10 Famous Books You've Been Reading Wrong This Whole Time
7. Jane Austen's Pride And Prejudice Is Not All That Romantic
Most people believe Pride And Prejudice to be the greatest piece of chick lit ever written, harking back to a more genteel time when ladies were ladies, men were square-jawed and stories ended with a nice wedding. They also believe it involves Colin Firth in some capacity.
Pride And Prejudice, at its heart, is not some grand love story. Love plays a part, as does prejudice and indeed pride, but the nub and crux of the book is its subtle critique of the social norm of treating women, specifically daughters, as a means of moving up the social ladder.
This message criticising what essentially amounts to arranged marriage has been lost over the years. This happens a lot with older books with romantic plotlines: Wuthering Heights, for example, is often considered a great romance, but it's more of a revenge story than anything else.
To truly understand Austen's writing, you need some insight into the woman herself. Jane Austen, who never married and didn't really like people, had no patience with either romance or the restrictions placed upon her by her class and gender. She was very smart and she was very bored, as anyone might be if their primary roles in life consisted of 'embroidery' and 'being charming'.