Pride and Prejudice Theme Analysis: Love

Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice tells a frothy tale of gowns and parties, gossip and confidantes, distaste and love, and, of course, pride and prejudice. One of the major themes that Austen brings up in this surprisingly deep work is that of the importance of love. It is held up above practicality, social etiquette, even familial ties, and shown to be the source of utmost happiness and success. For those who love, who follow their heart recklessly, a happy ending awaits. Take the protagonist, for example. The lovely, spunky, sparkling Elizabeth Bennet refuses two marriage proposals throughout the course of the novel (a shocking and distasteful action for any young lady presented with a practical offer of marriage in that day) because she does not love the men. The marriages are as practical as could be, the proposed union with Mr. Collins providing a secure home and social status for not only Elizabeth but also for her family, and the first, denied offer by Mr. Darcy offering extreme affluence and status. However, Elizabeth recognizes that Collins “could not make [her] happy” and that she is the “last woman in the world who would make [him] so” (93). She claims that she is a “rational creature,” but also that she speaks the “truth from [her] heart” when she rejects him. She is guided by romance, feeling, happiness, and emotion, a stark contrast to her dear friend Charlotte, who marries that same ridiculous Collins, with the reason that marriage “was the only honorable provision for well-educated women of small fortune, and however uncertain of giving happiness, must be their pleasantest preservation from want” (107). Charlotte’s marriage is looked down upon by Elizabeth and, by extension, Austen (and, most likely, the reader, since the reader tends to sympathize with Elizabeth), hinting at a distaste for the pure practicality of many marriages. In contrast, Elizabeth gets a fairy-tale ending, surrounded by those that she loves, far from those she does not, fabulously wealthy, and completely happy. Her marriage is a union of practicality and emotion, the ideal marriage, a victory which proves Austen believed wholeheartedly that those who follow their hearts will achieve their merry end. Regarding the idea that love is placed over social etiquette, Darcy’s marriage to Elizabeth was less than prudent on his part, but he did it for love. Elizabeth’s denial of Collins was entirely socially unacceptable, but she did it for the sake of love. Darcy and Elizabeth’s interactions were entirely awkward and often imprudent, but they acted in their foolish ways because of love (or lack thereof). Furthermore, love is placed above familial ties when Bingley and Jane wed against his sister’s wishes, Darcy weds against his aunt’s wishes, and in spite of Elizabeth’s lackluster family, and Lydia abandons her family for “love” (perhaps not the best support for my argument, since her love was questionable to say the least). I’ll just go ahead and embrace the cliché: Pride and Prejudice claims that love conquers all, and also reveals that it is of utmost importance.

The ideal reader should take this theme to heart, closing the book after reading the last page with a smile on their face and a flutter of hope in their heart for their romantic future. The book champions the idea that love will succeed, even if it falls flat on its face a few times before it even begins the race. Every reader wants a romance like Jane or Elizabeth’s, where the players are attractive and wealthy, amiable and intelligent, and, above all, in deep, head-over-heels love. They overcome troubles, they help each other overcome their own issues, they end up happily married—what isn’t to like? Essentially, the ideal reader should view Jane Austen’s hopeful view of love as an inspiration and an encouragement to encourage the same in their own life. (Ironically, Austen did just this and ended up a spinster. Perhaps we should take her advice with a grain of salt.) Furthermore, it should encourage freedom from social etiquette and the standards we are held to by our peers, from and undesirable ties to others that may inhibit our happiness, and freedom from mundane practicality. At least, this is the way that Austen would have it. As I mentioned earlier (albeit sarcastically), we shouldn’t take this advice in its entirety without some speculation. Reading Pride and Prejudice and deciding to live one’s life just as the characters do in order to achieve the same happy end is equivalent to watching Cinderella and expecting the same fairy tale ending. The tale is just that, a tale. The fact that this is fiction, and not a true-to-life account, means that Austen isn’t necessarily speaking the truth, she is just conveying how she wishes life was. Thus, the “universal reader” should read this text and take away a glimmer of optimism, all the while with the understanding that this isn’t reality, it’s a romance.

