Pearson Education Limited

Pride and Prejudice

JANE AUSTEN

Level 5
Retold by Evelyn Attwood
ries Editors: Andy Hopkins and Jocelyn Potter


Pearson Education Limited
Edinburgh Gate, Harlow,
Essex CM20 2JE, England
and Associated Companies throughout the world.
ISBN-13: 978-0-582-41935-3
ISBN-10: 0-582-41935-2
First published in the Longman Simplified English Series 1945
First published in Longman Fiction 1993
This adaptation first published in 1996
This edition first published 1999
10
NEW EDITION
This edition copyright © Penguin Books Ltd 1999
Cover design by Bender Richardson White

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Contents

		page
Introduction		V
Chapter 1	The Bennets	1
Chapter 2	New Neighbours at Netherfield	3
Chapter 3	Jane Gains an Admirer	9
Chapter 4	Mr Collins	18
Chapter 5	Mr Wickham	22
Chapter 6 The Ball at Netherfield		27
Chapter 7	Mr Collins Makes a Proposal of Marriage	33
Chapter 8	Netherfield Is Empty	36
Chapter 9	Mr Collins Makes Another Proposal	38
Chapter 10	Jane Goes to London	40
Chapter 11	Elizabeth Visits Hunsford	43
Chapter 12	Lady Catherine de Bourgh	46
Chapter 13	Visitors to Rosings	48
Chapter 14	Mr Darcy	53
Chapter 15	Elizabeth Receives a Letter	59
Chapter 16	Elizabeth and Jane Return Home	65
Chapter 17 The Regiment Leaves Meryton		70
Chapter 18	Pemberley	73
Chapter 19	The Bingleys	80
Chapter 20	Lydia and Wickham	84
Chapter 21	Mr Gardiner Goes to London	89

Chapter 22	Mr Bennet Returns	93
Chapter 23	Lydia and Wickham Are Found	95
Chapter 24	Mr Bennet Agrees to Their Marriage	99
Chapter 25	Return to Netherfield	106
Chapter 26	Lady Catherine Visits Longbourn	114
Chapter 27	Elizabeth and Mr Darcy	119
Chapter 28	The End	126
Activities		129

Introduction
Jane Austen was born in Steventon, Hampshire, in the south of England, in 1775. She was the seventh of eight children of George Austen, the minister of Steventon Church, and his wife Cassandra Leigh, whose father was also a church minister. Jane spent the first 25 years of her life at home in Steventon, where she learnt French, Italian, music and needlework. She was taught by her father, who encouraged her to read widely. The family also enjoyed performing plays, and it seems that Jane took part in these. She began writing at the age of fourteen as entertainment for her family.
When George Austen left his post in 1801, the family moved to Bath, a city which often features in Jane Austen's stories. When he died four years later, Jane moved back to Hampshire with her mother and sister and lived there until her death at the age of forty-one. The last few years of her life were affected by the development of the disease from which she died, and the suffering it caused her.
Jane Austen's life was an uneventful one, although some of her relatives led more exciting lives. She never married; she received proposals of marriage, though, and accepted one of them before changing her mind the next day. She was very close to her family, and in particular to her sister Cassandra, who also remained single. It seems that this quiet, ordered existence was necessary to Jane in order that she could write. She wrote very little while living in Bath, which was a relatively unsettled period in her life.
The restricted life that Jane Austen led had a strong influence on the subject matter of her stories, all of which deal with the everyday lives and concerns of middle-class people living in the countryside and towns of England. These people are anxious, above all, about their own and others' social position, about affairs

v

of the heart and marriage. Austen's particular skill is the careful and humorous way in which she explores every detail of their lives. A strong sense of morality underlies her work, which makes it even more powerful. This moral sense is shown through Austen's description of her characters' behaviour; the writer's beliefs are not stated openly.
Austen's early writing often made gentle fun of popular fiction of the time. Love and Friendship, her first book (completed in 1790), was not very kind to those writers who scorned emotional self-control. Northanger Abbey was written at the same time, but only appeared after her death. The main character in this book reads a great deal, and as a result confuses literature with real life. Sense and Sensibility was begun in 1797 but did not appear in print until 1811. This book, Pride and Prejudice (1813), Emma (1816) and Persuasion (1817) are Austen's best-known works; they all deal in sharply and humorously observed detail with the manners and morals of one small social group. A more deeply serious work is Mansfield Park (1814); this has never been as popular with the reading public as the others, but to many it is the height of her achievement. Austen's novels were fairly popular in her lifetime, but it was only after her death that they achieved great success and that she was really given the respect she deserved.
Pride and Prejudice was originally written under the title First Impressions. Austen then rewrote the book as Pride and Prejudice, which appeared in 1813 and became probably the most popular of her works. Austen herself loved the book, calling it "my own darling child", and she was very fond of Elizabeth Bennet, the story's main character.
It was very important at that time for young women of a certain class to marry well, since they had no money or property of their own and were completely dependent on their fathers first and then on their husbands. The story shows how various
characters choose their marriage partners, and the mistakes they make along the way. The underlying message is that it is not enough to marry for money alone; this will lead to unhappiness. Correct and polite behaviour is another important subject, but Austen shows that an honest and honourable nature is more important than social rules which are followed only on the surface.
Mrs Bennet's chief anxiety is her urgent need to find good husbands for all five of her daughters. So when a rich, unmarried young man rents a large house in the neighbourhood, her excitement reaches new heights; she is determined that Mr Bingley should marry one of the girls. He does in fact seem to be attracted to her oldest daughter, the calm and lovely Jane, but their relationship is not in fact an easy one. Mr Bingley has a rich friend named Darcy who begins to admire Jane's lively and amusing sister Elizabeth. On first sight, though, Elizabeth finds Mr Darcy much too proud and scornful of the company in which he finds himself, and she wants nothing to do with him. Gradually these four young people get to know each other, and themselves, much better, and they are often surprised by the discoveries they make.