Novel

Joseph Andrews as a Picaresque Novel:

The title page of Henry Fielding’s first novel reads as follows: “The history of the adventures of Joseph Andrews and of his friend Mr. Abraham Adams, Written in imitation of the Manner of Cervantes, Author of Don Quixote.” The allusion to Cervantes and his masterpiece Don Quixote is significant as it shows Fielding’s indebtedness to Cervantes. Parson Adams is indeed a truly Quixotic figure, and the structure of the book also follows Cervantes’ picaresque model. Joseph Andrews is a novel of adventures met while travelling on the road. Joseph loses his employment in Lady Booby’s service in London, on his way home to the country to his sweetheart Fanny, he meets Parson Adams. Together they run all kinds of adventures meeting a host of characters from low and middle-class layers of society: innkeepers, chambermaids, country squires and clergymen.

The picaresque tradition belongs to Spain and derived from the word “picaro”, meaning a rogue or a villain. The picaresque originally involved the misadventure of the rogue-hero, mainly on the highway. Soon, however, the rogue was replaced by a conventional hero – gallant and chivalric. The comic element lay in the nature of the hero’s adventures, through which, generally, society was satirized.

Fielding’s affinity with picaresque model appears first of all in the representation of rogue and villainy; secondly, in the humorous style which often takes a mock-heroic turn, and in the geniality of temperament; thirdly, in the portrait of characters of certain lower classes of men and women; and finally, in the humorous or satiric descriptions of the contents of the chapters and the introduction of side stories or episodes into the main narrative.

Thus, the journey in Joseph Andrews is not a mere picaresque rambling, a device solely for the purpose of introducing new adventures such as we find in the classic picaresque story, , but an allegorical journey, a moral pilgrimage, from the vanity and corruption of the city-life to the relative naturalness and simplicity of the country. The picaresque motif helps Fielding to fulfill his aim of ridiculing the affectations of human beings. The different strata of society can be represented through the picaresque mode. The travelers meet squires, innkeepers, landladies, persons, philosophers, lawyers and surgeons, beggars, pedlars and robbers and rogues. Fielding’s satire is pungent as he presents the worldly and crafty priests and the callous, vicious and inhuman country squires. Malice, selfishness, vanities, hypocrisies, lack of charity, all are ridiculed as human follies.

The Picaresque novel is the loosest in plot – the hero is literally let loose on the high road for his adventures. The hero wanders from place to place encountering thieves and rogues, rescuing damsels in distress, fighting duels, falling in love, being thrown in prison, and meeting a vast section of society. As the hero meets a gamut of characters from the country squire to the haughty aristocrat, from hypocrite to ill-tempered soldiers, the writer is able to introduce with the least possible incongruity, the saint and the sinner, the virtuous and the vicious. The writer has a chance to present the life, culture and morality prevalent in his time, and to satirize the evils.

Fielding acknowledged his debt to Cervantes, whose Don Quixote is the best known picaresque novel in Spanish.

Like the Don Quixote and Panza, Parson Adams and Joseph set out on a journey which involves them in a series of adventures, some of them burlesque, at several country inns or rural houses. Like the Don, Parson Adams is a dreamy idealist. But there are differences, too, between Joseph Andrews and the picaresque tradition, vital enough to consider Fielding’s novel as belonging to the genre of its own.

The central journey in Joseph Andrews is not mainly a quest for adventure as it is in the picaresque tradition. It is a sober return journey homewards. Joseph and Lady Booby are taken to London and the reader is given a glimpse of society’s ways in that great city.

It is in Chapter 10 of Book I that the picaresque element enters the novel, with Joseph setting out in a borrowed coat towards home. The picaresque tradition is maintained uptil the end of Book III. Joseph meets with the first misadventure when he is set upon by robbers, beaten, stripped and thrown unconscious into a ditch. A passing stage-coach and its passengers very reluctantly convey Joseph to an inn. The incident gives ample scope to Fielding for satirizing the pretences and affectations of an essentially inhuman society.

The Tow-wouse Inn provides a grim picture of callous human beings – the vain and ignorant surgeon and the drinking parson. Once again kindness and generosity come from an apparently immoral girl, Betty the chambermaid. With the arrival of Parson Adams, the picaresque journey takes on a more humorous tone, with plenty of farce. The encounter with the “Patriot” who would like to see all cowards banged but who turns tail at the first sight of danger, leads to the meeting with Fanny. She is rescued by Adams in proper picaresque-romance style with hero. Several odd characters are met on the way – such as the hunting squire – the squire who makes false promises. Then comes the abduction of Fanny – and the reintroduction of something more serious.

We also have the interpolated stories, which belong to the picaresque tradition. In his use of this device, Fielding shows how far he has come from the picaresque school.

To conclude, Joseph Andrews has a rather rambling and discursive narrative, which makes us to believe that it is a picaresque novel. But, on the whole, it is not a picaresque novel rather the picaresque mode has helped him in the development of his comic theory – that of ridiculing the affectations of human beings.

“Joseph Andrews” a comic epic in prose:

It is true that we can term “Joseph Andrews” as a ‘comic epic poem in prose’ because it has almost all the prerequisites that are important for labeling it as a ‘comic epic poem in prose’.

Fielding himself termed it as a ‘comic epic poem in prose’ in the “Preface to Joseph Andrews”. The impetus for the novel, as Fielding claims in the preface, is the establishment of a genre of writing "which I do not remember to have been hitherto attempted in our language", defined as the "comic epic  in prose": a work of prose fiction, epic in length and variety of incident and character. Fielding has combined the ideal of ‘comic epic’ and the ‘prose epic’ to produce what he termed as ‘comic epic poem in prose’.The comic tone of the novel is enhanced by the mock-heroic style, for Fielding admitted burlesque in the diction. It is instrumental in heightening the ridiculous nature of situation and affectations.

