Spoilers for “Pride & Prejudice”. Trigger warning: mentions of paedophilia and exploitation of women.

Jane Austen’s “Pride & Prejudice” is the first classic text I ever read. I’ve always been an avid reader and when I graduated from primary school, my principle gave it to me as a gift. She told me that I might end up having to study it in high school.

I don’t remember how I felt when I first read the book. I was 12 so I doubt I understood everything. And even now, seven years later, I’m still learning more and more. This book transcends time. I have read it so many times that you could read aloud to me any line from the book and I could tell you exactly where in the story it takes place. What happened before that point and what happened after. I’m not exaggerating, I’ve actually tried it.

And I think that the reason why I love this book so much is because I have always been a feminist at heart. In fact, this book helped develop my feminist leanings.

“Pride & Prejudice” seeks to expose the truly ridiculous people in Austen’s society. It’s a deep reflection on the way that first impressions can work against our favour and how we shouldn’t let our initial prejudice determine our feelings towards any one person. It exposes the ways in which rich men viewed women poorer than them in Austen’s time. It exposed the utter lack of regard these men had for women. How they viewed these women as emotionless commodities they could easily buy with the promise of money.

At its core, “Pride & Prejudice” is a feminist text and anyone who denies that fact needs to either re-read the text or re-evaluate their perception of feminism.

The Three Proposals Elizabeth Receives And Why She Only Accepted The Third One

Anyone who has read the text recently can clearly understand why Elizabeth rejected the first two proposals. Mr. Collins, she rejected, because he is not only an idiot but an idiot who cannot see his own deficiencies and therefore can’t even take her seriously when she politely rejects his proposal. Mr. Darcy, she rejected, not only due to his interference in her sister’s happiness but also because he’s an arrogant fool who insulted her in equal measure while trying to get her to marry him.

The First Proposal

The first proposal that Lizzy received in the novel was from Mr. Collins, her cousin, who was in line to inherit her family’s estate. In an attempt to make amends for his being set to inherit her father’s estate and consequently leaving her family destitute, he arrived at Longbourn in order to choose a wife among his five cousins. He originally chooses Jane but upon hearing that she is soon to be engaged to another, he switches to Elizabeth.

The ease in which he is able to switch from one sister to another and his nonsensical behaviour shows that he bears no love for her. He merely needs a wife and sees marrying one of his cousins as an act of charity. He also doesn’t respect his cousins as shown by the patronizing way he responds to Lizzy’s advice. This is fueled by his superiority complex and disdain for the intelligence of women as a whole.

After giving Elizabeth some attention, he proposes in as self-absorbed a manner as he possibly can. His proposal focuses more on his own feelings and situation than it does on Lizzy. And upon hearing her answer, he at first disregards her rejection as simply a game to increase his favour and then insults her.

Lizzy may have rejected Mr. Collins due to him not being a sensible man but his treatment of her reveals something more sinister than mere insensibility. He clearly does not respect her. He has showered her with attention but has made no attempts to understand her. His attention is a hollow thing. He is merely going through the motions of courting a lady. This shows that he sees her as a mere commodity. Something to be passed from father to husband.

This is unfortunately an accurate description of how a lot of men perceived women during recency England. They did not see women as human beings but as possessions. They did not understand that women had independent thought. That a woman could want for anything more than financial stability.

The Second Proposal

While Mr. Darcy is a better man than Mr. Collins, it’s not by much. Mr. Darcy was raised by exceptionally wealthy parents who spoiled him. While he was taught to be a good person, he was also taught to be arrogant. He was raised to think that he was better than people. So even though he contributed to charity and looked out for people, he also looked down on them.

Even Elizabeth, the girl he supposedly loves, couldn’t escape his condescension. He couldn’t push his pride aside long enough to propose to her without insulting both her and her entire family. And worse still, he just perceived his insults as being truthful. He had so little respect for her, as a poor woman, that he thought she would be tripping over herself to accept his bad proposal.

And this is definitely because he’s a rich man. In those days, women didn’t have many ways of securing financial stability outside of marriage. Because of this, it was easy for wealthy men to prey on women. I love Darcy but that’s exactly what he does. Elizabeth has shown no sign of even remotely liking him. But Darcy is so egotistical that he believes that a woman as good as her would lower herself to marry him just because he has money.

