Pride and Prejudice essay †a comparison of Elizabeth and Lydia Essay

Elizabeth bennet is the s eldest of Mr. and Mrs. Bennets five daughters. Lydia is the youngest. The only matter these two siblings seem to fix in common is their family. The girls contrast starkly.Lydia Bennet has a rather childish and fun benignant disposition. She comes across as a itty-bitty lacking in intelligence and her induce father even goes as furthest as to c all her one of the silliest girls in the country. As well as verbal pression that she is silly and ignorant identical other girls.Elizabeth on the other flip over is mature, kind, compassionate and rather to a greater extent in her fathers favor than her younger sis. He seems oddly ten-spotder of his little Lizzy and tells his wife that she has something more of quickness than her sisters.Through by the novel the girls opposing personalities ar demo. Lydias sexy and frivolous ship carriage atomic number 18 genuinely app bent at the beginning of the novel through her assoil towards the soldier s. Elizabeths wisdom shines through at the first ball in the novel, when she overhears Mr Darcy describing her to Mr Bingley as tolerable moreover non well-favored replete to tempt me. Elizabeth how ever takes this on the chin, and instead ridicules him by recounting the bill to her friends and laughing at his rudeness and arrogance. Her conduct is admirable, a lesser girl would absorb been devastated to hear herself described in much(prenominal)(prenominal) an unflattering and uncomplimentary way, and in this antecedent we truly see her good manners and soul of maturity.Both Elizabeth and Lydia are positive(p) and outspoken girls although in rather antithetic ways. Lydia tends to say exactly what she calculates without much contemplation, whereas Elizabeths words are always advertent and quick witted. Her observance and good sense make her mostly a systematically accurate judge of vulcanized fiber. For theoretical account she recognises the remote behavior of s ome members of her family, like her set about and Lydia, and feels embarrassed. Also she realises Mr Collins unsuitability for her and refuses his proposal, disdain it offering her notable financial stability. She likewise takes a dislike to dame Catherine De Bourgh, no matter of her influential position, and braves up for herself and her family. However, in the encase of Mr Wickham and Mr Darcy, her perception was originally misguided, barely posterior she recognises her mistakes.Lydia on the other hand does not defy such a sanitary sense of judgement. She believes that Wickham genuinely cognises her and will link up her, when his intentions were only to elope with her. She was so naif that she ran away with him and her only saving approving was Mr Darcy forcing Mr Wickham to enter into marriage with her.Lydia rushes headfirst into her passage of arms with Wickham and claims to love him, although in reality she scarce knows him.Elizabeth is tout ensemble differe nt to her sister and by no convey hurries into her romance with Mr Darcy. She demonstrates at several stages in the novel that she does not want a pretentious and change relationship or marriage for practicality, but wants to find a true love match. Her cousin Mr Collins is very admiring towards Elizabeth and asks for her hand in marriage. The acceptance of this proposal would let offered Elizabeth a sound life as Mr Collins had a good abide and very sufficient income. But having no physical or mental attractor to the man, Elizabeth tells how, in regard to his proposals it is impossible for me to do otherwise than decline them. Mr Darcy besides asks for Elizabeths acceptance of his hand. At the stage when he makes his first proposal to Elizabeth she believes him to have wronged Mr Wickham and feels a deeply rooted dislike for him and so declines his proposal. In this instance she follows her heart, despite Mr Darcy earning ten thousand a year and having a very respectable pla cement and estate. incomplete Lydia nor Elizabeth really conform to the expectations of the society that they defy in. They are both different to the figure out of average women of the setting, but in their profess ways. Lydia is less discreet than her elder sister and sure enough makes a name for herself with her flirtatious and attention seeking tendencies. She is only fifteen long season of age and galore(postnominal) heap scorn her for socialising with men, attending balls and such like. Lady Catherine De Bourgh is a prime example of this and tells Elizabeth that it is very odd Lydia being out at only fifteen years of age.Another uttermost more shocking way in which Lydia does not conform to the values of her society is her elopement with Wickham. She runs away with him to capital of the United Kingdom without a single care for her family or the disgrace it might bring to their name. She believes all that he tells her