A heroic epic has a towering hero, grand theme, a continuous action, a journey to underworld, wars, digressions, discovery, high seriousness, a high moral lesson and bombastic diction in it and in“Joseph Andrews” there is an ordinary hero, a journey from one place to another place, mock-wars, digressions, discovery, humour, a high moral and a bombastic diction in it. Unlike a heroic epic, the hero of “Joseph Andrews” is an ordinary boy. He is a foot-man of Lady Booby who has fallen in love with him. But Joseph is very virtuous and chaste and therfore is dismissed from his job. We can call “Joseph Andrews” as “The Odyssey on the road” because both the works, Homer’s “Odyssey” and Fielding’s “Joseph Andrews” in the first place involve a journey. Like Odysseus, Joseph Andrews after the displeasure of a lady, sets out on his way home and meets with many misfortunes on the way. So it would be fairly justified to call Joseph Andrews “ an epic of the highway full of adventures, horseplay and not too decent fun.”

Through the journey of Joseph, Fielding satirizes the society of the day and ridicules them. The corrupt and hypocritical clergy, Parson Trilluber and Parson Barnabas, individual like Lady Booby and Mrs. Slipslop, the Squire of Fools and the Squire of False Promises have been satirized.

The element of wars and conflicts is very important in an epic and it is no exception in “Joseph Andrews”. First of all, there is a conflict between lusty advances of lady Booby and Mrs. Slipslop and chastity of Joseph. Also there is a conflict between generosity of  Parson Adams and misely Parson Trulliber and Mrs. Tow- Wouse.Then  we see some real action in the form of a war in an inn where Joseph was insulted by the host. Parson Adams was annoyed and challenged the host. There started the first war between both the parties. The funny situation of the bloody fight in which Parson Adams gets doused in hog’s blood is described in Homeric terms. Then Parson Adams rescues Fanny from a ruffian and then, a squire attacks Parson Adams with his hounds and  a fierce battle is fought between hunter’s hounds and parson Adams. Joseph’s encounter with the dogs let loose on Parson Adams is  described in epic-style. Similarly There are many other epical elements in the novel to call it a comic epic.

Another epic convention is the use of digression. There are two major digressions in “Joseph Andrews”. There are, seemingly, irrelevant stories of Leonara and Mr. Wilson. Epic writers considered them as embellishments. Fielding, however, makes the interpolations thematically relevant. For, these are not irrelevant in reality.

The formula of discovery, as described by Aristotle, an essential element of an epic, has also been used by Fielding. In the end of the novel, we see that Joseph is recognized to be Mr. Wilson’s child and Fanny as the sister of virtuous Pamela.

High seriousness is an important element in epic. But in “Joseph Andrews” there is a great deal of comedy and humour, because it is a comic epic novel; indeed in Joseph Andrews the comic point of view is sustained throughout the novel. But behind this comedy, there lies a serious purpose of reformation. We have a gamut of vain and hypocritical characters in Parson Trilluber, Parson Barnabas, passengers in the stage-coach, Mr. Tow-wouse, Mrs. Slipslop, Peter Pounce and the various Squires. The surgeon and the lawyer and the magistrate are also some other example of hypocrisy and vanity. Each of these characters provides a great deal of humour and amusement under a serious purpose.

Every epic has a moral lesson in it and this is no exception with a comic epic. Fielding’s views on morality are practical, full of common sense and tolerance, liberal, flexible and more realistic. These are devoid of prudish and rigid codes. Fielding wanted to tear the veil of vanity and hypocrisy.

The use of grand, bombastic and elevated language is an important element in an epic. It has heroic diction. But in “Joseph Andrews” we see that Fielding has used prose for poetry because it brings us close to the real and actual life and it is much more suitable for Fielding’s purpose of dealing with comic epic. However, his use of prose is very good, up to the mark and apt for his novel.

So, we can conclude that the theory of the ‘comic epic poem in prose’ as described by Fielding in the preface of “Joseph Andrews” manifests itself in the novel. Fielding has assimilated the rules and adapted them to his way of writing so well that we are not consciously aware of the formal principles which give unity to his materials. According to Thornbury, “Joseph Andrews” by Fielding is: “An art which conceals art, but is the art of a conscious artist.”

Realism in Joseph Andrews:

Realism means conceiving and representing the things as they are. Henry Fielding is widely regarded as the first great realist in English novel. He is among  the few writers who, despite the wideness of their scope are capable of observing the demands of reality with perpetual ease. His novels hold up to view a representative picture of his age. He is as authentic a chronicler of his day as Chaucer was of the later 14th century.

 It is true that Richardson and Defoe have some claim to have brought realism to English fiction, it is Fielding who can be called the real pioneer in realistic mode of novel writing. Fielding  reacted against Richardson’s sentimentalism as a falsifying influence on the study of reality, although he does not reject sentimentalism altogether. “His desire”, says Cazamian, “is to give sentiment its right place; but also to integrate it in an organic series of tendencies where each contributes to maintain a mutual balance.”

Fielding’s realism is called “universal realism” as well as global. As Fielding says in the Preface to “Joseph Andrews”:“I believe I might aver that I have writ little more than I have seen.”

Fielding’s novels present the fairly comprehensive picture of English society in 18th century. Though Fielding does not give us material about the environment of the people, yet their mental and moral characteristics are displayed with “power of realism”. The landlords, landladies, doctors, lawyers, clergyman, postilions and coachmen – all go towards making the picture of society as comprehensive as possible. Fielding rejects burlesque and caricature, inspiring laughter with humour and amazing realism. The novel is infused with compassion, comedy, and a heightened sense of realism, which together turn into a vivid manifestation of the cankers of the society.