Personally, I agree with Jane on this one. I like to believe that I live my life free from societal norms, seeking out happiness and love around every corner and above practicality. It reminds me of the conflict that all people go through when determining the path their future will take: should I choose a job based on the money it will bring in or how happy I will be in it? Honestly, I want to be the person who decides to choose happiness over money. I do understand that affluence can bring a measure of happiness, in the sense that it opens doors for adventure and provides connections, as well as simply makes life easier, but I can’t imagine living out my life going to a job every day that I didn’t love with all my heart and that didn’t make me happy. So, I want to choose love and happiness over practicality, because I believe that love does conquer all, and that it is the best source of joy and fulfillment in this world. Furthermore, on a Christian note, I know that God will provide for me, and thus I need not worry about the material things. As a child of God, my life is about the spiritual and emotional side of things entirely. Okay, I’ve gotten away from myself a bit. I do understand that Jane Austen is talking about interpersonal love, not love for an occupation. But, since marriage was a woman’s job, so to speak, I would want to find love in that “job” if I lived in those days as well.

Creative Writing--Symbolism

Telephone

She begged and pleaded,
Beseeched and coddled,
stomped and pouted,
and then one day, mom ceded.

A new phone,
Peel off the plastic,
A picture of her dog as the background.

Week one: Freedom.
The mall, the park, the ice cream store.
Independence.
But check in with mom when you get there,
and on your way home.

After 2 weeks,
Her phone was sparkled
Bedazzled with gems,
Little hearts desperate to reflect the backlight.
Notice me!
But they are all the same colored plastic.
Teen Hearthrob replaces the puppy,
A colored hoodie and dark blue jeans the soccer shorts and t-shirt.

Her music,
Internet,
Social life,
GPS,
Photographs,
In one neat package, closed with a flip.
How did she live without it?

At the mall, she sits at a table, 3 friends in chairs.
Jeans alike, jackets alike, puffy boots alike,
Expressions of smug boredom alike.
Mom walks in to pick her up,
Which one is she?
She has to call and ask.

City vs. Country--Psychological Lens

Death of a Salesman is laden with conflict--father vs. son, man vs. woman, man vs. the business world, man vs. his past, etcetera. All of these affect the characters' psyches, but one of the biggest influences is the conflict between city and country life. Within the first minutes of the play, Willy asks Linda to open the windows, and when she informs him that they are, in fact, open, he rants "The way they boxed us in here. Bricks and windows, windows and bricks" (26). The mentality that the city is oppressing, stifling, even suffocating the characters permeates the entire book. The entire play feels trapped, as if the audience is being sucked helplessly in to the black hole of lies, failed dreams, and unrealistic expectations that characterize the Loman family, only to be freed when Willy is freed by his death.

In the city, life is driven by success, which translates to money and the approval of others. When discussing the path his life has taken, Happy blatantly states "It's what I always wanted. My own apartment, a car, and plenty of women" (31). However, before this self-affirming statement comes a monologue of doubt and exasperation--his life consists of constant ladder-climbing, never to be able to enjoy his present situation because he is perpetually looking forward, upward, and just out of reach. As the old adage goes, "the grass is always greener on the other side"--a mentality that can only lead to discontentment. Ironically, Happy will never be happy, simply because he will never stop attempting to reach that next promotion or that other, prettier girl. But isn't that the way of the city? You never reach the top, and if you do it's only to be overtaken by another, more successful, ambitious, lucky contender? Both Happy and Willy take similar approaches to their business-rooted discontentment. They lie. Willy conceals affairs, depression, even the fact that he isn't getting a paycheck in order to preserve the illusion of a perfect, happy family. Happy, similarly, lies about his job position (he's really just "one of the two assistants to the assistant" rather than the assistant manager, a lie he tells in order to keep his father happy and proud (124)), his love life (he promises, "I'm gonna get married, Mom. I wanted to tell you,"in order to keep his mother hopeful that a perfect family is on the way (70)), and even to the girls at the restaurant (when his father acts oddly, he claims "that's not my father. He's just a guy" (111)). Like a spider that has gotten caught his own web, both Willy and Happy have become entangled in their lies, and have nowhere to turn except for more deceit. They aren't hopeless--no, they continue to maintain a fervid hope that one day they will measure up to their own expectations. Rather, they are alone. Isolated by their deceit, only they can truly know themselves, if that. Relationships, even with their close family, are not between them and another person, but rather, the person they have created for themselves and another. They act out the scenes as the character they have created for themselves, but they lack the ability to step out of costume and into reality, because they are play-actors surrounded by genuine people. In fact, that inability to separate reality from fiction (or the past from the present) is at the root of Willy's hallucinations, and caused his eventual suicide--he couldn't live in the world any longer because he never knew how to live in the real world. In short, living in the city is portrayed in this play as an oppressive and constrictive lifestyle, and one that leads only to discontentment.

