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Comment on the characters and role of the comic characters in Pride and Prejudice

Jane Austen’s genius is essentially dramatic, although she wrote no play. She presents before us a comic view of life and the life that she reflects in her novels is the social life of the middle and upper-middle class of her day. She exposes the follies and foibles of the people of the said classes and laughs of them. Austen’s social comedy is patterned in a calculated mixture of serious and comic characters. Comic characters are not all comic in the same way, they are individually and belongs to certain type.

First of all, we meet Mrs. Bennet who is the mother of five daughters and her biggest concern in life is to get her daughters married off, however, with her lapses of social grace she is turn alinates the suitors she so desired to attract. Her biggest taunter is. comically her husband to which she has no clue. In the fist two chapters he acts like he is not going to introduce himself to the new tenant in the neighbourhood who could be a potential suitor for one of their daughters, when in reality he just tells her this to get a rise out of her. It seems that any chance he gets, he makes a mockery of his wife. Mrs. Bennet seems to be the type of neighbour who knows everything about everyone. She keeps tabs on all of the gossip that goes on and tries to save it to use to her advantage, which always. seems to backfire. His character is a satire of the effects of lower breeding and unbecoming behaviour.

The second important character Elizabeth who has a sufficient sense of humour. She is not fastidious type. She is endowed with ‘luminous wit’. Her wit is not devastating. It is enlightened. It springs up from the depth of her understanding and good sense. She smiles while she uses her wit, which does not hurt anybody.

And the next is Lydia Bennet who is one of Elizabeth’s younger sisters. She promiscuous and is move than excited when the naval. party settles in town. She and her sister Kitty are constantly throwing themselves at the officers, Little does she know, or care, that this disgrace on her part in turn threatens she entire Bennet family.

The most famous and dramatically significant among these comic figures is Mr. Collins. Some critics like J. B. Priestley have called him; the greatest humorous character in English fiction. He comes to life the moment we meet him or rather even before we meet him, the letter which Mr. Bennet reads out in chapter Thirteen. His pompousness of style mingles with his insensibility to rational human feelings makes him an object of laughter. His apologizing for being next in the entail’ is ridiculous. He does not exist simply for the sake of the story but exists in his own right and compels his creator to indulge him all over the place.

Most probably Jane Austen intended Mr. Collins to be a satirical portrait. All the intelligent characters in Pride and Prejudice’ are either bored or annoyed by him but for readers it is a rare treat to hear him talk. To call him simply a flatterer is to make a gross mistake, his speeches about Lady Catherine have devotional fervour. Jane Austen was no friend of romance, yet the fact remains than ridiculous Mr. Collins of her is a child of romance with all his oddities, He is ecstatic to introduce himself to Darcy at a party. Collin’s proposal to Elizabeth is the best comic proposal in literature. Mr. Collins being obsessed with the thought of his patroness has not sufficient interest and imagination to become a lover. His remark that being an heir to Mr. Bennet’s estate, he felt it almost his duty to choose one of his cousins. This is extraordinarily tactless, for no girl wishes to be pitied to. And Elizabeth hardly has realised it. Being refused he acts like a small boy imitating the elder and hints that refusal is a mere show of coyness.

And the next comic character is Collins’ patroness Lady Catherine de Bourgh. There is a lot of soothe mixed with humour in Jane Austen’s portrait of this dowager. She appears only twice in the story, but her name recurs infinitely in Collin’s speeches and letters. In the first she is seen seated on her throne as it were like a goddess of Rosings. Elizabeth is intelligent and self possessed girl, to her. She is an object of amusement rather than of respectful awe. She talks loudly almost non-stop to exert her personality but actually she has no personality and is vulgar in her tastes. She interferes into everybody’s affairs, poke her nose into their secrets and offers uncalled for advice. She esquires of Elizabeth in details about her family, age, activities and education of her sister’s in an objectionable manner. But Elizabeth stands her ground without feeling ashamed on afraid and plainly refuses to answer some of her cross questions. She becomes an object of laughter by her unabashed praise of herself and shameless habit of listening to her flatterers like Collins and Sir Williams. Lady Catherine is a foolish, headstrong woman who lacks both tact and manners like when she tries to intimidate Elizabeth to give-up the plan of marrying Dany.

So at last, we can say that Jane Austen looks at the contradictions in life with a genial humour. Her comic vision bubbles forth. She does not take cudgels against the erring people. She simply laughs at the follies of others and the peculiarities in human behaviour. Austen creates a genial laughter even in a serious situation with the skill of an artist.