The eighteenth century society which appears on the pages of “Joseph Andrews” is not very pleasant picture. It is marked by an astounding callousness and selfishness. The insensitive hardness of such a society is brilliantly portrayed by stage-coach passengers who are reluctant to admit the naked wounded Joseph on account of various pretexts. Only  the poor postillion offers  a great coat “his only garment”, and vows that he would rather remain in a shirt than “suffer a fellow-creature to lie in so miserable a condition.” The surgeon, who is summoned to look at Joseph’s wounds at the inn, refuses to come out of his comfortable bed for a mere foot passenger. Parson Trulliber, who uses his Christian teachings to speak against beggars and refuses to lend Adam even a few shillings, scornfully declares:  “I know what  charity is better than to give it to vagabonds.”

 We have also flashes of kindness amongst this all repressive inhumanity. Parson Adams, the postilion, the reformed Mr. Wilson, Betty the chambermaid and four peddlers are only ones to act with generosity.

The society is divided into clear cut classes – the high and the low. Dudden notices a " gulf which seems to separate the classes–the ‘high people' from the ‘low people..."

 The two classes may have dealings with one another in private, as Fielding tells us, but they scrupulously refuse to recognize each other in public. The rich regard themselves as the better and superior in every sense to the poor. Lady Booby could not think in her wildest dreams of admitting Adams to her table, for she considers him to be badly dressed. Mrs. Slipslop does not deign to recognize a ‘nobody’ like Fanny at an inn. While Fielding exposes such behaviour to ridicule, we realize the hollow pretension of a society which indulged in so much of affectation.

The professional classes in general show a marked inefficiency and indifference. They do not take their work seriously. Parson Barnabas, Parson Trulliber, the rural magistrate, the Lawyer Scout – all are the illustration of the corrupt and selfish aristcracy of the day. Parson Adams is merely one good being against so many bad clergymen.

In his novel, Fielding has concentrated more on the countryside. But the little that he describes of town society is enough to give us its characteristics. The wealthy society of the town shows a high degree of degeneracy. The story of Mr. Wilson and Leonora as well as Joseph short stay in London provide us with the clear idea about the vulgarity, degeneration of morals, the vanity and hypocrisy which infested town society.

Fielding represents human nature as truthfully as he presents the society. Fielding effuses realism into his characters and his vivid dialogues. He presents before us the complete reality and does not intentionally ignore anything. In his Preface Fielding writes: “I have scarce a character or action produced which I have not taken from my own observations and experience.” 

Fielding does not project realistic picture of society for mere entertainment. He has a moral purpose behind the realism. To laugh making out of folly is his professed aim. He satirizes  people in order to reform them:“I have endeavored to laugh at mankind, out to their follies and vices.”

Fielding shows a broad tendency of realism in “Joseph Andrews”. Social, psychological, individual as well as moral reality can be seen in the novel.

“As a painter of real life, he was equal to Hogarth; as a mere observer of human nature he was little inferior to Shakespeare.”

He not merely presented society but also criticized it in order to make the world a better place to live in.

Parson Adams: Character Analysis
Although Fielding's first novel bears the title Joseph Andrews, its main interest centers in Parson Adams. The immense popularity enjoyed by the novel can be fully attributed to him. In fact, it is difficult to imagine even the existence of this novel without the endearing figure of the absent–minded Parson Adams. “If he is not the real hero of the book”,says Dobson,”he is undoubtedly the character whose fortunes the reader follows with the closest interest.”

Dudden remarks:“The agreeable youngman, Joseph may be the centre of plot; but it is the ‘old foolish parson’ that is the centre of interest.”

Adams is one of the most original creations; Fielding himself claims that he is ‘not to be found in any book now extant’. Fielding explains in his preface that he has made Adams a clergyman "since no other office could have given him so many opportunities of displaying his worthy inclinations”. While all other characters remain types, Adams emerges as an individual. He is a positive force not only as a clergyman who puts his principles of charity into practice, but as a man who manages to confront the physical obstacles of the world in the most awkward ways, and prides himself rather too much as a teacher of Latin and as a writer of sermons.

Adams’ physical appearance is really interesting. He has a “comical face, with bearded chin and deeply wrinkled cheeks”,  a fist “rather less than the knuckle of an ox”, with a wrist, ”which Hercules would not have been ashamed of”. His legs are so long that they almost touch the ground when he drives on his horse’s back. He usually wears a “tattered old cassock” and a “periwig” on his head. In addition, he is in the habit of snapping his fingers. He has so shabby an appearnce that Parson Trulliber mistakes him for a hog-dealer.

Adams serves as the novel's moral touchstone;Fielding bestowed on his exemplary parson, childlike innocence: “He is an innocent … so completely sincere in his beliefs and actions that he can’t imagine insincerity in other; he takes everyone he meets at face-value”. Adams is a dreamy idealist;he is as ignorant of the world  of his own day “as an infant just entered into it could possibly be”. The devious ways of contemporary mankind are quite beyond his comprehension. Being naïve and guileless he is constantly imposed upon. He is easily taken in by the sentimental bragging of pseudo-patriot as by the pious platitudes of hypocrical Parson Trulliber. Adams’ endless tribulations at the hands of others serve as an index of society’s alienation from ethical and moral codes.

Although simpelton and naïve , Adams is a man of exceptional learning. Educated at the university of Cambridge, he has made himself familiar with many languages, and, in particular, has acquired masterly knowledge of the Greak and Latin:

 “Mr. Abraham Adams was an excellent Scholar. He was a perfect Master of the Greek and Latin Languages; to which he added a great Share of Knowledge in the Oriental Tongues...”

 His favourite author, however, is  Aeschylus and he carries a transcript of Aeschylean tragedies for more than thirty years. With the modern literature --- except a few books of divinity---he does does not have even a nodding acquaintance. The history of last thousand years is to him almost a blank.  

