Pride and Prejudice: Unmasking Mr. Darcy
Jane Austen’s novel Pride and Prejudice underlines the complexity and three-dimensionality the main characters exhibit. While Austen shifts the readers interpretation on each character by overcoming their biases towards each other, a light is shed on their underlying selfishness. Fitzwilliam Darcy being no exception to this egotistical nature. Having grown up in wealth, Darcy is a victim of assessment by everyone around him. Counteractively, because he is cautious of his disposition (where he is viewed as a walking bag of fortune), he can get what he desires. However, this does not apply towards Elizabeth Bennet as she poses a challenge to him. Darcy displays a manipulative nature towards Elizabeth to have his affection returned. This is evident though their interactions beginning with the first impression, the marriage rejection, and the letter depicting his change of heart. Since manipulation can best be defined as an assault and influence on mental and emotional sides. Darcy utilizes Elizabeths perception of him to demand sympathy and eventually loyalty through acceptance.
When Darcy is first introduced, Austen categorizes him as “proud” and “having a most forbidding disagreeable countenance” (Austen 12). While he does not owe anyone his kindness, he is able to depict himself however he pleases because of his privilege. He does not have to mold himself to be agreeable to any party, much less towards people of a different class. His indifference towards Elizabeth when he first notices her accentuates that he values a higher sense of charm. “She is tolerable; but not handsome enough to tempt me” (Austen 13). By placing himself on the pedestal of a higher class, he is also establishing that he is worthy of another type of woman. Someone who could tempt him would have to be more well established in beauty. Darcy announces this and Elizabeth loses her “cordial feelings” towards him. However, Darcy is conniving as he creates a game of hot and cold chemistry between them. Where he is portrayed in a cruel manner, he also targets Elizabeths emotions by being kind in various instances. In Netherfield, he insisted that the Bingley sisters include Elizabeth on the paths walk. Additionally, the undeniable wittiness and banter they share by pointing out each other’s flaws. “And your defect is a propensity to hate everybody.’ ‘And yours,’ he replied with a smile, ‘is willfully to misunderstand them” (Austen 52). This repartee is crucial to understanding the nature of their relationship. Both parties have analyzed each other. They have given enough thought and consideration to each other’s existence to be critical about it. Darcy noticed that he has been able to get under Elizabeths skin and takes advantage of this. If she did not care about him at all, she would not have attempted to solve his enigmatic behavior.
Since Darcy is used to his environment being agreeable to him, Elizabeth constitutes a challenge. Having spent his life getting what he wants, she provides a playfulness that he is not used to seeing. Thus, “Darcy had never been so bewitched by any woman as he was by her” (Austen 47). It is evident that he truly does have affection for her. However, his selfishness causes him to infiltrate Elizabeths mental balance without any consideration of her feelings. “In vain I have struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed” (Austen 161). Upon demonstrating passive aggressive behavior towards Elizabeth and employing the hot and cold method, Darcy is abusing her emotional availability. “The tumult of her mind was now painfully great. She knew not how to support herself, and from actual weakness sat down and cried for half an hour” (Austen 167). While Darcy does tell his truth, he does so by exploiting a scheming fashion. Causing confusion though love bombing and the triangulation effect. This effect causes a ripple between Darcy/Elizabeth/Jane. Particularly, by his acknowledgment of superiority over Bingley which causes him to hold his judgement as “the highest opinion” and with “the firmest reliance” (Austen 16). Darcy, willingly, played God by assembling the fate of two people without knowing the depths of their hearts. Regardless of his intentions, he presents a scheming nature when he balances others’ emotions but holds his own perception above everyone else’s. This is evident with the way he talks about Jane Bennet, “she is really a very sweet girl, and I wish with all my heart she were well settled. But with such a father and mother, and such low connections, I am afraid there is no chance of it” (Austen 33). By admitting that she is acceptable he is validating Bingley’s affections but further molds him into his frame of mind. This demonstrates that Darcy’s selfishness extends to alter Elizabeths life for his benefit. His good deeds towards the Bennets can be seen as another cunning way of winning Elizabeth over. As he states, “[…] your family owes me nothing. Much as I respect them, I believe, I thought only of you” (Austen 306). He had no consideration for the people he was affecting until it ruined his chances of marriage. One can speculate that if Elizabeth had said yes at first, perhaps he would not have been good natured towards the Bennet family.
Following Elizabeths rejection, she lists all the reasons she is denying Darcy, “[…] your arrogance, your conceit, and your selfish distain of the feelings of others” (Austen 166). Darcy further pushes on her emotions by writing her a letter. While attempting to clear his name, Elizabeth was left speechless and intoxicated with thoughts of Darcy. He wiggled through her mind by confessing his truth and recognizing his defects. He toys with her emotions throughout the letter in lines such as “Pardon me — It pains me to offend you” (Austen 169). By exhibiting the same prideful and intrusive nature he always has, he is establishing ethos. Nevertheless, it still displays how false his change of heart is. Additionally, Elizabeths rejection draws a parallel to the monologue of explanation that Darcy spills later in the narrative. “As a child I was taught what was right, but I was not taught to correct my temper. I was given good principles, but left to follow them in pride and conceit. Unfortunately an only son (for many years an only child), I was spoilt by my parents, who though good themselves […], allowed, encouraged, almost taught me to be selfish and overbearing, to care for non beyond my own family circle, to think sense and worth compared with my own. Such I was, from eight to eighty and twenty; and such I might still have been but for you, dearest, loveliest Elizabeth! What do I not owe you! You taught me a lesson, hard indeed at first, but most advantageous” (Austen 308). Darcy’s manipulation of Elizabeth is underlined here as he acknowledges her initial complaint of him and recites his flaws. Darcy, however, does not take full responsibility for his behavior but attaches his actions to his parents and his upbringing. As an adult, he should be able to have authority over his character but is exposed for being a man-child. Drawing on Elizabeth’s sympathy by stating that he was the only child renders him vulnerable to loneliness. Finally, crediting Elizabeth for “changing him,” he places her on a pedestal for the first time. He prays on her stubbornness by spoon feeding her everything she wants to hear. Indeed, by being at her mercy it creates the illusion that Darcy has had a change of heart.
Conclusively, Fitzwilliam Darcy sees Elizabeth Bennet as a challenge. Since Darcy has grown up with a fortune, he is accustomed to people abiding by his will, except Elizabeth. Darcy displays a manipulative nature towards Elizabeth to have his affection returned. This is apparent though their interactions beginning with the first impression at the ball, the marriage rejection, and the letter depicting his so-called change of heart. Since manipulation can best be defined as an assault and influence on mental and emotional sides. Darcy utilizes Elizabeths perception of him to demand sympathy and eventually loyalty through acceptance.
Works Cited:
Austen, Jane. Pride and Prejudice (Wordsworth Classics). Wordsworth Editions Ltd, 1997.