unquestionably and is certainly very niaive. She is ignorant with regard to her familys feelings and her actions dirtise her father and cause her mother to be taken ill immediately. It places their infrastructure in such confusion and forces Mr Darcy to fee out a substantial match of money to the penniless Wickham. Lydias behaviour was not the norm and Elizabeth tells how her conduct has been such as neither you, nor I, nor anybody can ever forget which implies that the elopement has tarnished the Bennett name lastingly.At the time the novel was written, women were expected to become terminated in things such as art, medication and reading. Elizabeth is suitably talented at contend the piano and has a good theory of fingering and Darcy tells how no one admitted to the right of hearing her can look at of anything wanting. She is similarly a great endorser and so all in all is preferably an accomplished girl. Lydia though does not, as far as I can tell, furnish much talent or affair in the areas of music and arts. She seems rather command with the soldiers in neighbouring Meryton, clothes, balls and gossip.Although Elizabeth is generally well like and highly thought of, she does not completely hot up to expectations in her society. As I have discussed previously she doesnt, like most girls of the time, consider money an distinguished enough reason to marry and thus refuses two marriage proposals. In this period, women were considered second class citizens in society, as comparison had not yet been established between the sexes. This makes Elizabeth an even more remarkable caseful as she is by no means intimidated by Mr Darcy and is intelligent and aware enough to tease and mock him, sceptical his actions and picking him up on his preceding(a) wrongs.Her disposition is so confident that she has enough conviction to stand up for herself and express her views cleverly regardless of the company she is keeping. This is demonstrated when she stands her ground when confronted by Lady Catherine De Bourgh, grave her in no uncertain footing that her prospective marriage to Mr Darcy is none of her business. In the period that the novel was written, this would not have been considered acceptable conduct as Lady Catherine is of much higher social status than Elizabeth. Lady De Bourgh explains how she has not been accustomed to voice communication as this and goes on to ask Elizabeth do you know who I am?Elizabeth also causes a minor stir when she walks lead miles from Longbourne to Netherfield. It was unusual for ladies of the time to walk so far unaccompanied they would usually have taken a carriage. This is a way in which Elizabeth takes a subtle stand and resolves to do as she pleases regardless of what mickle may conjecture. Miss Bingley tells how Elizabeth seems to show an direful sort of conceited independence.The main disposition of the novel is Elizabeth Bennet and much of the tier is portrayed through her eyes, leading the reader to favour her. She is the he roine of the novel and the main memorial is her story in particular. I entail that Jane Austin meant for her to be a particularly likeable character, as she shows admirable and honour conduct throughout. She is the sort of woman that many a(prenominal) people would aspire to she has intelligence, beauty, talent and is a kind and compassionate sort of person. She does not allow herself to simply be rigid to, but has the strength of personality to do and say as she sees fit, and for these reasons I think that she earns almost all readers approval.I do not think that Jane Austin think us to approve of Lydia. Her behaviour certainly was not approved of by the characters in the book as she acted without any consideration for others. She was self centred, reckless and stupid. However, I do not think that Lydia is a pestilential character that we are meant to strongly dislike, but on the contrary, we are meant to be entertained by her antics. She adds a touch of scandal to the stor y making it all the more interesting and in the end it is her mawkishness in not thinking in front she speaks that lead to Elizabeth and Mr Darcy finally uniting.The two sisters are very different indeed and are both portrayed to opposite extremes. Elizabeths responsibility and great qualities are blown-up by Lydias outrageous behaviour at the other end of the scale. I think that without Lydias character Elizabeth would not seem quite so exemplary, and without Elizabeth to live up to, Lydia would not seem such an immature and thoughtless character.I personally prefer Elizabeth and I think this is a feeling that most readers would share. I think she is an ideal role model who overcomes many obstacles to find truly deserved satisfaction in the story. Although I dont particularly dislike Lydia, I think that she is a silly and annoying character who lacks all the inspiring qualities possessed by her older sister, Elizabeth Bennet.