Plot Construction in Pride and Prejudice

 Write a note on Jane Austen's plot  Construction as shown in 'Pride and Prejudice'

      A novel implies a plot which is essentially artificial, make-believe. In life nothing begins or ends in a systematic was as we find in a work of art. A work of art is an orderly way unity; life is a heterogeneous tangle. The writer of fiction has to devise a form for his inspiration, which will at once please us as an artistic pattern and give us a convincing impression of disorderly reality. Thus has to reconcile not only fact and imagination. He has to provide the missing links within the chain which have been dropped out or postponed in the random reality which happens to catch the attention of the artist. It is a hard task indeed!

     It cannot be said that, Jane Austen always succeeded in it. In Northanger Abbey and Sense and Sensibility she sacrifices fact to form. In Mansfield Park she sacrifices form to fact. At her best, however, she keeps the balance between fact and form as no other English novelist had ever done. She neither twists reality to fit a logical scheme like Henry James, nor like Scott, lets life tumble pell-mell about the reader's head in indeterminate confusion. Her stories are meticulously integrated. There is not a character not an episode which does not make its necessary contribution to the development of the plot. "She makes her incidents so natural, endows her characters with so independent a reality that it is possible to read about them without even realising that they are part of a scheme at all. Even if we do realise it we are half in doubt as to whether it is an intentional scheme. The picture she presents to us seems no calculated composition but rather a glimpse of life itself; life caught at moment when its shifting elements have chanced to group themselves into a temporary symmetry. Emma and Pride and Prejudice are as logically constructed as a detective story; yet they give us all the sense of spontaneous life that we get from a play of Chekhov."

                                                                                     (David Cecil).

     Jane Austen's plots, though worked out with microscopic delicacy, are not original and ingenious. Prof Garrod has observed that she had but one plot. Somerset Maugham holds the same view that "she wrote very much the same sort of story in her books." In five of her six novels, we have a village, or something like it. In this village lives a marriageable maiden. To this village comes, on various pretexts, an eligible bachelor. They fall in love. Their relations develop and, thus, the story moves on till they are ultimately wedded. "Each heroine is furnished with a rival or foil; Marianna with Eleanor (Sense and Sensibility), Elizabeth with Jane (Pride and Prejudice), Catherine with Isabella (Northanger Abbey), Fanny with Mary, (Mansfield Park), and Emma with Jane (Emma). Anne Elliot (Persuasion) whose case does not fit this scheme quite nearly, has two foils to see off her beauty."

     The plots of Jane Austen 'may not be highly original or ingenious, but they are highly artistic. No other writer of fiction has ever achieved such great results by such insignificant means, none other has, upon material so severely limited, expended such beauty ingenuity and precision of workmanship.  Her manuscripts which are profusely corrected show that she worked on her novels very slowly and with inexhaustible patience. Cross has rightly observed that no novelist since Fielding had been a master of structure as Jane Austen was.

     Referring to the plot of Pride and Prejudice, Cross has observed: "Pride and Prejudice has not only the humour of Shakespearean comedy, but also its technique. Elizabeth first meets Darcy at a village ball. She at once becomes prejudiced against him on account of his haughty behaviour in general and a remark of his regarding her in particular that she was not handsome enough to tempt him to dance with her Jane Austen now displays very great skill in handling events to the deepening of Elizabeth's prejudice, and the awakening of Darcy's love, inspired of his pride. When prejudice and proud love have reached the proper degree of intensity, she brings Elizabeth and Darcy together at Hunsfard Parsonage. There is an arrogant and insulting proposal of marriage and an integrant refusal. From this scene on to the end of her story, Jane Austen is at her very best. By easy gradations, through a process of disillusioning, Elizabeth's prejudice vanishes, and with its gradual vanishing goes on the almost pitiable humiliation of Darcy. The marriage of Elizabeth inevitable as the conclusion of a properly constructed geometrical and Darcy is not merely a possible solution of the plot, it is as demonstration. For a parallel to workmanship of this high order one can look only to Shakespeare, to such a comedy as Much Ado About Nothing."