Parson Adams is only a curate. He lives in the parsonage in Sir Thomas Booby’s parish.He is about fifty years old and has a wife and six children whom he can barely support on his very small income as a curate. He considers all his parishioners, especially Joseph and Fanny, as his children. In contrast with Parson Trulliber and Barnabas, Parson Adams is extremely sincere in his profession .He gets a very small income from the church but his virtue remains utterly uncontaminated. He refuses to become a puppet in the hands of Lady Booby when the latter forbids him to publish the banns of Joseph’s marriage with Fanny .

Fielding has made Adams a comic character . He has made him absent-minded and given him amusing mannerisms. However this does not detract Adams’ greatness as a true Christian. Simple, kind, generous and courageous, Adams is the epitome of true feeling and goodness of heart. Adams’ impulses always prompt him to help anyone in distress.He is ever ready and ever willing to fight for the right cause. Although fifty years of age, Adams is magnificently strong and healthy. He knows how to use his huge fists in defending others. 

Adams’s generosity, friendliness, and bravery appear to be tied to one another, as indeed they ought to be according to Fielding’s moral scheme. In Adams, however, bravery is excessive because he does not regulate it with prudence; “Simplicity,” or naïveté, is certainly more present in Adams’s character than in any other in the novel

Parson Adams establishes a sort of unadorned criterion of simplicity against vanity and hypocricy of most of the other characters. He is a bundle of contradictions, a delightful mixture of scholarship and simplicity, and pedantry and credulity. He is eccentric and forgetful; he often leaves his hat and his sermons (which he intends to sell) behind, and has to return for them.He lands into misadventure after misadventure - he wanders from inn to inn without the means to pay his bills, he is beaten, swindled and mocked at, he is involved in hilarious nightly adventures -but he never loses his innate dignity and goodness. Martin C. Battestin sees in Adams "the Christian hero, the representative of good nature and charity, which form the heart of morality."

We can sum up  above discussion in the words of Dudden: “Adams emerges from testing adventures and experiences with his sweet temper unsoured, his honourable character unsullied, and his innate dignity unimpaired”

Theme of Morality in Joseph Andrews

Henry Fielding undoubtedly holds moral views far-ahead of his times. Morality is an approval or adherence to principles that govern ethical and virtuous conduct.

Fielding was accused of being immoral in his novels. Dr. Johnson called his novels “vicious and corrupting”. Richardson echoed the “charge of immorality” against him. Modern critics, however, has justified Fielding and gave him a credit of “an estimable ethical code”. Strachey declared him a “deep, accurate, scientific moralist”. Indeed neither “Joseph Andrews” nor “Tom Jones” strikes the modern sensibility as ‘low’ or ‘immoral’ either in purpose or in narration. Behind the truthful portrait of life, lies his broad moral vision. His aim was to correct mankind by pointing out their blunders: “I have endeavored to laugh at mankind, out to their follies and vices.”

Fielding reacted sharply against the code of ethics as incited by Richardson in “Pamela”. He feels that Pamela’s virtue is an affectation and a commodity, exchangeable for material benefits. Virtue cannot and should not be to chastity alone. Mere external respectability is not morality. For Fielding: “Chastity without goodness of heart is without value.”

A truly virtuous man is disregardful of material benefits. He is devoid of an affectation.

He finds:

“A delight in the happiness of mankind and a concern at their misery, with a desire, as much as possible, to procure the former and avert the latter …”

Fielding’s moral vision is much wider that Richardson’s. Morality is no longer equated with chastity or outward decorum. It is broad enough to include every aspect of human behaviour. One’s intentions, instincts, motives are equally important in judging a man.

In “Joseph Andrews” we are confronted with a chameleonic society that quickly changes its appearance to gratify personal lusts. Fielding’s  aim was to show human beings camuoflaged in various shades of vanity and hypocrisy and it is done ruthlessly and wittily in “Joseph Andrews”.

The stage-coach scene is perhaps the best illustration of Fielding’s concept of morality. In it we are confronted the haughty passengers which are all models of hypocrisy. The coachman simply bids the postillion to "Go on, Sirrah, we are confounded late”. The lady reacts in a contemptible manner: "O Jesus, a naked Man! Dear Coachman, drive on". The old gentleman deems: "Let us make all the haste imaginable, or we shall be robbed too".In addition there a lawyer who “wished they had past by without taking any notice", although his final advice is “to save the poor creature's life, for their own sakes”. At last, it is the postillion, “ who hath been since transported for robbing a hen-roost,  voluntarily strips off a great coat, his only garment" and swears that he would rather remain in a shirt than "suffer a fellow-creature to lie in so miserable a condition". Here Fielding shows the contrast between the attitude of the rich passengers and that of the poor Postillion. What sets him apart is not his class, but the fact that he alone dismisses his own comfort and he is the only person who considers Joseph a "fellow-creature" worthy of such rescue. Fielding emphatically declares: "High People" are "People of Fashion", but that they are not "higher in their Dimensions" nor in "their Characters".  The journey undertaken by Joseph and Parson Adams reveals vanity or hypocrisy at every stage.

It is significant that Parson Adams jumps with joy at the reunion of Fanny and Joseph. It reflects an ability to sympathize with other’s feelings. Simple, kind, generous and courageous, Adams is the epitome of true feeling and goodness of heart which is a vital aspect of Fielding’s concept of morality. Adams’ impulses always prompt him to help anyone in distress. He saves Fanny’s virginity two times.

“He is an innocent … so completely sincere in his beliefs and actions that he can’t imagine insincerity in other; he takes everyone he meets at face-value”.

