Essay — Families in Pride and Prejudice (A)

‘The Bennet sisters suffer from the limitations of their parents.’ In light of this comment, discuss the presentation of families in Pride and Prejudice. Pride and Prejudice explores the roles and dynamics of families, particularly through the lens of the Bennet family which takes centre stage. As the novel reveals the various ways in which the Bennet sisters suffer because of their mother’s indelicacy and their father’s negligence, we discern that families are microcosms of society: they ought to provide children with the prudence and propriety needed in later life. By presenting families as potential sources of frustration and shame, Austen ultimately reveals the inseparability of individuals from their families: one’s family will always affect how one is judged by others, and by extension, one’s prospects in life. First, families are presented as an important training ground for the individual: they have both the capacity and responsibility to mould the characters of children. Austen elucidates this insight most clearly through her principal example of bad parenting: the Bennets’ failure to instil a sense of propriety in their two youngest daughters contributes to their frivolity and recklessness. In Chapter 7, after listening to Lydia and Kitty’s “effusions” about soldiers, Mr Bennet “coolly observe[s]” that “from all he can collect by [their] manner of talking, [they] must be two of the silliest girls in the country”. The unrestrained, excessive quality of “effusions”, coupled with the frivolous subject matter of their conversation (officers), reveals the extreme superficiality of the girls which the family needs to rein in. Despite this serious lack of maturity, Mr Bennet remains wholly unconcerned: he remains emotionally detached (“coolly”), assuming the role of a passive “observe[r]” who is studying their manner of speech rather than correcting their behaviour as their parent. In fact, Mr Bennet uses superlatives (“silliest”) and hyperbole (“in the country”) to ridicule his daughters, focusing on his own sardonic amusement rather than his parental responsibility to educate them. By drawing attention to Mr Bennet’s negligence, Austen draws attention to the role that families play in developing the maturity of children. Mrs Bennet is even less responsible at nurturing her daughters’ character: she not only says that “they are all of them very clever”, but also claims that they “will not think about officers any more than [the Bennet parents] do” when they grow up. This moment is replete with irony: her emphatic use of the absolute “all” and intensifier “very” to affirm the intelligence of her girls stands in stark contrast to their actual foolishness, highlighting her ignorance of and inability to correct her daughters’ flaws as a parent should. Additionally, even though she maintains that her daughters will learn from her example and stop thinking about officers, she talks about Colonel Forster’s appearance in the very next sentence (“I th