In contrast, the country is portrayed as this idealized, beautiful place, where people are free to live their own lives as their own selves, unbound by the social pressures of the city. Take the image of Willy driving home from Florida, where "the trees are so thick and the sun is warm," with the windshield down, letting the "warm air bathe over" him (24). Refreshing, calming, and beautiful, this depiction of a country drive is a sharp contrast to the depressing city. On a symbolic level, the windshield of the car represents the city, enclosing and entrapping. Once that gets out of the way, though, Willy is free to enjoy and experience life, symbolized by the trees, sun, and air. The largest contrast between city and country, however, comes in the form of Biff. He romanticizes the wild west, escaping there to find contentment and returning home only to feel that "all [he's] done is to waste his life" (31). He beseeches Happy to come out west with him, "buy a ranch, raise cattle, use [their] muscles," but Happy refuses, claiming that his contentment comes from his success and his women. However, Happy is quite obviously unhappy, discrediting the workaday lifestyle as a source of happiness. This provides credibility to Biff's claims that the west provides him with contentment. Interestingly enough, Biff is at peace when he is away from people and independent--yet another characteristic of a "country man." By living to please himself and rejecting the expectations of others, as Willy and Happy do in the city, Biff is able to come to grips with himself and his true personality. He understands that the city is not the place for him, saying to Happy, "men built like we are should be working out in the open" (31). Many people go to nature in order "find themselves," stopping and breathing in the fresh air and the beauty of nature on the beach, in the mountains, or really anywhere that is an escape from the pressures of work and day-to-day life. The country, nature, where a man can "be outdoors, with [his] shirt off," is where Biff finds individuality and contentment, away from the city and the pressures of his family, and where Willy escapes to in his mind when he realizes he can't escape the life he has built around himself in the city (30). Biff's honesty, when it comes to his actions, his future, his past, everything, is another huge contrast between the city and country mentalities. Because he lived on his own for so long, apart from his family or anyone else who held expectations for him, Biff is now able to separate himself from the web of lies that serve as home for the Loman family. He can see the truth of his own life, his inadequacies as well as his talents, and must tell the truth to his family to finally cut away the last strands of the web and be free. Essentially, the city is confinement and the country is freedom, and no matter how many seeds Willy plants in the city, attempting to salvage a little bit of country in both his physical and emotional "homes," it's "too late now"--nothing is going to grow (116).

Photo Walk

After 2 hard days of skiing, I set out for the river near my family's cabin in Packwood, Washington, legs tired and fingers numb. Just a minute or so walk away from our haven in the woods, the trees open up to reveal a vast riverbed. Tall trees conquered by the rushing floods of the Cowlitz in the spring pepper the riverbank, gnarled roots exposed to the frigid winds. All of these photos likely look the same to many of you, shot after shot of brown and dark green woods with a light dusting of snow. But, in fact, each of these are something entirely different to me. Maybe because I am hyper aware of my surrounding and any change in them, but more likely because of the many years I have spent exploring these woods and riverbeds with my brothers.

