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For Tuesday: Finish Vol.3 of Pride and Prejduice!

 


Answer TWO of the following: 

Q1: Why, after the slow lead-up to Darcy's final proposal, does Austen suddenly race through the subsequent marriages and get everyone settled in a single chapter, stopping only to include a brief letter from Lydia? In other words, why does she end with a telescope where many people would have preferred a microscopic approach?

Q2: After meeting with Lady Catherine (see Q3), her mother asks her about their conversation, and the narrator reflects, "Elizabeth was forced to give into a little falsehood here; for to acknowledge the substance of their conversation was impossible" (Ch. XIV). Why does Lizzie continue to withhold information from her parents, even after berating herself earlier for not telling them about Wickham? Is this a testament to her pride, or her prejudice (against her parents)? 

Q3:One of the greatest scenes in the book is the verbal duel between Elizabeth and Lady Catherine in Chapter XIV. In many ways, this scene illustrates something Jonathan Culler writes about in Literary Theory: "the performative breaks the link between meaning and the intention of the speaker, for what act I perform with my words is not determined by my intention but by social and linguistic conventions." Based on this, why do Darcy and Lady Catherine interpret her words so differently (and which one do WE hear)? How can her responses to Lady Catherine be 'read' as different performances? 

Q4: Once you finish the book, do you have a sense that the book polices Austen's society into accepting the age-old prejudices of marriage, female servitude, and male infallibility? Does Austen question these aspects of her society merely to affirm them? After all, the two main sisters are ultimately married off to very eligible bachelors just as Mrs. Bennet wished, so to her, this is a completely happy ending. Should we desire the same happy ending as Mrs. Bennet?  

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