Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)

At the beginning of the New Year and feeling the need for some long-overdue self-improvement, I set myself the ambitious challenge of reading 100 of the greatest books ever written. One of the books at the top of my list was Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.

What it’s About:

This is an amusing novel about love, family, relationships and class. Set in the early 1800s in England, the novel focuses on the bright and pretty Elizabeth Bennet and her growing relationship with the handsome and rich bachelor Fitzwilliam Darcy. Initially she finds him aloof and conceited and makes her disapproval of him riotously clear, but gradually she realises she may have been a little hasty in her judgement. But is it too late for her to win back his affections?

Why Read It?

Because it’s brilliant story, superbly written! If you haven’t read any of Jane Austen’s novels before then you are in for a treat. It’s the perfect blend of romance, tragedy, wicked humour and excitement, all wrapped up into one perfect little book. Plus it’s full of theatrical characters like the melodramatic Mrs Bennet and Elizabeth’s obsequious yet equally pompous cousin, Mr Collins.

Favourite Quotes:

“A lady's imagination is very rapid; it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony, in a moment.”

“The power of doing anything with quickness is always prized much by the possessor, and often without any attention to the imperfection of the performance.”

“Good opinion once lost, is lost forever.”

“There is, I believe, in every disposition a tendency to some particular evil— a natural defect, which not even the best education can overcome.”

“I am only resolved to act in that manner, which will, in my own opinion, constitute my happiness, without reference to you, or to any person so wholly unconnected with me.”