I came across a little clearing that Seth and I dubbed "Walk Like an Indian Campground." When we were little, my brothers always instructed me to "walk like an Indian" during our voyages through the moss-covered groves. Not to make a noise, step on a twig, brush up against a leaf. And I, the recalcitrant girl that I was (and am), always questioned them. Whats the point of exploring, adventuring, living if I don't leave my mark behind, to be remembered by those to come? I would stomp through the woods, twigs breaking helplessly under my velcro skechers. But I realized something the other day. This world is more beautiful than anything I could ever hope to leave behind. In fact, I can't picture myself making a single improvement to the wild beauty and freedom of this place. I don't want to leave my mark on this wood, I want to respect and enjoy it without corrupting one of the few things that seems, well, natural in my life. Its like climbing mountains, or skiing a really hard line--you don't "conquer" the mountain (a mentality that I have set out with more than once). Rather, I have respect for the mountain's danger, strength, and grandeur, and hope and pray that it respects my attempts to enjoy that grandeur in the best waysI know how.

Honestly, people kind of suck sometimes. Let's compare: the Miller Lite can nestled in the well of a grand old tree, blue and silver aluminum adding nicely to the rich pallette of green and brown, or the gigantic beaver dam, an indication of the intelligence, strength, determination, and organization in nature. Which would you rather leave behind? I don't want to touch these woods. I want to respect their wildness, I want to enjoy their beauty, I want to walk like an Indian.

Don't get me wrong--I've always been the type of girl who wants to be remembered, to make her mark on the world. But not here, not in the woods, not someplace thats already perfect. No, the girl in the woods, the girl who doeasn't wear makeup, has a compulsive need to keep up with the boys, plays in the dirt, skins her knees, and is an awesome shot with a slingshot, she doesn't leave a mark. The girl in the city, the girl in heels, with an insatiable appetite for fashion magazines, who knows way too much about pop culture, and uses more than 5 adjectives to order her coffee--she won't hesitate to leave a mark on those city streets, because that home of hers isn't perfect, and she won't rest until she's done all she can to make it just as wonderful, wild, free, lovely, perfect as the woods she grew up in.

I'm scared. I'm scared of leaving these woods behind. I don't want to lose the girl in the woods. I don't want to lose my passion for the outdoors, the inexplicable power a beautiful sunset at the cove has to clear my head, the feeling of flying through the trees, skis buried in knee-deep powder, and simply letting go. these pictures look cold, unwelcoming. Some of them seem as if they were taken in black and white, the colors are so

bleak. But these woods, this riverbed, is welcoming, comforting, and warm. Memories flood my head--getting trapped in a whirlpool at the base of a tree in a yellow rubber raft, paddling and laughing and screaming for dear life, the bottom of that yellow raft falling out on us while lazily floating along, a brother's trick that left me standing barefoot in a pile of elk pellets, dams built, towers knocked down, frigid swims, hot days, burying ourselves in mud, finding pools so beautiful we pretended that we were in Lord of the Rings. My life has been idyllic thus far, so much that it scares me sometimes. I'm afraid of losing the joy, passion, and vibrancy of my childhood when I face the real world. And frankly, the idea of living in a concrete jungle freaks me out a little bit. Sometimes I just want to escape and live in a little cabin in a ski town and play outside my entire life. But I know that I have so much more potential, and I would kick myself for eternity if I wasted the gifts I have been blessed with because I am afraid of going out of my comfort zone, afraid of being away from sunsets, mountains, snow, rain, trees, rivers, oceans. I have to trust that God is just as present in the city sidewalks as he is in the wide open sky, and that I can find myself just as well in the library of a university as I can atop a mountain. Just like jumping off a cliff, taking a breath and skiing off that ridge, running for miles--I have to let go. But before I do, just one more look at the riverbank, dusted in snow.

Total and Prose Meaning of "Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Eliot

“We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.”

