Novel review: Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice (1813)
Another foray into the classic literary canon, this time with one of the most famous romance novels of all time. 600 pages of dense XIXth prose I devoured in a week, courtesy of Standard Ebooks's pristine EPUB. You can guess my general opinion of it, with such reading rhythm: it deserves its status.
First because it is beautifully and intelligently written, in a way that can only embarrass a reader from two centuries in the future at how low literateness has fallen in such a short time. By "intelligently", I'm not only thinking about the style, but also the characters being fully fleshed, lifelike in their acting and speaking. Even the erratic feelings of the protagonist slowly falling in love, wavering between brooding negativity and hope, feel genuine.
Second, it manages to jump from humour to romance and even drama very deftly, which is a big plus in my eyes, especially in a decent sized novel. You can almost hear the sarcastic contempt of the author when she writes about Lydia and her mother or Mr. Collins!
Thirdly and finally, because it doesn't reach for simplistic resolutions. When Elizabeth opened Mr. Darcy's letter, I dreaded a "she's going to deux ex machine this and make Darcy looks like a misunderstood knight…" but no, or at least not completely: Mr. Darcy was indeed filled with much pride (NB: the author carefully distinguishes it from vanity) which induced more than a few faux-pas. Similarly, Elizabeth was too superficial and prejudiced when comparing him to Mr. Wickham which gave the other half of the equation for the big misunderstanding this story is about. The characters aren't flawless in a very human way and this matters.
Actually, that letter is the high point of the novel. When read carefully, Mr. Darcy really doesn't make any mistake of thinking, only of manners. And the fact that the recipient of this letter understands this with a single reading and goes from self-righteous anger to mortification is cathartic. A harsh but necessary realisation that amiability and virtue aren't the same; and that you can grow the former but not the latter.
PS: don't roll your eyes, but I quickly started to see a lot in common between myself and Mr. Darcy, together with some feelings for the fictional character of miss Elizabeth. This may have influenced my appreciation (a lot).