And yes, he does grow to become better but up until the second proposal, I’d call him a misogynist. He wants Lizzy and because he’s a rich man, he thinks he can have her regardless of what he does.

Yes, Lizzy has other reasons to reject him (his treatment of Wickham and his act of meddling in her sister’s affairs) but his proposal definitely didn’t help. A woman like Lizzy, who actually respects herself, could never accept a man who valued her so little that he couldn’t even restrain himself from insulting her while proposing to her.

While it may seem ridiculous to accept the proposal of a man who doesn’t respect you, in rejecting Mr. Darcy, Lizzie is an anomaly. Not many women in her position would be brave enough to reject two proposals from wealthy men (Mr. Collins isn’t wealthy now but he will inherit her father’s estate). She defied her society by choosing happiness over financial stability. Not many women could do what she did and you see this in how Charlotte accepted Mr. Collins despite actively disliking him.

Women didn’t have a choice in those days. Maybe if their family was wealthy, they could afford to be more picky but otherwise, they were reliant on the men in their life. If they couldn’t find a husband to support them, they could become homeless once their fathers died. Or worse, they could become a burden to their family, further pushing them into marriages with horrible men.

The Third Proposal

The third proposal actually acknowledges Elizabeth as a human being, worthy of love and respect. This was the first time Darcy acknowledged her as an equal. And in this proposal, he was willing to hide his affections if she told him to. He only proceeded with the proposal after hearing her feelings had changed, thus showing he valued her feelings.

And that’s a huge bonus. This is the first time that a man has pursued her with both honesty and respect. Rather than becoming a full fledged incel like Mr. Collins, Mr. Darcy actually took Elizabeth’s criticisms into consideration. Even though her words hurt him, he took the time to evaluate the truth in them.

There likely hasn’t been many people brave enough to tell him off and so the woman he loves doing it was enough to make him see sense. He valued and respected her enough to take the time to explain his side of things. And instead of simply labelling her as a stupid or cruel woman, he actually took her criticism on board and made an effort to change.

She didn’t accept him simply because he helped her family. If the Darcy from the second proposal had helped Lydia, she would still be grateful but not enough to marry him. The reason why Elizabeth finally agreed to marry him was because he’d dropped his superiority complex long enough to show her that he was actually a decent human being. This allowed Elizabeth to realise that she genuinely liked him. His saving her sister was just a bonus on top of that.

And the fact that with this proposal, Mr. Darcy actually took the time to let Lizzy know that he was more than ready to take no for an answer and that he was only repeating his proposal so that he could get clarification shows that he values her as a human. While Mr. Collins assumed that she was just illogical because of her gender, Mr. Darcy understood that she was an intelligent woman capable of making her own decisions.

That’s why he only went to her parents after she accepted his proposal. He genuinely loves her and because of this, he just wants her to be happy. And so while it would break his heart if she married another, he was willing to let her go so that she could live the life that would make her happy.

That, my dear gentlefolk, is what love is all about. If you truly love someone, you respect their decisions: even if those decisions involve them choosing another. Love is not jealousy. It isn’t possessiveness. And it definitely isn’t disregarding the sanity of someone just because they rejected you. If you were a decent human being who truly loved someone else, you would understand that you are not entitled to their affection.

This is a message that is still relevant today. The rise of incel culture and the motto “Nice guys finish last” is a product of misogyny. While before women were dependent on men for financial security, the women of today (mostly) are able to achieve stability outside of marriage. This means that women have greater freedom to choose who they want to start a relationship with.

Unfortunately, this has been a source of anger for many men. There is this ridiculous idea that just because a man is nice to a woman, he is owed either sex or a relationship. That’s false. If someone doesn’t like you in that way, no amount of kindness will fix that. In fact, if the only reason you are nice to someone is because you think that entitles you to a relationship, you aren’t actually nice. You’re just manipulative and that’s not okay.

No one is owed a relationship, no matter how nice they are. If you are friends with someone simply because you hope to one day be in a relationship with them, stop the pretense and just ask them out. If you are unable to take no for an answer, kindly end that friendship. We women love it when the trash takes itself out.

And please, if your female friends keep ending up in toxic relationships, help them. Have them see a therapist or maybe try and figure out some red flags so that they can avoid toxic relationships in the future. Please don’t take advantage of them. They don’t owe you a relationship and if you truly liked them, you wouldn’t try to force them into something they don’t want.