J. Alfred Prufrock lives inside his head. His fantasies throughout the poem deviate further away from reality as the poem goes on, beginning with the idea that he might simply interact with the women, then the daydream of a long relationship with one of the women, and finally a scene involving him swimming with the mermaids. With the final stanza, Prufrock reveals the gravity of these daydreams. The idea that he is fully submerged in “the chambers of the sea” heightens the feeling of being trapped inside his head. However, Prufrock does not paint this scene as an unpleasant one. In fact, his description of the mermaids is beautiful and peaceful—“sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown.” Thus, he acknowledges his separation from the real world and admits that his seclusion isn’t an unwanted one. In the final, haunting line, Prufrock is forced to face the contrast between his situation and reality, and he “dies,” for Prufrock lives only in his dreams and fantasies, and, when he is faced with reality, he dies (figuratively, that is). When he is shocked out of his contented dream, the force of the water—the realization of the isolation, stagnancy, and depression of his uneventful life—crushes him.

Now, I’ve gotten a bit ahead of myself. Prufrock comes to this conclusion after just over 130 lines of internal monologue, written in a stream-of-consciousness style that make this insecure man even more vulnerable and transparent than he already is. As I said, he slowly drifts away from reality. He begins by asking an ambiguous other character (interpreted in this analysis as himself) to walk around a decrepit city, described with raw, even sexual imagery. (The evening is “spread out across the sky/like a patient etherized upon a table,” “restless nights” are spent in “cheap hotels,” and streets are like arguments with “insidious intent.”) At the end of the stanza, he says “Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”/Let us go and make our visit.” In this opening stanza, he appears to have a purpose (to visit the women), seems likely to fulfill that purpose (telling himself not to ask questions, but to simply act), and also seems to have a full grasp on reality (through his descriptions of highly tangible things). His imagery and diction is characteristic of a somewhat despondent, sexually inclined, normal man. In the next stanza, he compares the “yellow fog” in the city to a cat, rubbing itself against the buildings, “lick[ing] its tongue on the corners of the evening,” “lingering” in stagnant pools, and letting itself be dirtied by soot. While, yes, the metaphor is between the fog and the cat, the cat’s actions in fact mirror those of Prufrock. He wallows in the muck of his surroundings, he revels in the grimy puddles and smudged windowpanes, and then, with full understanding of his depressing surroundings, turns his back and falls asleep, to fester in his own passivity.

While I have yet to discuss the bulk of the poem, these first and last stanzas speak the most of Prufrock’s character and mental state. The middle stanzas are all very similar, all rebounding back to his passivity and dreaminess. This idea of him talking himself in a circle is reinforced by his repetition of the sentence “In the room the women come and go/Talking of Michelangelo.” He questions himself (against his own wishes, ironically) repeatedly as well, questions such as “Do I dare?” “How do I presume?” “Would it have been worth it?” that prove his uncertainty and insecurity. This insecurity is furthered with his awareness of his physical imperfections that hold him back from action as well. When he plans to triumphantly “descend the stair” he remembers his appearance, certain that the women will say “How his hair is growing thin!” and “But how his arms and legs are thin!” However, it is not only his insecurity that holds Prufrock captive to his own inactivity. He uses violent, gruesome imagery to depict his society’s reaction to him, saying they will pin him “sprawling…wriggling on the wall” and that his head will be “brought in on a platter.” He fears the harsh judgment of society and believes that they have grest power over him, his happiness, and his life. He even admits that he has “seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker, and in short, I was afraid.” On a literal level, he is afraid of death, but on a figurative (and perhaps more relevant) level, he is afraid of rejection, of social death.

Towards the end of his monologue, he says “I grow old… I grow old…” In this repeated phrase, the meaning of this poem comes clear. Life and time rushes by as he sits back and thinks, falling further and further away from reality, action, relationships, and experience. He is like the “lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows”—he only observes the world, never engages in it. In his last, desperate attempt to find life in his life, by eating peaches and rolling his trousers up, fantasy elements (the mermaids) find their way in, and the fact that he has no true, real escape from his musings becomes clear. If life is spent in watching, thinking, and musing, analyzing and questioning, life is not life at all. His insecurity and fear bind him like the chains of paralysis, locking him inside his own mind, never to experience, well, anything tangible at all.

