Pride and Prejudice

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1813

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Volume 1, Chapters 1-3Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Volume 1

Volume 1, Chapter 1 Summary

Mrs. Bennet excitedly informs her husband that Mr. Bingley, a “single man of large fortune; four or five thousand a year” (6) has rented Netherfield Park, a nearby estate. According to Mrs. Bennet, this is “a fine thing” (6) for their five daughters. When Mr. Bennet asks why, Mrs. Bennet, exasperated, suggests Bingley may fall in love with one of them. Though she adamantly encourages her husband to visit Bingley, Mr. Bennet is in no hurry, telling her she and the girls may visit Bingley without him; he even suggests the girls go alone, for as Mrs. Bennet is “as handsome as any of them” (6),Bingley may fall in love with her, instead. Mrs. Bennet insists that a woman with “five grown up daughters” does not have the luxury of “thinking of her own beauty” (6).

Mrs. Bennet’s desire for her husband to visit Bingley is made greater by the fact that their neighbors, Sir William and Lady Lucas, are going. Mr. Bennet is unmoved, insisting he will “send a few lines by you to assure him of my hearty consent to his marrying whichever he chooses of the girls” (6); he adds that he personally prefers their daughter Elizabeth, for Elizabeth “has something more of quickness than her sisters” (7), who “are silly and ignorant like other girls” (7). When Mrs. Bennet accuses her husband of not considering her nerves, Mr. Bennet assures her that he has “a high respect” for her nerves, which are his “old friends” (7).

Volume 1, Chapter 2 Summary

Mr. Bennet “had always intended” to visit Bingley and in fact is “among the earliest” of Bingley’s visitors, but he keeps his intention from his wife (8). When Elizabeth is fixing her hat, Mr. Bennet tells her he hopes Bingley will like it; Mrs. Bennet “resentfully” reminds him that they “are not in a way to know what Mr. Bingley likes” because they haven’t met him (8). When Elizabeth suggests their friend, Mrs. Long, can introduce them, Mrs. Bennet tartly complains that Mrs. Long, “a selfish, hypocritical woman” (8), will not introduce them because she is trying to marry off her two nieces. In her frustration, she snaps at her daughter, Kitty, telling her to stop coughing and to “[h]ave a little compassion on my nerves” (8). Mr. Bennet, playing along, states that “Kitty has no discretion in her coughs” (8).

Mr. Bennet asks their daughter, Mary, for her opinion; Mary, “a young lady of deep reflection” (9), finds herself unable to come up with a reply. When Mrs. Bennet exclaims that she is “sick of Mr. Bingley,” Mr. Bennet tells her he wishes he had known, for he would not have visited Bingley that morning. The resulting “astonishment […] [is] just that he wished” (9). Mrs. Bennet, overjoyed, states that she knew he loved his daughters too much not to do as she’d asked, and that Kitty is now free to cough as much as she likes.

After telling her daughters that “making new acquaintances” is “not so pleasant” but that she does it for their sakes, Mrs. Bennet suggests Bingley will dance with Lydia, the youngest daughter, at the upcoming ball (10). The family then discusses plans to see Bingley in the future.

Volume 1, Chapter 3 Summary

Lady Lucas and her husband find Bingley “quite young, wonderfully handsome, extremely agreeable” (10), and he is willing to attend the next ball. The women are pleased, for “[t]o be fond of dancing [is] a certain step towards falling in love” (10-11). Mrs. Bennet tells Mr. Bennet that she will “have nothing to wish for” if she can arrange for one of her daughters to marry Bingley and for the rest to be “equally well married” (11).

A few days later, Bingley visits Mr. Bennet in his library. He is disappointed not to have met the Bennet daughters, “of whose beauty he had heard much” (11), but the daughters manage to catch a glimpse of him from an upstairs window.

Bingley is soon joined by his two sisters, brother-in-law, and friend, all of whom attend the ball. Bingley is attractive and friendly, and his sisters are “fine” (11) and fashionable. His friend, Mr. Darcy, is tall, handsome, and noble-looking. Also, according to rumor, his estate earns him £10,000 a year. He’s admired for much of the evening, until he is “discovered to be proud” and “above being pleased,” with “a most forbidding, disagreeable countenance” (12). Whereas Bingley is “lively and unreserved” (12), offering to give a ball at Netherfield, Darcy associates only with the women in his own party. He appears to those in attendance the “most disagreeable man in the world” (12).

