Classics Corner: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen; Allegedly Classic Romance Is Overrated with Irritating Characters

Classics Corner: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen; Allegedly Classic Romance Is Overrated with Irritating Characters

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: Jane Austen is practically an industry and her book, Pride and Prejudice is the flagship of that industry. It seems every year a new variation of Austen's works appears. I remember Austenmania in the ‘90’s when most if not all of her books were put on the screen and they haven't left since.

Modern day adaptations like Bridget Jones's Diary snd Clueless move the characters to modern day. Books and movies like Jane Austen Book Club feature people who use Austen's works as advice to the current lovelorn. Fanfiction and novels put Darcy, Elizabeth, Emma Wodehouse, the Dashwood Sisters and the rest in the heart of mysteries, thrillers, more realistic setting, and in front of zombies.


When something becomes that much a part of popular culture, you have to wonder if it's worth all the hype. While Pride and Prejudice has its fans in this case, I am going to have to say no.

Pride and Prejudice is a tremendously overrated book and part of the issue is in Austen's protagonists. Some consider Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy the Alpha Romantic Couple, the yardstick of which other romantic literary couples should be compared. Unfortunately, they are some of the more irritating characters ever written and their media overexposure makes them even more irritating.

I know. I know. They are supposed to be an argumentative couple, the type that ridicules and mocks each other but we the Reader's know they are nuts about each other. The problem is that Austen spends so much time portraying them as a feuding couple, she fails to give us a reason why they should be together in the first place. (Sorry “He's Darcy,” is not a reason.)

They have the pride and prejudice towards each other of the title but they spend so little time together doing anything but bicker so that every time I read it, I feel “Seriously, this is the couple I heard so much about?” When do they actually show anything resembling friendship or affection for each other?

They don't have a chance to develop into fully three-dimensional characters. Elizabeth has a few nice redeemable moments with her sisters but Darcy has barely any at all.

We know the drill. We are supposed to find out that his pride is just a shell and he really isn't that bad a guy after all. But is he really? In the rare occasion when he is alone, he comes across as snide and arrogant as he is with the Bennets. Austen gives us very little depth that goes into the character so through most of the book it appears that the surface opinions people have about him may actually be true.

So the book is less about two flawed individuals helping each other to smooth out their rough edges, than it becomes another tired cliche of the bad boy redeemed by the love of a good girl. (Though admittedly she gets smoothed out a bit too.)

While I don't find them as offensive as I do Wuthering Height's Catherine and Heathcliff which are the prototypes of every abusive and toxic relationship, I mostly find Elizabeth and Darcy one-dimensional and annoying. Unfortunately, they contributed to the romance genre so much that every couple since then has been compared to them and has recreated their courtship ever since creating later generations of one-dimensional and annoying couples.

I keep comparing them to Benedick and Beatrice from Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing, another argumentative couple destined to be together. While they also bicker constantly, their one-liners and repartee are clearly put-ons and they seem to enjoy the arguing almost as much as the romance. But most of all they are more than just a fighting couple. There are multiple scenes that show how deeply they care about their friends and there is never a point where the Reader feels that their comments are anything worse than a friendly rivalry.

There are hints that the book is meant to be something else perhaps a satire or parody of the genre. Austen herself never married, so she could be very well making fun of the genre in which she would later become the face. There are many moments particularly at the various dances where Elizabeth and Darcy play off each other like a dance where he takes a step then she does. There are quite a few times when characters call out the rigid rules of courtship such as when Elizabeth compliments the ball and she reminds Darcy that he is supposed to comment on the size of the room or the amount of couples as though there was some preapproved conversation list that they were supposed to follow.

Also Austen seems fully aware of the consequences of a romance based on passion and nothing else. Elizabeth's younger sister, Lydia runs off with a known rake, Wickham. Other books have done this subplot better most notably David Copperfield with David's childhood friend, Little Em'ly running off with his vain schoolmate, Steerforth. That it is in Pride and Prejudice at all shows it to be almost a counterpoint to the other romantic couplings that are going on.

Another counterpoint in Pride and Prejudice is provided by Mary, the plain younger sister. In a book that is so entranced with pairings, that Austen chose not to pair one of the sisters at all is an interesting choice. Mary instead is the introverted bookworm who comments on her other sister's foolishness and vapidity. Perhaps Mary is meant to be a stand-in for Austen herself silently and gently mocking romance while still being a part of it.

Pride and Prejudice did not invent the romance genre but many that follow look to it as the blueprint. It is incredibly flawed, but if you look at it deeper and see the potential for comedy and satire, it might stand to be one of the best put ons of all time.

However as far as literary heroes go, you can keep Mr. Darcy. I'd rather have Sherlock Holmes