Jane Austen is renowned for her light, humorous style, perfected in her various romantic trifles, including "Pride and Prejudice", "Sense and Sensibility", and "Emma". Austen's style is especially characterized by her humor and expert use of irony, as well as her biting social commentary.



In "Pride and Prejudice", Austen manages to poke fun at nearly all of her characters. Mrs. Bennet, the family matriarch, is hilariously caught up in the romantic lives of her daughters and at times appears embarrassingly silly. The irony of Mrs. Bennet is that her antics actually wind up repelling the appropriate suitors she so craves for her daughters.



\Unlike many British authors of the period, Austen is less concerned with describing the scenery than with revealing the emotions and motivations of her characters. She accomplishes this, not through omnipresent narration, but through dialogue. The characters' interactions reveal, not only how they feel about each other, but how they feel about themselves, such as this exchange between Mr. and Mrs. Bennet, from the novel's first chapter:

``My dear Mr. Bennet,'' said his lady to him one day, ``have you heard that Netherfield Park is let at last?''

Mr. Bennet replied that he had not.

``But it is,'' returned she; ``for Mrs. Long has just been here, and she told me all about it.''

Mr. Bennet made no answer.

``Do not you want to know who has taken it?'' cried his wife impatiently.

``You want to tell me, and I have no objection to hearing it.''

This was invitation enough.

``Why, my dear, you must know, Mrs. Long says that Netherfield is taken by a young man of large fortune from the north of England; that he came down on Monday in a chaise and four to see the place, and was so much delighted with it that he agreed with Mr. Morris immediately; that he is to take possession before Michaelmas, and some of his servants are to be in the house by the end of next week.''

``What is his name?''

``Bingley.''

``Is he married or single?''

``Oh! single, my dear, to be sure! A single man of large fortune; four or five thousand a year. What a fine thing for our girls!''



Austen also makes fun of her heroine, Elizabeth, and her eventual love interest, Mr. Darcy, by pitting them against each other. Elizabeth's initial judgment of Darcy as rude and haughty, and his of her as loud and low-class, reveal what Austen thought was the overly-critical aspect of the English society she lived in.



Although Austen's style is often criticized as being too light and romantic to be considered true literature, many readers do not realize the social commentary hidden in her works. In "Pride and Prejudice", Austen criticizes not the necessity of marriage, but the terrible effort (by people like Mrs. Bennet) that goes into securing favorable marriages.



In the end, though, Austen prefers happy endings for
those characters that deserve them. After a novel's worth of bungling their destined courtship, Darcy and Elizabeth finally realize they are meant to be. Likewise, Jane, Elizabeth's sister, marries her love, Mr. Bingley, despite initial fears that she was not as in love as her.



Over the ages, Austen's style has fared remarkably well and become the blueprint for hundreds of examples of lesser "chick lit", including "Bridget Jones's Diary" and "Clueless".