Kindness achieved supreme importance in Fielding’s moral code. A good and a moral man takes joy in helping others. Fielding says: “I don’t know a better definition of virtue, than it is a delight in doing good.”

Fielding is as liberal in ridiculing affectation as he is hard on the lack of charity. Adams’ definition: “A generously disposition to receive the poor”, is the simple test employed  to men by Fielding to  check their capability of charity. When Parson Adams asks for some shillings to Parson Trulliber, he declares in frenzy: “I know what charity is better than to give it to vagabonds.”

This shows 18th century’s clergy’s degeneracy, who is reluctant to give some shillings. The rich Parson Tulliber, Mrs. Tow-wouse, Lady Booby and Peter Pounce lacks natural kindness whereas the poor postilion, Betty and Pedler are true Christians, for they are ready to help other man in distress asking nothing in return. But Mrs. Tow-wouse scornfully declares: “Common charity my foot.”

Fielding is against the prudish morality which considers sex as an unhealthy and dangerous for human life. He favours a healthy attitude towards sex. But he does not approve of Lady Booby’s desire for Joseph nor does he favour Mr. Slipslop’s extreme whims. But Betty’s desires spring from a natural heart and feeling. It is worth noticing that Betty is free of hypocrisy. She acts as ordered by her nature.

“She is good-natured generosity and composition.”

Summing up, Fielding’s concept of morality is realistic, tolerant, broad and fairly flexible. Modern opinion has vindicated the moral vision of Fielding as healthy, wide and practical.

  

Theme of Love and Marriage in Pride and Prejudice:

Pride and Prejudice is one of the most popular novels of Jane Austen due to its multi-dimensional versatility of themes. Andrew H. Wright remarks: “ She (Jane Austen) develops themes of the broadest significance, the novels go beyond social record, beneath the didactic, to moral concern, perplexity and commitment”

One of the most important themes of Pride and Prejudice,  love and marriage, is also the central theme of the novel. The oft-quoted opening sentence of the novel demonstrates this basic theme: “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife”

It is true that the chief preoccupation of Jane Austen’s heroines is getting married and life is a matrimonial ceremony for them. Pride and Prejudice dramatizes the economic inequality of women, showing how women had to marry undesirable mates in order to gain some financial security. Marriage was a significant social concern in Jane Austen’s time and she was fully conscious of the disadvantages of being single as she wrote to her niece Fanny Knight, “Single women have a dreadful propensity for being poor….which is one very strong argument in favour of matrimony”.

Through five marriages, Jane Austen defines good and bad reasons for marriage. Charlotte – Collins, Lydia – Wickham, Jane – Bingley and Elizabeth – Darcy are the four newly-weds. The old marriage is that of Mr. and Mrs. Bennet.

The marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Bennet is the worst example of its kind in the novel. They are pole apart in their thoughts and temperaments. Their marriage is shown to be a disaster, with the wife playing the part of a fool and the husband retreating to live an uninvolved life.  Jane Austin says about this marriage:
" Her (Elizabeth’s) father captivated by youth and beauty … had married a woman whose weak understanding and illiberal mind had very early in their marriage put an end to all real affection for her “. Their marriage lacks "emotional compatibility and intellectual understanding". The Bennet’s marriage ends in mutual forbearance.

Charlotte and Collins are the first newly-weds. Charlotte agrees to marry Collins solely for her financial security. It is relatively her advancing age that hastens her engagement. Charlotte tries to justify her position by giving argumentative reasons to Elizabeth: “I am not romantic you know, I never was, I ask only a comfortable home”. Thus, to Charlotte, marriage is an economic transaction undertaken in self-interest.

The runaway marriage of Lydia-Wickham is based on mere superficial qualities as sex, appearance, good looks and youthful flirtation. The passion between the unprincipled rake, Wickham and the flighty Lydia is bound to cool, and in their unhappy conjugal life, mutual toleration is the nearest approach that can be expected.

The marriage between Jane and Bingley is a successful marriage of its kind. Jane Austen expresses her opinion about this marriage through the words of Elizabeth:
"All his (Bingley) expectations of felicity, to be rationally founded, because they had for basis the excellent understanding, and super excellent disposition of Jane, and a general similarity of feeling and taste between them."
However, unlike Darcy and Elizabeth, there is no planning in their relationships. Both the characters are too gullible and too good-hearted to ever act strongly against external forces that may attempt to separate them. So, their marriage is in between success and failure.

The fifth and final example of marriage is that of Elizabeth and Darcy. It is a kind of an ideal marriage based on the true understanding and cross examinations. According to Jane Austen , the courtship of Darcy and Elizabeth is a perfect union which sums up the purpose of her novel. Although it begins with the pride and prejudice; it passes through many stages as "it converts from full hatred to complete admiration and satisfaction" . For Darcy, Elizabeth is no longer the woman who is "not handsome enough to tempt (him)", as he has admitted that “… it is many months since I have considered [Elizabeth] as one of the handsomest women of my acquaintance.”. Also for Elizabeth , he is no longer "the last man in the world whom (she) could ever be prevailed on to marry" but he becomes the "man who in disposition and talents , would most suit her" .

Thus the theme of love and marriage is very aptly exemplified in Pride and Prejudice. Beginning with the arrival of Bingley and Darcy, both single men “in possession of a good fortune”, the novel traces the courtship of Jane-Bingley and Elizabeth-Darcy through various misunderstandings and hindrances, before they are happily married to each other. We can sum up above discussion in the words of Elizabeth: “There can be no doubt that it is settled between us already that we are to be the happiest couple in the world.”

Irony in Pride and Prejudice:

One of the most prominent features of the literary style of Jane Austen is her frequent use of irony. In fact, in no other book is her use of irony more pronounced than in Pride and Prejudice. In Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen employs a variety of irony, verbal, thematic, situational, and dramatic.

