Mr And Mrs Bennet - Pride And Prejudice

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Mr and Mrs Bennet are the parents of Elizabeth, Jane, Lydia, Kitty and Mary and have a significant role in raising their five daughters to supposedly be well mannered and to eventually marry a wealthy man who will look after them. Their financial position is not extravagant but they lead comfortable lives. Both of whom are from the upper middle class but admire superior rank to themselves, especially Mrs Bennet, who hopes that one day her daughters will all marry rich bachelors. Their characters are completely different and Austen makes this clear in the novel. Mrs Bennet is a ‘woman of mean understanding, little information and uncertain temper’ compared to her husband who is ‘a mixture of quick parts, sarcastic humour, reserve and caprice’, which could be argued that they are not a good match for each other. Mr Bennet ‘with a book he is regardless of time’ but Mrs Bennet takes great pleasure in gossiping and making herself centre of attention. The opening line ‘It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife’ is rather ironic and directly focuses to Mrs Bennett’s view on marriage. At the beginning of the novel, Mr Bennet, as insisted by his wife, visits Mr Bingley who invites them to the Meryton Assembly to be formally introduced to his two sisters and good friend, Mr Darcy. The visit enables the Bennet sisters to be connected with the upper class which shows Mr Bennets significant role in uniting his daughter’s with their possible future husbands, which in fact is true for Jane and Elizabeth. Mrs Bennet is delighted when Bingley takes a liking to Jane at the Meryton Assembly , and encourages Jane, going so far as to force her to visit him on horseback rather than taking the carriage, in the hope that being out in the rain makes her so ill that she has to stay overnight. Mrs Bennets vulgar
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