Essay on the Metamorphosis in Pride and Prejudice -- Pride and Prejudi

Metamorphosis in Pride and Prejudice As the fiction develops in Jane Austens novel, Pride and Prejudice, the reader is witness to a shift in attitude between the principle characters. The chapter in which Elizabeth Bennetts reactions to Mr. Darcys letter are explored results valuable insights into this metamorphosis. The first description of Elizabeths state upon perusing Fitzwilliam Darcys revelatory missive is diagnostic of Austen when relating heavy emotion she doesnt. Her feelings as she read were scarcely to be defined, she tells us (Austen 233). Of course, all this negation of representational skills is purely for dramatic effect, and Miss Austen goes on to provide a full account of every aspect of Elizabeths emotional convulsion per her reading of the letter, but not, however, without using the device again in the present moment paragraph, in treating the subject of the truth somewhat Mr. Wickham. Elizabeths feelings are conveyed as having been ...yet much acutely painful and more difficult of definition. Said difficulty is therefore short lived, as the next sentence reads, Astonishment, apprehension, and even horror, oppressed her (Austen 233). The Wickham division of the chapter, spanning pages 234, 235, and the better part of 236, is significant not so much in its development of Wickhams character, as in what it does to Elizabeth. After the aforementioned astonishment et. al., Elizabeth momently engages in denial (This must be false This cannot be This is the grossest imposition (Austen 233)) but eventually her intellectual faculties regain their footing and she settles down to a second mortifying perusal of all that related to Wickham, and commands herself ... ... character about whom we can care, in the midst of a narrative which is not a chore to read. Works Cited Auerbach, Nina. Waiting Together Pride and Prejudice. Pride and Prejudice. By Jane Austen. Ed. Donald Gray. New York Norton and Co., 1993. pp. 336-348. Austen, Jane. Pride and Prejudice. 1813. Ed. Donald Gray. New York Norton and Co., 1993. Harding, D. W. Regulated Hatred An Aspect in the Work of Jane Austen. Pride and Prejudice. By Jane Austen. Ed. Donald Gray. New York Norton and Co., 1993. pp. 291-295. Johnson, Claudia L. Pride and Prejudice and the seeking of Happiness. Pride and Prejudice. By Jane Austen. Ed. Donald Gray. New York Norton and Co., 1993. pp. 367-376. Mudrick, Marvin.Irony as Discovery in Pride and Prejudice. Pride and Prejudice. By Jane Austen. Ed. Donald Gray. New York Norton and Co., 1993. pp. 295-303.