Jane Austen's skill in plot-construction in Pride and Prejudice lies in the way in which she gradually removes the clash of Pride and Prejudice from the hearts of Darcy and Elizabeth respectively and brings them close to each other. To watch her making delicate stroke after stroke is a most delightful and engrossing pastime. What she has set out to do; she has done it with consume ease.

The plot of Pride and Prejudice is carefully constructed like that of a drama. It has an introduction, complication, climax, resolution and catastrophe. Baker has pointed out that both the theme and the plot-structure of Pride and Prejudice are remarkably dramatic. He divides the narrative into the following five acts of a high comedy:

    Act I: We are introduced to Longbourn people, and are acquainted with their leading traits, foibles and prejudices. Elizabeth and Darcy meet; but Darcy's pride leads not total indifference, for Darcy "feels the danger of paying a prejudice against him. Still, dislike is Elizabeth too much attention." The sub-plot also begins to outline itself in the mutual attraction of Bingley and Elizabeth. But, both the affairs come to an end with the departure of the two girls from Netherfield and Bingley's silence.

    Act II: This act is largely taken up with absurd antics of Mr. Collins, who, having been refused by Elizabeth, marries Charlott Lucas. Elizabeth is fascinated by the handsome scapegrace Wickham Darcy continues to be fascinated by her, but is repelled by the follies of her mother and younger sisters. A master stroke of irony begins to develop in this act, for Collins and Wickham are both to be instrumental in bringing about complete reconciliation of Elizabeth and Darcy.

    Act III: The turning point of the story lies in this act. Elizabeth goes to Hunsford on a visit to the Collinses, and meets there Darcy and his friend Colonel Fitzwilliam. Darcy makes to her a proposal of marriage, which she rejects stigmatising his pride and the alleged wrong done to Wickham Elizabeth receives from Darcy a long letter of explanation which gives her food for thought. An idea flashes across her mind that in spite of all his charming manners Wickham perhaps, is not a good man, and that his accusation of Darcy is false and malicious. She nowbegins to see the other side of the case put by Wickham. She has a talk with Colonel Fitzwilliam about Darcy and his eyes are opened (turning point in the narrative).

 Act IV: Elizabeth goes on a tour with her uncle and aunt, the Gardiners, and visit Pemberley. While they are being shown round the famous mansion, she is surprised by the sudden arrival of Darcy. Darcy is exquisitely civil to her and her relations Elizabeth's resistance to Darcy begins to melt away. But fresh difficulties crop up; news arrives from Lgbourn that Lydia has eloped with Wickham. Will Darcy, the haughty man, condescend to marry the daughter of a family which has been disgraced by Lydia's elopement? There seems to be no hope for Elizabeth.

    Act V: Mr. Gardiner makes a search for the runaways; and finds them hiding in London. Wickham is persuaded to marry Lydia. They marry and come to Longbourn for a few days. A casual remark of Lydia leads Elizabeth to discover that it was Darcy, and not Mr. Gardiner, who prevailed on Wickham to marry Lydia. Darcy pretends to have done it, for he held himself responsible for the mischief done by Wickham. Jane and Bingley are engaged, but Elizabeth does not hope that Darcy's former feelings for her will ever revive. She has already refused to marry him. Bus a chance occurs which edables Darcy to know Elizabeth's true feelings for him. Lady Catherine, who is anxious to bring about a match between Darcy and her daughter, goes to Longbourn to extract a promise from Elizabeth that she will not marry Darcy. Elizabeth, however, gives no such promise. When Darcy comes to know of this visit and its result he realizes the true nature of Elizabeth's feeling to him. Finally the lovers meet, "and it does not take long for two such intelligent and sensitive persons to make sure that pride and prejudice is at length beaten."