Pride and Prejudice introduces Mrs. Bennet, who looks forward to the arrival of the rich, young man, Mr. Bingley, who will hopefully marry one of her five daughters. During the ball, Mr. Bingley shows great affection to Jane Bennet, whereas Mr. Darcy now holds the reputation of a wealthy yet selfish and prideful gentleman. As Jane and Bingley's relationship rises upwards, Caroline Bingley shows extreme hatred and jealousy towards the Bennets. Later, Mr. Darcy finds himself falling for Elizabeth Bennet, although she despises him for various reasons: he prevented her sister, Jane, and Mr. Bingley from seeing each other, breaking their relationship; George Wickham, Mr. Darcy's former friend, had said that he stole Wickham's inherited money from his father's master, late Mr. Darcy. However, it is soon discovered from his apological letter that Mr. Darcy had only tried separating Bingley and Jane as he thought it unsuitable for his friend to get attached to the Bennet family with its lack of wealth. George Wickham is also found to be lying and spent all his inheritance partying. Meanwhile, Mr. Collins becomes engaged to Elizabeth's best friend, Charlotte; Jane and Mr. Bingley happily reunite and marry; Wickham ends up married to Lydia Bennet, an unalert and naive girl; whereas Elizabeth accepts Mr. Darcy's proposal.
Other than romantic feelings, love can hold many lies and dark secrets, blinding idealistic people from reality. Many people in a romantic relationship don’t see through the playful charms that are made, and end up stuck in a trap. In Pride and Prejudice, the relationship between Wickham and Elizabeth Bennet, although not entirely romantic, reflects the blindness and prejudice Elizabeth had held. George Wickham is a handsome, charming, yet poor man who seeks money, wealth, and social status. After hearing that Darcy, his enemy, had already had a bad reputation and first impression, Wickham created schemes to alure innocent girls with higher status than him. His tricks worked especially on Elizabeth, as she was so prejudiced against Darcy that she even believed Wickham over her sister Jane and Miss Bingley. In this case, Elizabeth is shown to be blinded by Wickham’s charms and schemes, like a fish who was tricked by the bait. In addition, Wickham found and performed his charms on Miss King, later revealed to be Georgiana Darcy, who had just inherited a fortune. Soon, however, he is caught by Mr. Darcy and forced to surrender his plans. Wickham had been trapped by his own, everlasting greed for money and reputation. Elizabeth and Wickham are both shown to get blinded by different facets of the darkness of love. People can get deprived of understanding, perception, and reality when fallen in the various traps that a relationship can hold.
Marriage depends not only on the aspect of love, but also on social status and wealth in order to ensure family stability. Although most stable marriages are relatively more realistic, engagements that only look up on finance can result in an unamusing future. In the novel, Charlotte and Mr. Collins’ engagement is shown to be blind and deprived of true love. Charlotte only married Collins because he was rich and had a good amount of social status, which was just what she needed; Collins, on the other hand, saw marriage as a little and unimportant pick-me game and didn’t care much about Charlotte’s poor condition or appearance. They both don’t have any romantic intentions, but in reality, that makes their marriage a suitable match. In addition, it is shown from Charlotte’s conversation with Elizabeth that she is happy when her husband isn’t around. She purposefully separates her drawing room and Mr. Collins’ studio, and encourages him to work in the front garden while her room was in the back of the house. Charlotte mainly seeks stability and doesn’t care much about love; the only romance that she had consisted of the fake charms she set up to make Collins take interest in her, much like George Wickham. Collins, on the other hand, seeks reputation, and doesn’t want to get rejected the third time; therefore, he settles on Charlotte, who seems to like him. Blind marriages, ones that lack true love, makes a turn for the worst: a future in isolation, just like the result of Charlotte and Collins’ engagement.
In the subject of ‘romantic blindness’, marriage holds more of it than just love, as it has a social advantage. Many relationships might not question much about social status, wealth, and financial situations, while in engagements, these factors are put to great consideration. The two relationships in the novel, Elizabeth and Wickham, and Charlotte and Mr. Collins, each reflect the blindness that love and marriage can hold. However, Charlotte and Mr. Collins’ engagement is somewhat even more deprived of love and true understanding. In the former’s relationship, a hint of love or in other terms, friendship, could be detected within Elizabeth. Although she later finds out that she didn’t really like Wickham at all, she is still shown to take interest for him and follow him around. On the other hand, in the latter’s marriage, the two sides don’t have any feelings for each other: Charlotte likes it when her husband is absent, while Collins only purely wants a wife and reputation of not getting rejected the third time. In addition, the importance of love to them is made smaller than a fraction when social advantages are introduced to their marriage. Charlotte’s only purpose of marrying Collins is for his wealth, inheritance, and relatively higher social status. Marriage, in terms, possesses more amounts of romantic blindness than love, as it holds a social advantage over true love.
In Pride and Prejudice, many different marriages centering different social classes and characters are introduced, such as the engagements between Jane and Bingley, Elizabeth and Darcy, Lydia and Wickham, and Charlotte and Collins. The novel introduces two different relationships, a relationship, although not fully romantic, between Elizabeth and Wickham, and the marriage between Elizabeth and Mr. Collins. Both of these connections are shown to be ‘blind’, or deprived of understanding, perception, and love. Between love and marriage, the latter is holds relatively more amounts of ‘romantic blindness’, as it has the social advantage of social status, financial situation, and wealth.
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