Darcy very quickly offends Lizzie by saying, ‘she is tolerable; but not handsome enough to tempt me.’ As well as that, Darcy’s pride in his family, social class and connections leads him to be prejudiced against Elizabeth as she comes from a lower social class than himself. Because of his arrogant treatment of Elizabeth, it offends her innate pride, and in turn, prejudices her against him. ‘I could easily forgive his pride, if he had not mortified mine.’
Not only does Lizzie’s inferiority, prejudices Darcy against her, but also the way her family act. Mrs Bennet, Kitty and Lydia are constantly chasing and flirting with the officers and Mrs Bennet encourages them. Their kind of behaviour is not what young girls, in the 19th Century should be like and Darcy and the Bingley sisters frown upon it.
In chapter 18, even Mr Bingley manages to embarrass Elizabeth when Mary tried to sing but Mr Bennet told her quite abruptly to stop, ‘You have delighted us enough. Let the other young ladies have time to exhibit.’ In chapter 18 everything the Bennet’s do further alienate Darcy at the ball. This is because the Bennet’s behaviour shows Elizabeth in a bad light, making Darcy even more prejudice against her.
Mrs Bennet’s behaviour in this chapter furthers Darcy’s prejudice against Lizzie and her family. She arranged for the coach to be late and as Bingley and Darcy were and wanting to go to bed, they had to stay up until the Bennet’s had left. The Bingley sisters repulsed every attempt of Mrs Bennet at conversation. They were ‘evidently impatient to have the house to themselves.’
This is another case where the Bennet’s behaviour reflects badly on Elizabeth, where Darcy is becoming more prejudiced against her.
When someone is prejudiced against another and hears a bad rumour about them, they believe it as they want to believe bad of them. ‘Made her too angry to have any wish of doing him justice.’ People get too mad to listen to the good points of another and their anger make them more willing to believe their bad points.
Austen portrays that in Elizabeth. When Wickham talks to Lizzie about what Darcy had done to him, Lizzie readily believes everything he says. At this point Lizzie is blinded by prejudice, not only because of what Wickham said but also because she likes him very much.
While Elizabeth steadily likes Darcy less, Darcy is starting to see her good points and is slowly falling in love with her. Though his pride is stopping him from announcing to her his feelings. Against his pride, soon Darcy proposes to Lizzie but he does it in such a way that really offends her pride.
Darcy tries to tell Elizabeth how he feels, though he makes it sound as if he’s doing her a favour, as she is such a lower social class to him. He states that it would be degrading to marry her. Elizabeth is shocked, her pride is wounded and tells Darcy that he would be the last man who she would ever marry.
Darcy takes all her comments to heart and straight away writes a letter to Lizzie. He tries to explain his actions. She accuses Darcy of many things and he explains what really happened. This letter is Darcy’s first step of changing his manners and when Lizzie reads it, her first step of changing her mind.
This letter is a turning point in the novel. As after Lizzie reads it, and realises that she had acted wrongly, that her prejudice had been directed wrongly towards the wrong person. Like many cases of pride and prejudice, Lizzie might not have been so prejudice against Darcy if he hadn’t wounded her pride.
Many things in the letter make Lizzie start to see Darcy in a new light. She finds out Wickham’s true character, ‘Mr Wickham’s chief object was unquestionably my sister’s fortune.’ Wickham was a very materialistic man; he only went after girls who had a large fortune, to fund his gambling habits and to give him a good life without working for it.
When Lizzie visits Pemberly, she sees that the house reflects its owner; she starts to see his good points through the housekeeper. Lizzie really does change her mind about Darcy, she realises he’s not as proud as she first thought.
It is not just Lizzie who is changing in this chapter. Darcy is also. He is more sociable towards Lizzie and her aunt and uncle. Earlier on in the novel Darcy wouldn’t have talked to people below his social status if he could help it. But now he’s trying to change because of Elizabeth’s comments when he asked her to marry him.
Where prejudice is found, you will also find wrong judgements, a misunderstanding of someone’s character and first impressions. It is found in Darcy’s character, he attributes his pride partly to being shy but unfortunately Lizzie does mistake him for having too much pride. Though Darcy did have a lot of pride, as he was brought up to think he was better than everyone as he is in a higher social class.
Austen portrays in Elizabeth and Darcy what can happen when wrong judgements are made. Even though they are perfectly suited for each other, their pride and prejudice stands in their way.
In Austen’s time, social class was very important, that people never tried to belong to other classes. Within the higher social classes pride was commonplace and that all classes were prejudice against each other social classes. Through Darcy and Elizabeth’s characters, we see what society was like and how they manage to overcome it to find true love.