Elizabeth overhears Darcy telling Bingley that she is “tolerable” but “not handsome enough to tempt me” (13) to dance. Though Elizabeth, who has “a lively, playful disposition, which delighted in any thing ridiculous,” has “no very cordial feelings towards him,” she laughingly shares the story with her friends (13).

Mrs. Bennet is pleased that Bingley dances with Jane twice; Elizabeth, too, is happy for Jane. Kitty and Lydia are happy to have had partners all night. They return to their home, Longbourn, to find Mr. Bennet reading. Mrs. Bennet regales him with tales of Mr. Bingley’s charms and of his obvious admiration of Jane, the only woman whom he asked to dance twice. She pronounces Darcy “high and so conceited,” declaring Elizabeth “does not lose much by not suiting his fancy” (15).

Volume 1, Chapters 1-3 Analysis

The famous opening sentence—“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife” (5)—establishes that marriage will be a central theme in the novel. By stating that it is “universally acknowledged,” however, Austen suggests that this “truth” is the opinion of the town, and not necessarily of the man in question. Similarly, the following sentence—which states that “this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding families” despite how “little known” (5) the man’s feelings actually are—establishes that gossip, or the meddling of outsiders, will play a role in events to come. The prevalence of gossip—such as the townspeople’s interest in how many people Bingley plans to bring to the Meryton ball—is demonstrated frequently in these chapters.

Though the story is told by an omniscient narrator, Austen frequently relays information from the point-of-view of the townspeople. Darcy, who “[is] looked at with great admiration for about half the evening” until “he [is] discovered to be proud, and above his company,” is described according to the people’s opinions of him (12). When he refuses to dance with anyone outside his own party, “[h]is character [is] decided” (12): “He [is] the proudest, most disagreeable man in the world” (12). This hyperbolic statement reinforces that Pride and Prejudice will be, in part, a study of people’s opinions.

Characters’ personalities are similarly revealed early on. Mrs. Bennet’s excitement over Bingley’s arrival at Netherfield is the first dialogue of the book; her husband’s passive response to her asking if he’d heard the news—Austen does not give him actual dialogue, instead simply stating that “Mr. Bennet replied that he had not” (5)—suggests that Mr. Bennet plays a more passive role than his exuberant wife.

The witty banter for which Pride and Prejudice is known is demonstrated in these early chapters, often in the back-and-forth volleys between the Bennets. Mrs. Bennet often bursts with emotion, and Mr. Bennet responds with a teasing retort that goes over Mrs. Bennet’s head. When Mrs. Bennet complains that Mr. Bennet has “no compassion on my poor nerves,” Mr. Bennet counters that he has “a high respect” for her nerves, which are his “old friends” (7). In Chapter 2, he plays along with his wife’s disappointment that he won’t visit Bingley, even though the visit has already occurred—and the “astonishment” his wife and daughters express “[is] just what he wished” (9). This incident illustrates the playfulness and humor that sustain him in a household of “silly” daughters and a wife “of mean understanding, little information, and uncertain temper” (7). It also shows the levity with which he treats the social niceties his family takes so seriously.

Despite Mr. Bennet’s teasing, Mrs. Bennet’s interest in society is not wholly irrelevant. Her comment that she “shall have nothing to wish for” if she sees her five daughters “well married” (11), while perhaps overly dramatic in the eyes of Mr. Bennet, demonstrates people’s real concern about ensuring the futures of their daughters. Because of the laws of land ownership, the Bennet daughters cannot inherit the family estate, Longbourn, when Mr. Bennet dies. The estate is entailed to a distant cousin, and this leaves the family’s future uncertain. The best chance each daughter has to be financially secure is to marry. Competition for eligible bachelors is established early: Mrs. Bennet’s desire to become friendly with Bingley is made more urgent because the Lucases are intending to do so, and she believes Mrs. Long won’t introduce them because she has nieces of her own. Though she is gossipy and frivolous, Mrs. Bennet’s urgency is inspired by real concern, a concern that Mr. Bennet appears not to acknowledge.