The title of the novel contains a hidden strain of thematic irony.  Jane Austen subtly introduces an inversion in the thematic foibles, ‘Pride’ and ‘Prejudice’ and the characters they belong to. It is Darcy who is supposed to have the pride and Elizabeth who is supposed to have the prejudice. But in their misunderstandings with each other they accuse each other of excessive pride and prejudice.

Verbal irony is present in profusion in Pride and Prejudice. The oft-quoted opening sentence of the novel is one of the finest example of verbal irony: “It is truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife”. The statement in fact encapsulates the ambitions of the empty headed Mrs. Bennet, and her desire to find a good match for each of her five daughters. Sometimes the characters are unconsciously ironic, as Mrs. Bennet and Mr. Collins. Mr. Bennet and Elizabeth serve to directly express the author's ironic opinion. Although Mr. Bennet is basically a sensible man, he behaves strangely because of his sarcasm with his wife.  Mr. Bennet cruelly mocks his wife’s silliness with the comments as “…you are as handsome as any of them, Mr. Bingley might like you the best of the party”.  Elizabeth is to some extent similar to her father’s cynicism. At the second ball, not only does she reject Darcy’s request to dance with her, but also mocks him with  comments like “Mr. Darcy is all politeness”,  and “I am perfectly convinced by it that Mr. Darcy has no defect”.  Her speeches crackle with irony that is filled with pep and display vibrant humor. 

Dramatic irony is at work when the audience knows something that the character doesn’t, is seen mainly through Elizabeth and Darcy. Elizabeth is critical of Jane’s blindness to others’ faults.  This criticism is filled with irony, because Elizabeth herself is blind to the true character of Darcy because of her prejudice against him. Also, Darcy was blind to his love when he declines to dance with Elizabeth. In addition, when the Gardiners are talking about a future mistress of Pemberley, they don’t know that Darcy had proposed to Elizabeth and that she could have been that mistress now. This gives a clear example of a dramatic irony.

The focal point of the story’s situational irony is Darcy’s falling in love with Elizabeth. Mr.Darcy, who once called Elizabeth “tolerable; but not handsome enough to tempt (him)”, gets captivated by her fine countenance, and ends up admitting that “… it is many months since I have considered [Elizabeth] as one of the handsomest women of my acquaintance.” Likewise, Elizabeth, who starts out hating Mr. Darcy with a passion, ends up marrying him.   There is a fine streak of irony in her  response to Charlotte’s engagement and her own subsequent leniency towards materialism at the first sight of Pemberley: “To be mistress of Pemberley might be something!" Elizabeth tells Mr. Collins that she is not the type of a woman to reject the first proposal and accept the second but does exactly this when Darcy proposes her second time.

Mr. Collins advises to Mr Bennet, talking of Lydia's elopement:"You ought certainly to forgive them as a Christian, but never to admit them to your sight, or allow their names to be mentioned in your hearing." Mr collins is being unconsciously ironic, his idea of 'forgiveness' isn't really forgiving at all.

Irony in character is even more prominent than irony of situation. It is ironical that Elizabeth who prides herself on her perception and disdains Jane’s blindness to realities, is herself blinded by her own prejudice. Darcy always thought himself to be a gentleman but his own proposal to Elizabeth is quite ungentlemanly. Wickham is graceful to look at, but at heart he is an unredeemed villain. The Bingley Sisters hate the Bennets for their vulgarity but are themselves vulgar in their behaviour. Lady Catherine de Bourgh views herself to be a graceful lady, but  is an equally self-conceited and haughty woman. Mr. Collins always boasts of himself as a clergyman,  but is an ironical portrait of self-satisfied sycophancy and pomposity. Thus, the novel abounds in irony of characters.

To conclude, the irony of Jane Austin is not tinged with any bitterness, nor does she reflect her cynicism. Rather her irony can be termed comic. Irony is used by Jane Austin in Pride and Prejudice to expose the hypocrisy and pretentiousness of contemporary English society. Andrew H. Wright very aptly remaks that irony, at the hands of Jane Austen, is the “instrument of a moral vision.”                                                                                  

 Pride and Prejudice: Title

“Pride and Prejudice” was first written in 1797 under the title “First Impressions”. It was later revised and published under the title “Pride and Prejudice” in 1813.

First impressions do play an important role in the novel. Elizabeth is misled in her judgment of both Darcy and Wickham. Her attitude towards both the characters is only a result of the First Impressions. But if we study the novel deeply, we find that “Pride and Prejudice” is an apt title. The first impressions only last for the first few chapters of the novel while pride and prejudice permeate the soul of the novel. The novel is about the pride of Darcy and the prejudice of Elizabeth caused by their mutual misunderstanding.

Earlier in the novel, Mary describes Pride as “…a common failing. Human nature is particularly prone to it”. Mr. Darcy stands as the most obviously proud character. Wickham tells Elizabeth that he has a ‘filial pride’ and we tend to agree with Mrs. Bennett’s complaint that “He walked here and he walked there, fancying himself so very great”.

His haughty manners at the ball gave people a very bad impression of his personality, especially Elizabeth, whom he considered as “tolerable; but not handsome enough to tempt (him)”. Lady Catherine, Miss Bingley and even Elizabeth Bennett constitute the other proud characters. While Lady Catherine’s patronizing behavior and Miss Bingley’s rudeness are due to their social class, Elizabeth can be deemed proud on the account that she has high respect for herself and this is best displayed when Elizabeth refers to Darcy: “And I could easily forgive his pride, if he had not mortified mine.” Being rejected by him at the ball, her prejudice mounts up and from the start; she willfully misinterprets all his utterances and actions.