The Financial Hurdles Faced By Charlotte Lucas

In my opinion, Charlotte Lucas is one of the saddest characters in “Pride & Prejudice”. She is forced to accept the proposal of a man who doesn’t love her just so she could have financial stability and could stop being a burden on her parents. And if this wasn’t bad enough by itself, she loses the respect of her best friend.

While I love Lizzy as a character, I cannot stand how judgmental she is. It’s clear that Charlotte doesn’t have a choice and is driven by a need to protect her family and herself and yet Elizabeth still has the gall to judge her for it. This simply isn’t fair but it is the sad reality that many women lived through.

Women were forced to disregard love and marry men who didn’t respect them and simply saw them as an incubator. In fact, there are still women in today’s society who have to go through this. It’s important to acknowledge this reality and it’s important that we don’t cast judgement on these women. We don’t live their lives and so we have no way of understanding what they’re going through.

Lydia’s Shame

While Charlotte Lucas is one of the saddest characters in the story, Lydia truly is the saddest. She is preyed on by a pedophile (she’s 15, he’s in his mid-late 20s and has previously tried to take advantage of young teenaged girls) and instead of garnering sympathy, she only gets lectured.

Yes, I understand that she wanted to marry him but she’s 15 and therefore too young to make decisions like this. She should not have been allowed to marry him. In fact, her parents should’ve taken better care of her. The text makes it quite clear that in terms of understanding and education, the Bennet sisters were neglected. Not only did they not have tutors, they also didn’t have a governess. They were left to figure out their education on their own and were not correctly disciplined by their parents.

Lydia’s obsession with getting married should have been checked. Her parents should have stepped in and attempted to explain things to her before she was allowed to run wild.

When I was 15, I made so many mistakes and I wouldn’t have improved as much as I did if I didn’t have people around me to teach me to be better. In fact, when I was 15, I did get into an unhealthy relationship. And it was with an 18 year old (which should have been a red flag for me). That relationship ended and it taught me so many important lessons. I’m proud to say that I haven’t been in a toxic relationship once since then (and I’m 19 now). But that was only possible because there were people around me to guide and teach me right from wrong.

Lydia didn’t have that. She grew up in a society so obsessed with a woman’s purity that they were willing to let a child enter a marriage with a pedophile. And yes, standards were different but that’s exactly the problem with regency England.

Austen’s society preached family values while at the same time neglecting its daughters. Instead of framing Lydia as a victim of a manipulator and a con man, she was vilified for shaming her family. Instead of being concerned about her welfare in a marriage with a man who neither loved nor respected her and only married her to settle his debts, her family was instead worried about her being loud.

Of course, she’s loud, she’s a child. She should have been protected but instead her wellbeing and happiness was sacrificed in order to protect her family’s reputation. Which is absolutely horrifying but it was the sad reality Austen lived in. Where a girl losing her “purity” also meant losing her rights to basic human decency and kindness.

Lydia was not spiteful. She did not set out to hurt people. Her only problem was that she was loud and flirtatious. She may have been careless but at no point does she set out to harm the people around her. Her running away with Wickham was simply the action of a gullible child. She did not deserve to be as vilified as she was.

Wickham should have been the one to face the consequences. Instead, his debts were settled, he was offered money and given a job just so he could marry the child he exploited. And what’s worse is that Wickham knew that Lydia was not set to inherit a fortune. So the only reason he even took her was because he was bored.

Instead of punishing men like Wickham, Austen’s society made it the woman’s responsibility not to be exploited. It held teenage girls to a higher standard than grown men. So here’s to hoping these values soon die a quick death.

Final Thoughts

“Pride & Prejudice” is one of those books that, on a surface level, seem like the kind of book I’d avoid at all cost. It is a book on romance and marriage from an exceptionally patriarchal and misogynistic society. But on a closer read, it’s hard to miss the sarcasm and the clear disdain Austen had for the way her society treated women. I 100% recommend this book to my fellow feminist readers.

And to those of you who have already read it, feel free to let me know what you think of it in the comments below. As always, you can comment anonymously. But please be kind. If you wouldn’t say it to my face, don’t say it after I’ve given you the option of anonymity.