Feminism in Pride and Prejudice

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Feminism in Pride and Prejudice

女权主义在《傲慢与偏见》中的体现

Feminism is a culture in which women are treated differently or inferiorly than men, and that, becasue of the differences in treatment, women are at a disadvantage.

Feminism assumes that such unfair treament is cultural and there is a way to change and make a difference.

The role of women, in Pride and Prejudice, was to marry successfully to a man of rank, fame and property. In Order to reach their goal, women had to act gracefully, ladylike manner to win the status for themselves. In the scene where Elizabeth arrives at Netherfield to visit her sister who is fallen ill at Mr. Bingley’s residence, however, she rejects the idea of going in a carriage, she walks across country, she arrives with a muddy hem, the soiled slippers, therefore is sneered at for that by Bingley’s sister.    Yet, she is held up as a kind of counter example of naturalness and real feeling, proper sensibility by contrast to these aritificial women in the great house. We can see that Elizabeth is very much chanllenging the status quo in her own way.

Elizabeth Bennet, always make her own decisions independently. Even Liz doesn’t reveal to her sister Jane about her changed feeling toward Mr. Darcy until he has actually proposed again and she has accepted.

Jane Austin makes a feminist statement by having Elizabeth insist on being treated as a “radical creature”, rather than as a “elegant female”, when trying to explain her “No” be understood as “No” literally to Mr. Collins.

Lizzie tells Mr. Collins, “I do assure you that I am not one of those young ladies who are so daring to risk their happiness on the chance of being asked a second time. I am perfectly serious in my refusal. You could not make me happy, and I am convinced that I am the last woman in the world who would make you so” From this statement, it obviously show that Lizzie is an idealist. She wants to marry for love and she want someone with no flaws of character.