Darcy’s pride stemming from the superiority of intellect, his noble ancestry and his enormous riches prejudices him strongly against Elizabeth’s family and her low connections. Although “he had never been bewitched by any woman as he was by her”, Darcy feels beneath his dignity to admit to his love for her. Even when he can repress his feelings no longer and does propose to Elizabeth, “he was not more eloquent on the subject of the tenderness than on pride”. He is considerably humbled when he is rejected without ceremony, and Elizabeth’s words “had you behaved in a more gentlemanlike manner” and her criticism of his self-conceit affect him deeply.

Elizabeth’s refusal initiates a process of introspection and self analysis in Darcy. Consequently,  he emerges as a man who has gone through a considerable transition. This is revealed by his long explanatory speech to Elizabeth towards the end of the novel. The greatest proof of this transition is in his remaining firm in his choice of Elizabeth even after Lydia-Wickham elopement which draws from Elizabeth the acknowledgement- “indeed he has no improper pride. He is perfectly amiable.”

In Elizabeth, the intelligent and self-assured young woman too we see the interesting compound of Pride and Prejudice. Her initial prejudice against Darcy arises from injured pride. At the Natherfield ball she overhears Darcy calling her, “tolerable; but not handsome enough to tempt(him)”. From that evening Elizabeth is left with no cordial feeling towards Darcy. In addition, Elizabeth is prejudiced in favour of Wickham, charmed by her fine countenance, pleasing addresses and his flattering attentions.

Elizabeth's judgments about other characters' dispositions are accurate but only half of the time.  While she is correct about Mr. Collins and how absurdly self-serving and sycophantic he is and about Lady Catherine de Bourgh and how proud and snobbish she is, her first impressions of Wickham and Darcy steer her incorrectly.  When Charlotte tries to show Elizabeth the agreeable side of Mr. Darcy, Elizabeth cries out in a disdainful manner: “To find a man agreeable whom one is determined to hate! Do not wish me such an evil”. It is only when she reads Darcy’s letter that her eyes are opened to the true characters of both Darcy and Wickham.

In fact Darcy’s letter introduces in Elizabeth the same self-criticism that Darcy too undergoes. Thus Elizabeth realizes her folly in trusting her first impressions and states, "how despicably have I acted. I, who have prided myself on my discernment! - I, who have valued myself on my abilities."

In sum, the title, “Pride and Prejudice” very aptly points to the theme of the novel. The protagonists have been tangling with pride and prejudice throughout the novel. They also struggled to put down their pride and get rid of their prejudice. However, to say that Darcy is proud and Elizabeth is prejudiced is to tell but half of the story. The fact is that both Darcy and Elizabeth are proud and prejudiced. The novel makes clear the fact the Darcy’s pride leads to prejudice and Elizabeth’s prejudice stems from a pride in her own perceptions.

In a nut-shell, the appropriateness of the title, Pride and Prejudice is indeed unquestionable and it bears immense significance to the plot, thematic concerns and the characterization in the novel.

Jane Austen’s Limited Range:

Jane Austen as a novelist has stringently set her limits which she seldom oversteps. She was amazingly aware of which side her genius lay and she exploited it accordingly without any false notions of her capabilities or limitations. As Lord David Cecil points out, she very wisely stayed "within the range of her imaginative inspiration." Her imaginative inspiration was as severely limited as, for example, Hardy's or Arnold Bennett's. Her themes, her characters, her background setting -everything has a well-etched range within which she works, and works exquisitely. Jane Austen herself referred to her work as “Two inches of ivory.” In a letter to her niece, Fanny Knight, Jane Austen wrote, “Three or four families in a country village is the very thing to work on.”

Although she works on a very small canvas, yet she has widened the scope of fiction in almost all its directions. Her stories are mostly indoor actions where only family matters are discussed. However, her plots are perfect and characterization is superb.

Critics have labeled her novels belonging to a narrow range of themes and characterization. Even in her limited world, Austen restricts herself to the depiction of a particular class of country gentry. She excludes the matters of lower class and hardly touches aristocracy. For instance, she has discussed Lady Catherine only for the purpose of satire. The same sort of story is repeated, subject matters are very much the same in all her novels, confined to the gentry class – servants, laborers and yeomanry rarely appear in her novels.

 Her nephew James Austen-Leigh, alludes to her limited range:

“She was always careful not to meddle with matters with which she did not thoroughly understand”.

There is no terrible happening in Jane Austin’s novels. Everything happens in a civilized manner. The extreme severity in “Pride and Prejudice” is elopement of Lydia with Wickham.
Charlotte Bronte was constrained to observe about Jane Austen:

"She ruffles her reader by nothing vehement, disturbs him by nothing profound. The passions are perfectly unknown to her : she rejects even a speaking acquaintance with that stormy sisterhood."

Charlotte Bronte believes that Jane Austen is not concerned with the deep morals and she is an author of the surface only: “Her business is not half so much with the human heart as with the human eye, mouth, hands and feet.”

Andrew H. Wright points out that there is very little religion discussed in her novels, politics is not mentioned too. There are no adventures found in her books, no abstract ideas and no discussion of spiritual or metaphysical issues.

Macaulay declares that her characters are commonplace, “yet they are all as perfectly discriminated from each other as if they were the most eccentric of human beings.” Sir Walter Scott appreciates the precision of her Art and its merit:“That young lady has a talent for describing the involvement of feelings and characters of ordinary life which is to me the most wonderful I have ever met with.”

G.H. Lewes pays glowing tribute to her:“First and foremost, let Jane Austen be named, the greatest artist that has ever written... Her circle may be restricted, but it is complete. Her world is a perfect orb, and vital sphere.”

Pride and Prejudice like her other novels has a narrow physical setting in which she lived. The story revolves around Netherfield, Longbourn, Hunsford, Meryton and Pemberley. It seems to be an irony of the history that when the Romantic Poets were discovering the beauties of nature, Jane Austen confined her characters within the four walls of the drawing room. Her heroines also famously never leave the family. Edward Fitzgerald states: “She never goes out of the Parlour.”