Tone Analysis: "Ghost House" by Robert Frost

Ghost House

I dwell in a lonely house I know
That vanished many a summer ago,
And left no trace but the cellar walls,
And a cellar in which the daylight falls,
And the purple-stemmed wild raspberries grow.


O'er ruined fences the grape-vines shield
The woods come back to the mowing field;
The orchard tree has grown one copse
Of new wood and old where the woodpecker chops;
The footpath down to the well is healed.


I dwell with a strangely aching heart
In that vanished abode there far apart
On that disused and forgotten road
That has no dust-bath now for the toad.
Night comes; the black bats tumble and dart;


The whippoorwill is coming to shout
And hush and cluck and flutter about:
I hear him begin far enough away
Full many a time to say his say
Before he arrives to say it out.


It is under the small, dim, summer star.
I know not who these mute folk are
Who share the unlit place with me--
Those stones out under the low-limbed tree
Doubtless bear names that the mosses mar.


They are tireless folk, but slow and sad,
Though two, close-keeping, are lass and lad,--
With none among them that ever sings,
And yet, in view of how many things,
As sweet companions as might be had.

Frost develops a tone of melancholy contentment throughout this poem. The poem has a sort of sad beauty about it, with images of nature, triumphant over the homes, fences, and roads of man. The rebirth and regrowth of this nature, however, is depicted with careful diction maintaining the funereal tone of the poem. For instance, the rasperries grow in a "cellar in which the daylight falls," and image that implies a death or degradation with the term "fall" (as opposed to the common terms for sunshine: "shines" Fills" "lights up"). It's as if the sunlight is defeated in this cellar, an intriguing foreshadow to the eventual revelation that this poem is a euphemism for a graveyard, since death is archetypally seen as the defeat of light (or life) by darkness (or death.) Another example of the delicate sadness maintained in the nature imagery is the second stanza, in which terms like "shield," "mowing field," "chops," and "healed" imply a harsher, darker take on the overgrowth of nature (the word "copse" even looks like the word "corpse"). There is a slight tone shift in the last half of the third stanza and the 4th stanza, where the melancholy lightens and the speaker tells of bats that "tumble and dart" and a fluttering whipoorwhill, images evoking life and joy. There is also a barrage of verbs in these lines, providing an energy which contrasts with the slow and descriptive sentence structure of the first stanzas--a hint that the speaker is "waking up" and is about to give the thrust of the poem (as most of it has been description thus far). This shift in energy gives the poem a more optimistic and positive tone, at least until the last two stanzas, in which the speaker shifts back into a more melancholy tone and seems unwilling to accept the fact that he is, in fact, dead (it's as if he is in denial). He describes the corpses as "mute...tireless folk" who "share the unlit place with me" (the "unlit place" refers to the "lonely house" he has discussed throughout the poem), a lovely and euphemistic description of dead bodies. His descriptions do depict a contentment with his present situation, however. By describing the dead lovers as "sweet companions" and in using euphemism, he portrays the lighter, closer to bittersweet side of death, and thus conveys his slightly positive attitude towards his own death.

Meyers-Briggs Personality Test

Your Type is ESFP
Extraverted-78%
Sensing-25%
Feeling-75%
Perceiving-33%

After reading all of the links explaining what, exactly, ESFP means, as well as the jobs that are good options for me, I can definitely say that this is a pretty accurate depiction of myself. The major character traits were a tendency to talk endlessly, a desire to be the center of attention, a need to be around people, spontaneity and a lack of planning skills, and a sense of ease in most situations. The jobs suggested for me were related to performing first and foremost, which makes complete sense with my hobbies, fashion (yet again, makes perfect sense), and general realtions with people. In addition, the ESFP personality type is known as the "performer" and also tends to be very interested and up-to-date in fashion, music, media, and the like. All of these traits are true to my personality. However, I have a very solitary, organized, and calm side that, although it may be repressed a bit, is not reflected in the results.