Austen, Jane - Life and Pride and Prejudice (2)

How Austen’s literary carrier had started

She was educated at home and she start writing when she was 12.
Between 1787 and 1793, she composed Juvenilia that can be considered three collections of humorous and gothic tales, poetries, parodies and drafts of novels.

This literary work was important for the structure, the preparation and the themes debated in Sense and Sensibility which was published anonymously "by a lady" in 1811 but it won favourable notices.

She was a fervent writer since she published at close range all her novels.
In 1813 she published Pride and Prejudice;
In 1814 she published Mansfield Park;
In 1815 she published Emma.

Then in 1818 Persuasion and Northanger Abbey were published posthumous because Jane Austen died on the 18th of July 1817 maybe because of the complication connected to Addison's disease.

Austen’s novels are usually characterized by limited setting and characters because she is used to describe "3 or 4 families in a country village".
Setting is focused on the provincial world which she knew from her experience.
On the other hand, descriptions depend on dialogue and irony.
As a matter of fact dialogues are the author’s style for their clarity and precision that help to make commonplace thing and characters interesting.
There is also a use of an omniscient third persona narrator but it is almost imperceptible. She is considered un-romantic for her use of irony and the didactic aim of her novels.

Pride and Prejudice: a summary of the plot

In the meantime Mr Darcy, Mr. Bingley's friend who spends with him his holiday, falls in love with Elizabeth, he also makes her a proposal, but she refuses: she hates him because a young soldier Mr. Wickham told her that Darcy has a dark past.
In the meantime Mr. Bingley leaves his house and goes to London abandoning Janes who finds her hopes deceived.
One of Darcy's relatives tells Elizabeth that it was Darcy who convinced Mr Bingley to leave Jane and go to London.

So Elizabeth's hate towards Darcy grows more and more. But when Elizabeth's youngest sister Lydia runs away with Mr. Wickham Darcy finds them in London and persuades Wickham to marry Lydia by paying him much money.
When Elizabeth knows how Darcy helped her sister, she realizes she loves him too and accepts his wedding proposal.
In the meantime, Bingley comes back and asks Jane to marry him. She accepts so there's a happy end: Jane marries Bingley and Elizabeth marries Darcy.