Jane Austen’s limitations stemmed from the choice of her themes: love, marriage and courtship. All of her six novels deal with same theme of love and marriage. There are pretty girls waiting for eligible bachelors to be married to.

Another limitation is the feminisation of her novels. Men do not appear except in the company of women. All the information about Darcy is proved through Elizabeth’s point of view. Hence, the reader looks at Darcy through Elizabeth’s eye.

However her novels are profound in the psychological delineation of her characters. She is able to capture superbly, the subtlety of thoughts and reflexes of her characters. We can sum up above discussion in the words of Virginia Woolf: “Jane Austen is the mistress of a much deeper emotion than appears on the surface.”

Hardy’s Philosophy or Tragic Vision of Life:       

Hardy, the novelist, was essentially a poet and an artist rather than a philosopher. Hardy was primarily a story-teller and should be viewed more as chronicler of moods and deeds than  a philosopher. He repeatedly affirmed that the 'Views' expressed in his novels were not his convictions or beliefs; they were simply "impressions" of the moment. In The Return of the Native, Hardy proves a dismal view of life in which coincidence and accident conspire to produce the worst of circumstance due to the indifference of the Will.

In order to understand Hardy’s philosophy, we should have a fair idea of Hardy’s biography. Hardy lived in an age of transition. The industrial revolution was in the process of destroying the agricultural life, and the subsequent shifting of population caused a disintegration of rural customs and traditions. It was a period when fundamental beliefs — religious, social, scientific, and political — were shaken to their core and brought in their stead the "ache of modernism." The new philosophies failed to satisfy the emotional needs of many people. As a young man, Hardy read Darwin's Origin of the Species and Essays and Reviews (the manifesto of some radical clergymen), both of which influenced Hardy’s attitude toward religion profoundly. He found it difficult, if not impossible, to reconcile the idea of a beneficent and benevolent, omnipotent, and omniscient deity with the fact of omnipresent evil and the persistent tendency of circumstances toward unhappiness.

Hardy's novels can be best understood in the light of the author's fatalistic outlook on life, for Hardy fluctuates between fatalism and determinism. Fatalism is a view of life which acknowledges that there is some malignant power that controls the universe, and which is out to thwart and defeat men in their plans. It is especially hostile to them who try to assert themselves and have their own way. Determinism, on the other hand, acknowledges that man's struggle against fate is futile and man is but  puppet in the hands of destiny. In Tess of D’urbervilles, we are told that, “Justice was done, and President of Immortals(in Aeschylean phrase) had ended his sport with Tess.”  In The Return of the Native, Hardy again reminds us that, “What a sport for Heaven this woman Eustacia was!”

In Hardy's novels, then, Fate appears in the form of chance and coincidence, nature, time and woman. None is Fate itself, but rather all of these are manifestations of the Immanent Will. Fateful incidents are the forces working against men in their efforts to control their destinies. In addition, Fate appears in the form of nature as a powerful agent, that affects the lives of the characters. Those who are most in harmony with their environment can find some solace, but those who are indignant and rebellious, it destroys all their happiness.Eustacia suffers in The Return of the Native, because of her direct confrontation with Edgon Heath, which symbolizes nature. In the end Eustacia laments:

 “How I have tried and tried to be a splendid woman, and how destiny has been against me. I do not deserve my lot…O, cruelty of putting me into this ill-conceived world. I was capable of much; but I have been injured and blighted and crushed by things beyond my control.”

Hardy remarks: “What of Immanent Will and its designs? It works unconsciously as heretofore, Eternal artistries in circumstance.”     

In Hardy's considered view, all life is suffering. Man suffers from the moment of his birth upto his death. Happiness is only occasional, it is never the general rule:

"Happiness is but an occasional episode in a general drama of pain". 

There is none who gets more than he deserves but there are many who get much less than what they deserve. Not only man suffers, but all life suffers. Suffering is writ large on the face of nature. A ruthless, brutal struggle for existence is waged everywhere in nature. All nature is red in tooth and claw and life lives upon life. Thus all life, including human life, is subject to this law of suffering and none can escape the operation of this law.

Hardy’s characters are also a prey to irony of circumstance. Right things never happen at the right time: they happen either not at all, or too late, when their happening brings nothing but misery and suffering in their train. The heroines of Hardy, like Tess and Eustacia, as well as his male characters, like Clym, Henchard, Angel, Alec are all the victims of the irony of circumstance. In ill-conceived scheme of things there is nothing but “strange oschestra of victim shriek and pain.” Almost all of the Hardy’s characters are susceptible to this omnipresent evil power.

In The Return of the Native, Hardy suggests the philosophy of Rustic Resignation. Man must be resigned to one’s lot. It is useless to complain or resist for nothing can refom “ill-conceived scheme of things.” If he is rash, hot-headed and obstinate, like Henchard or Eustacia, he can bring about his own downfall. On the other hand, if he is contended ang resigned to his own lot like Thomasin, he can make much of his limited opportunities.

Summing up, Hardy’s philosophy in The Return of the Native is certainly ‘twilight’ and gloomy one but it is not too much pessimistic, for pessimism implies negation of life, a wish not to have been born at all. It is only in his last novel “Jude of Obscure” that some cynicism enters, and Hardy becomes pessimistic otherwise he is an acute realist. “My practical philosophy”, says Hardy, “is distinctively meliorist”, an honest facing of human suffering. “If a way to the better there be, it implies good look at the worst.”  Hardy is a humanist, a poet who wants men to turn from nature to their own kind for

“There at least discourse trills around

There at least smells abound

There same-time are found

Life-Loyalties.”