What Is Pride and Prejudice About? Jane Austen's Classic Love Story Explained

Pride and Prejudice is a novel by the English writer Jane Austen, published in 1813, about the clever Elizabeth Bennet and the proud, wealthy Mr Darcy, who dislike each other at first and slowly learn how wrong their first impressions were. Behind the love story is a very practical problem: the Bennet family has five daughters and no son, and their house can only pass to a male heir, so at least one daughter needs to marry well. The result is a comedy of manners full of sharp dialogue, awkward parties and unforgettable characters, and it remains one of the most-read novels in English.

The story in brief

The Bennets live at Longbourn, near the small town of Meryton in Hertfordshire. Mrs Bennet's great wish is to see her daughters married. When a rich young man, Mr Bingley, rents the nearby estate of Netherfield, she is delighted. At a local ball, Bingley is clearly charmed by Jane, the eldest daughter. His friend Mr Darcy, even richer, seems cold and superior, and he refuses to dance with Elizabeth, saying she is "not handsome enough". She laughs about it, but she is deeply offended.

Several new people complicate things. Mr Collins, a pompous clergyman and the cousin who will inherit Longbourn, proposes to Elizabeth; she refuses him, and he quickly marries her friend Charlotte Lucas instead. The charming officer George Wickham tells Elizabeth that Darcy treated him badly, and she believes him. Then Bingley suddenly leaves for London, and Elizabeth suspects that Darcy persuaded him to abandon Jane.

In Kent, Darcy surprises Elizabeth with a proposal, declaring his love while also making clear that he thinks her family is beneath him. She rejects him angrily. The next day he gives her a letter explaining the truth about Wickham, who had tried to elope with Darcy's young sister. Reading it, Elizabeth realises that she has been unfair.

Months later, touring Derbyshire with her aunt and uncle, Elizabeth meets Darcy at his estate, Pemberley, where he is unexpectedly warm and polite. Then news arrives that her youngest sister, Lydia, has run off with Wickham, a scandal that could ruin the whole family. Wickham is found and agrees to marry Lydia; Elizabeth later learns that Darcy secretly arranged the marriage at his own cost. Bingley returns and marries Jane. Darcy's aunt, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, tries to make Elizabeth promise never to marry him, and Elizabeth refuses. Darcy proposes again, and this time she accepts.

Main characters

• Elizabeth Bennet – the second daughter, witty and intelligent, but quick to form strong first impressions.
• Fitzwilliam Darcy – the owner of Pemberley in Derbyshire, intelligent but stiff in company, so people mistake his reserve for pride.
• Jane Bennet – the gentle eldest sister, who loves Bingley.
• Mr and Mrs Bennet – a dry, sarcastic father and a nervous, tactless mother obsessed with marriage.
• Lydia Bennet – the youngest, flirtatious and careless, whose elopement causes a crisis.
• George Wickham – a charming officer with a dishonest past.
• Mr Collins – the self-important clergyman who will inherit Longbourn.
• Lady Catherine de Bourgh – Darcy's domineering, wealthy aunt.

Who was Jane Austen?

Jane Austen (1775–1817) was an English novelist known mainly for six novels that look closely at the English landed gentry of her time. Her plots often explore how much women depended on marriage for social standing and financial security, and she is admired for her realism, wit and irony. She wrote major novels before she was 22 but was not published until she was 35, and her books appeared anonymously.

How the novel was written

Austen wrote the first version between October 1796 and August 1797, when she was about twenty-one, under the title First Impressions. Her father offered it to a London publisher, who turned it down without reading it. She revised it heavily in 1811–1812 and renamed it Pride and Prejudice, partly because other works called First Impressions had appeared in the meantime. Since so much of the final novel is carried by letters, scholars assume the first draft may have been written entirely in letters.

She sold the copyright to the publisher Thomas Egerton, who brought out the book in three volumes on 28 January 1813. Good reviews helped the first edition sell out, and a second edition followed in October of the same year.

A famous first sentence

The novel begins: "It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." It sounds like a serious statement, but it is ironic: the people who really "want" the rich young man are the mothers of daughters. This gentle irony runs through the whole book. Austen also uses free indirect speech, a technique in which the narrator's voice takes on a character's thoughts and words, so we see events through Elizabeth's eyes and share her mistakes.

Themes

Pride and prejudice, on both sides. Darcy must overcome his pride, and Elizabeth must overcome her prejudice; neither hero nor heroine is simply right.

Marriage and money. Marriage is a question of love, but also of survival. Charlotte accepts Mr Collins for security, Lydia marries recklessly, and Elizabeth refuses two proposals she cannot respect. The novel shows how much was at stake for women who could not inherit property.

Learning to judge well. Elizabeth's growth comes from discovering the difference between people who seem good and people who are good.

Legacy and adaptations

Pride and Prejudice has sold more than 20 million copies and regularly appears near the top of lists of the most-loved books. In the BBC's 2003 poll for the UK's best-loved book, it came second, behind The Lord of the Rings. Well-known screen versions include the 1940 film with Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier, the 1995 BBC series with Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth, and the 2005 film with Keira Knightley and Matthew Macfadyen. The story also echoes in later books such as Helen Fielding's Bridget Jones's Diary and the mash-up Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

Learn with Pride and Prejudice: English phrases

Phrase	Meaning	Example
first impressions	the opinion you form when you first meet someone	First impressions can be wrong.
to swallow your pride	to accept something even though it hurts your pride	Darcy swallowed his pride and apologised.
to jump to conclusions	to decide too quickly without the facts	Elizabeth jumped to conclusions about him.
to look down on someone	to think you are better than someone	He seemed to look down on her family.
to have a change of heart	to change your opinion or feelings	She had a change of heart after the letter.

Try this: Write three English sentences about a time your first impression of someone was wrong, using "to jump to conclusions" and "to have a change of heart".