Pride And Prejudice
Jane Austen – Pride & Prejudice
Jane Austen was born in 1775 at Steventon, Hampshire, a small town in southwest England, where she spent the majority of her life. She was the seventh of eight children of her father, a clergyman and was raised in the middle class society. Having such a big family influenced her in her novel as she wrote about many every day things going on in the family at that period of time. She also mentions how she grew very close to her sister, which is included in Pride & Prejudice as Jane and Elizabeth. Like other young women of her social class in this time, Jane and her sister Cassandra were educated mostly at home in subjects of music, drawing, painting, needlework, and social behavior. Her father’s encouragement and her own enjoyment in reading led Jane to become very well read.
In those times, a woman’s only job was to get married, preferably to a wealthy man who would reassure her and her family a good future. “Not everyone can afford to be romantic.” To meet new people, men and women attended many balls with their families. This was a great place to dance, have fun and maybe even find a partner. Looking as though you didn’t want a husband was commonly done by women who found it polite. As at the ball you would usually be in the presence of your parents, dancing with your partner was the only true moment when you got to speak to them privately.
Jane’s middle class existence greatly influenced her writing. In her novels, Jane expressed her contempt for the superficiality of the upper class and usually made them her most comical characters. Most of Jane’s writing was done during social engagements. Jane would spend the majority of the evening in the corner of the room with her manuscript and blotter observing the world surrounding her. She would write when the room was quiet and in she even had a door which cracked so she would know when some one came in. Pride and Prejudice, one of Jane’s earlier...
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