In Pride and Prejudice, journeys play an important role to the story as a whole; they bring about lots of change whenever they happen. The characters are oftentimes travelling to one place or the next to attend a ball, to see an exquisite estate, or even to just take a break from the town of Longbourn.
Elizabeth’s first journey is what introduces her to Darcy for the first time. Even though it is a rather short journey, it is important to her development as a character. Elizabeth’s family attends a ball hosted by Mr. Bingley and news of Mr. Darcy, “soon drew the attention of the room by his fine, tall person, handsome features, noble mein; and the report which was in general circulation within five minutes after his entrance, of his having ten thousand a year” (12). Darcy seems like the perfect man at first, but it is later brought to attention that “his manners gave a ‘disgust’ which turned the tide of his popularity” (12).
Towards the end of the story, Darcy goes on a journey to track down Lydia and Wickham and save the honor of the Bennet family. Elizabeth thinks highly of his journey to track them down, and “thanks [him] again and again, in the name of all my family, for the generous compassion which induced you to take so much trouble, and bear so many mortifications, for the sake of discovering them” (346). Elizabeth’s opinion of Darcy has drastically changed since the beginning of the story, and the multitude of journeys undertaken by both characters has developed the relationship between them until “her sentiments had undergone so material a change, since the period to which he alluded, as to make her receive with gratitude and pleasure, his present assurances” (346). Elizabeth and Darcy are now married, much to the joy of Mrs. Bennet. Without the journeys that took place, the marriage would obviously not have happened, and they would both continue to be disgusted by the other.
To build on what you said, journeys in Pride and Prejudice not only represent changes but specifically changes in the relationships between characters. They are symbolically associated with the redefinition of connections.
ReplyDeleteOne example comes from Lydia’s elopement with Mr. Wickham, which effectively severs her connection with the Bennet family. After first separating from the family to travel with the regiment, foreshadowing the soon to be destruction of her relationship with it, she runs off to London with him in a trip whose covertness suggests its immorality. As a result, the connection that she has with the Bennet family is so frayed that, despite her eventually agreeing to at least restore the form of propriety through marriage, Mr. Bennet “refuses to advance a guinea to buy clothes” for his daughter’s wedding (Austen 294). Finally, Lydia’s greatly decreased relationship with her family is also represented by another trip, her exile to the north.
Another example of how journeys represent change in the relationship between characters comes from Elizabeth’s journey to Derbyshire. Interestingly, Elizabeth did not originally intend to go there at all, but a change in Mr. Gardiner’s schedule makes it so that they can “go no farther northward than Derbyshire” (Austen 230). Thus, Elizabeth’s trip changes from something that would not go close to the symbolic center of Darcy’s power to something that goes directly to it; it is as if she cannot stay away from him. Consequently, the change in her relationship with him is foreshadowed.