Analysis of Chapter 6 in Pride And Prejudice Essay

A/O2

How does Jane Austen tell the story in chapter 6 of the novel Pride and Prejudice?

Jane Austens starts chapter 6 of her novel Pride and Prejudice using the telling method to inform the reader how the Bingley sisters feel about the Bennet family. Austen uses the third person which is known as the omniscient form, which is like an all-knowing narrator and is able to narrate the story completely from all the characters point of view. Austen tells the reader that the Bingley sisters didnt like Mrs Bennett and the two younger sisters and thought of them to be very intolerable but would rather be acquainted with the two eldest. The author puts the word them when referring to the two younger sisters in italics to create emphasis and propose that they are as lower class people and of a great distance to them and wouldnt want to socialise with them.

As Austen carries on telling the story the reader begins to see things from Elizabeths point of view, known as focalisation. Focalisation is the point of view being narrated; it is the distinction between who speaks and who sees. Focalisation is the perspective from which we experience the narrative being told. Even though the narrator speaks, it is from the focalisers perspective from which the actions of a story are witnessed.

We acknowledge the fact that Jane seems to show admiration to the Bingley sisters but Elizabeth is critical and believes that theyre only being nice because of their brothers admiration to Jane, which seems to be increasing on every meeting. Suspecting that Jane is falling in love, Elizabeth mentions it in confidence to her close friend, Charlotte Lucas. Jane Austen uses the showing method and in her use of dialogue she shows to the reader the conversation which is taking place between Elizabeth and Charlotte. Through the use of dialogue we learn that Charlottes views and attitudes on love and marriage are very different to that of Elizabeths. Charlotte believes that women should express her love to a man and warns Elizabeth that those women who dont show affection risk losing it. Her views are very much in consistent with the society; while Elizabeth thinks that this attitude is wrong and believes that an individual should follow his or her feelings with dignity. Even though they are the closest of friends their views and attitudes towards marriage are very diverse to each other.

In the dialogue there is one line when Charlotte says: When she is secure of him, there will be leisure of falling in love as much as she chooses, which informs the reader that her opinions are alike to that of societies, like Elizabeths mother Mrs Bennett. She believes that a woman should display more fondness than she feels in order to make a man create an attachment to her. Elizabeth sarcastically replies saying: I dare say I should adopt it, showing to the reader she doesnt really agree with what her friend Charlotte is saying about love and marriage. Elizabeth also says that Jane has only known Bingley a mere fortnight and therefore cant have established her true feelings yet, and a fortnight is not quite enough to make her understand his character.

There is also another line in the dialogue said by Charlotte: Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance, which implies to the reader she doesnt mind who she marries as it is only a matter of chance if she will be happy or not. It also suggests that the marriage could be a happy or unhappy time depending on how well the characters know each other from beforehand.Elizabeth disagrees with her once again and responds sarcastically by saying: ...you would never act in this way yourself, this is an example of dramatic irony. Dramatic irony is when the words and actions of the characters of a work of literature have a different meaning for the reader than they do for the characters. This is the result of the reader having a greater knowledge than the characters themselves. Austens choice of words is also archaic which shows the time in which the text was written. Words such as vexation and Vingt-un are rarely used nowadays.

Also it is in this chapter that Darcys attitude to Elizabeth begins to change; Austen marks this as the turning point as to how Darcy saw Elizabeth. He humbles himself by spending more time with her to be closer to her and she notices this. From Austens point of view she shows us this change: But no sooner had he made it clear to himself and his friends that she hardly has a good feature in her face, then he began to find it was rendered uncommonly intelligent by the beautiful expressions of her dark eyes, Darcy begins to notice Elizabeths beauty and wants to know more about her. Elizabeths liveliness, and intelligence attracts Darcy.

Prior to conversing directly with Elizabeth, Darcy listens to conversation between Elizabeth and Sir William Lucas. From this point Darcys prejudice against Elizabeth begins to fade while her prejudice still remains because he refused to dance with her at the ball. Sir William Lucas notices Elizabeth not dancing and attempts on setting her up with Darcy but this time she refuses. Her blindness to Darcys regard for her is caused by the insensitive judgement of which she created at the ball.

Afterwards Darcy tells Caroline Bingley that Elizabeth has captured his admiration, though to Carolines relief he seems to show no interest in marrying her and gaining Mrs Bennett as a mother in law. When Darcy informs Caroline Bingley about his admiration, the readers get an impression that perhaps Caroline Bingley is jealous of Elizabeth and wishes to marry Darcy herself.

Jane Austen uses several ways to tell the story in chapter 6 of the novel Pride and Prejudice, for example she uses, the telling method to grasp the readers attention. We learn about the friendship between the Bingley sisters, Jane doesnt show her feelings for Mr Bingley adn that Elizabeth and Charlotte discuss the couple.