejudice though. At the beginning of the novel she judges Darcy on his pride because Wickham tells her of how sinister Darcy is to try and win Lizzy's love. ‘ If late Mr Darcy had liked me less, His son might have borne me with better; but his fathers uncommon attachment to me irritated him early in life†. This is one of Wickhams lies that Lizzy sadly fell for. Wickham is trying to say that Darcys' father paid more attention to him than Darcy. Darcy then got jealous and started disliking Wickham. Lizzy's empathetic reply to this was: â€Å"I had not thought Mr Darcy so bad as this†. As Lizzy falls gullibly she expresses her feelings for Wickham. While Wickham smugly smiles at his attempt to poison Lizzy. When Lizzy realises she has judged wrong, she fiercely chastises herself for misjudging Darcy. â€Å"Infact my feelings are quite the opposite† This is what Lizzy says on Darcy's second proposal. Jane Bennet portrays positive pride in the way she looks e.g. the posture and the structure in the way she sits, stands and walks. She also shows great pride in her mother and some in the rest of her family. Jane's pride in the way she looks is strongly criticised when Mr Bingley disengages from her. This would make Jane feel very degraded. Jane is very sad about Mr Bingley leaving her, when she hears news of his return her face lights up and her pride is given back to her. This is because she knows he is coming back to see her. Mr Bennet has a lot of pride in Lizzy as he thinks she is the brightest one of his daughters. He stands by Lizzy in all she does. â€Å"We all know him to be a proud, unpleasant sort of man, but this would be nothing if you really liked him†. This is what Mr Bennet has learned that Lizzy has accepted Darcys' second proposal. Mr Darcy was determined to not make himself look daft/pathetic again he makes sure that Lizzy is not leading him on before he properly proposes: â€Å"I could not have addressed you in any possible way that Would induce you to accept me. So tell me if your feelings Are as they were before†. Georgina on the other hand is very proud of her brother and the way she has been brought up. She obviously shows pride in her family and in all she does. I think Georgina looks up to her brother (Darcy) and respects him greatly in all he does. The negative version of pride appears in this novel quite often. A lot of it appears in conversations between the Bingley sisters. The Bingley sisters are some of the most prejudice people throughout this book. They think they are a step above the rest and only have friends with ‘money'. They think that all women should be elegant females and learn to play at least one instrument, sew and act lady like (basically to be accomplished). â€Å"Women are inclined to learn to play at least one instrument fluently† It shows us this when Lizzy dashes half way across the countryside by foot to visit her sick sister. The greeting she gets is an unimpressed one and they are dicusted in her unladylike exertion. â€Å"Yes and her petticoat; I hope you saw her petticoat, six inches deep in mud, and the gown which had been let down to hide it, not doing its office†. The Bingley sisters are proud in every thing they do and given chance to talk about themselves would claim to be the best (or ‘one of'). Their clothes they wear in the video portray their class in society and they are very arrogant, self-worrying people. Lady Catherine de Burgh is also another example of being very prejudiced or if not, the most prejudiced in the book. There isn't a lot of Lady Catherine in the story until the end, but all the way throughout there are refers to her and her strong influences she has on people i.e. Mr Collins. â€Å"Lady Catherine said I should marry as I am a clergyman† Lady Catherine has a lot of pride, mostly in herself but some in her daughter. Lady Catherine is also extremely arrogant and does not like things when they don't go her way. E.g. when Lady Catherine heard news of Darcy wanting to propose to Lizzy again, she storms up to Longbourn by horse and carriage to declare that Lizzy refuses his offer as Darcy is engaged to be with Lady Catherine's daughter. Lizzy standing up for her rights bites back at Lady Catherine and makes no such promise to say no to Darcy. She ends up doing quite the opposite and accepting his offer. In the beginning of the novel Darcy is a very proud, arrogant and upper, top class person (so he seems to think). An early start became a bad start when he went to the first dinner and saw Lizzy. Darcy portray his arrogance by dancing with Mrs Hurst and Miss Bingley. Only Mr Bingley saw Darcy and tried to make him dance with Lizzy, but he said: â€Å"She is tolerable but not handsome enough to tempt me†. Comic Pride is a rare pride in this novel and can be seen in at least two of the characters. The first Character it occurs in is Mr Collins he has so much self-love he could make Lady Catherine vomit! Mr Collins shows his smugness in almost everything he does. When asking for Lizzy's hand in marriage, thinking that she couldn't turn him down financially or because its not something an 18th century woman would do. This refers to meaning 5 on the first page. Mr Collins also had the audacity to say that Lizzy would be daft to say no, as no one else would want to marry her because of her finances. â€Å"You should take it to farther consideration that inspite of your manifold attractions, it is by no means certain that another offer of marriage may never be made of you†. Collins is funny in the way he moves and acts I would describe him as behind the time (old fashioned). He shows huge respect for Lady Catherine by doing everything she tells him to do. E.g. She said he should get a wife and settle down. So he obeyed her and went to ask for Lizzys hand in marriage. The other example of comic pride would be Mrs Bennet. She always claims she's right and I think she's two faced. One minute she will say that Mr Bingley is an arrogant, self-centred person for dumping Jane, and when news travels he's coming to visit shes really nice to him. E.g. She creeps round him asking how his journey was and how was he. She claims she's always right by, for example when Lydia ran off she said she would never come back she's been kidnapped. When she heard Lydia was coming back married she said she always knew she'd come back. Both these characters are humorous in the novel and the video, but do get quite annoying. Changing Pride also happened only once or twice in this novel. The first person it happens to is Lizzy as her pride changed when she realised she'd thought wrong of Darcy. At first she saw him as rude and arrogant but by the end she saw that she really loved him. She learned to see through all his arrogance and self-centredness and saw the polite and pleasant Darcy. This changed her views on Darcy and gave her reason to accept his proposal second time round. Darcy the mostly changed character. He has fallen for Lizzy and realises he wants to spend the rest of his life with her. At the start or the book Darcy could've been described as arrogant, self-centred/confident man I think Lizzy's influences changed Darcy's pride and he started looking at people for what they were and not what they looked like. She did this by making him realise what's she was like deep down and not what she looked like on the outside or of her family name. The Pride in this novel is what I think keeps the story going, it makes it a lot more exciting to read. All four of these prides mixed in to one and written in the most interesting ways stops you from wanting to put this book down.