VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION
GRADUATION PAPER

THE CHANGES OF MR. DARCY IN THE NOVEL
PRIDE AND PREJUDICE BY JANE AUSTEN
Supervisor: Văn Thị Thanh Bình, M.A
Student: Nguyễn Huyền Ly
Course: QH2010
Ha Noi, May 2014
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ĐẠI HỌC QUỐC GIA HÀ NỘI
TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ
KHOA SƯ PHẠM TIẾNG ANH
KHÓA LUẬN TỐT NGHIỆP
SỰ THAY ĐỔI CỦA DARCY TRONG TIỂU THUYẾT
KIÊU HÃNH VÀ ĐỊNH KIẾN CỦA JANE AUSTEN
Giáo viên hướng dẫn: Th.s Văn Thị Thanh Bình
Sinh viên: Nguyễn Huyền Ly
Khóa: QH2010
HÀ NỘI - 2014
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ACCEPTANCE PAGE
I hereby state that I: (Nguyen Huyen Ly, class Qh2010.F1.E1), being a candidate
for the degree of Bachelor of Arts (TEFL) accept the requirements of the College
relating to the retention and use of Bachelor’s Graduation Paper deposited in the
library.
In terms of these conditions, I agree that the origin of my paper deposited in the
library should be accessible for the purposes of study and research, in accordance
with the normal conditions established by the librarian for the care, loan or

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Table of content
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PART 1: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale of the study
The first time the researcher heard about the novel Pride and Prejudice was
when she studied in primary school. However, she did not read or even care for it
because she was not interested in the English Medieval literature then. It was not until
she became a sophomore did she got a great chance to watch the movie and fell in love
immediately with this masterpiece. The author kept on watching the movie again and
again without feeling bored at all. Watching is not enough; the investigator dug deeper
into the film by reading the original novel in both languages: English and Vietnamese.
The decision was not wrong, as the author has found lots of fabulous detail in the
novel and after each time reciting it, she experiment some more attractive points. After
hundreds of time enjoying the masterpiece, the researcher decides to investigate this
love story as her B.A. thesis.
As the author had some explorations, many researchers have studied this
masterpiece before. The topic can be simple as analyzing the main characters as
Student Companion to Jane Austen (Teachman, 2000) and Jane Austen’s Pride and
Prejudice (Bloom, 1987); to the deeper topic as studying the society in Understanding
the society in which Jane Austen sets Pride and Prejudice (Whalan, 2003) or
examining about artistic as in Jane Austen: New Perspectives (Todd, 1983). It seemed
that this novel has been studied in many aspects. However, the author found out that
there were some slices of the masterpiece have been glanced through only. One of
those is the changes of Mr. Darcy – the main character of the novel.
Apart from that, in the context of University of Language International Studies,
there exists few research on the novel. There are only two studies about the love
between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth (Lizzy); and a few ones penetrated further into the
personality of Lizzy. It appeared that in the whole world for general and in our
university for particular, the love and the personality of women are more interested

• How did the personality of Mr. Darcy change throughout the whole novel?
• What are the reason(s) and effects of the changes on Mr. Darcy’s behavior to
other people and to himself?
4.1. Data collection procedure
To conduct this investigation, the researcher has to collect and read the novel and other
research about this mastepiece to have deeper understanding about it. Besides,
research about the people, society and norms of that society are also sources of
material for the study. The discussion of researchers and others about the content of
the novel are backbones for the researcher to analyses characters’ thought and
behaviors. They are significant background knowledge for researcher to base on
during the process. The types of sources are various such as books, journal articles
oand previous study related to the topic.
4.2. Data analysis procedure
This research will consist of interpreting, comparing and constrating the sources of
material above. After having edequate knowledge and data, the researcher will analyse
and synthetize these source of information and draw conclusion. Therefore, researcher
will use document observation as the main instrument to conduct the study. After
being analyzed, the result would be presented in Part 2 “Development”.
PART 2: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
1.1. Definition of fiction
According to Hirst (n.d), fiction “in archaeology and elsewhere, refers to a
piece of literature or other creative work that's wholly invented by the author”. This
means fiction is the literary work which people use their imagination only to form the
story. This is the biggest difference to distinguish fiction with all other types of
literature work: fiction is the work of imagination of the mind whereas other kinds are
based on the truth, statistic and information in the outside world.
According to the definition of fiction by Hirst, fiction may consist of novels,
short stories, plays and poems; and literature works which based on the truth such as
memoirs, biography, investigation papers, etc. are non-fiction.

view and third-person point of view. The first-person point of view consists of “I”,
“me” and “we” – This can be the author himself or a character in the story. This point
of view can help the story become more reliable by giving the most truthful emotions
of the main characters, but in contrast, it also bring unreliable for the narrator because
of subjectivity - In case “we have reason to doubt the information we are getting”
(Swenson, 2011). The second-person point of view is seldom used because it includes
the readers (the “You” pronoun). The third-person point of view (includes “he”, “she”
or Imaginary – the story-teller can have “omniscience” (know all details) or “limited
omniscience” (narrator tells us the feelings/thoughts of only one character). There can
be some more kinds of narrator which depends on the aims of the author. It can be
“objective, subjective or multiple-person narrative mode point of view”, as Satwase
has specified.
1.2.5. Characters
As usual, a narrative fiction has “round, flat, dynamic and static” characters
(Satwase, 2008). Among them, the dynamic and static characters are the two most
common kinds of characters. If a story in which these two types are highlighted than
any other characters; we may call them Protagonist and Antagonist. The Protagonist –
as Swenson claimed (2011) – is the core character which develops as all other human
beings, gets a life-and-death lesson or turns into something else more significant or
“right”. Apart from that, the static character does not change in the whole story; even
they are affected by some shocking event. This kind of character usually is the
secondary character.
1.3. Historical background and the hierarchy
According to Lambert (2012), in the 19
th
century the whole Britain was
converted by the “industrial revolution”. At the early of the century, there was a few
people lived in towns. The majority of population lived in urban areas. However, as
time passed by, they gradually moved to towns and until the last two decades of the
century, about two thirds of the population lived in cities. Apart from that, the

stratums and convention of each class for the others was gradually set up from this
problem.
1.4. Jane Austen
1.4.1. Jane Austen’s life
Jane Austen (1775 – 1817) though did not well-known at her time, has become
one of the world’s famous writer. Austen was the seventh child in her family (out of
eight) and her parents were both respected by the people as Jane’s father was an
Oxford-educated rector. Thanks for her father; all her siblings are well educated and
focused on creative thinking. Right from she was very young, all her brothers, sisters
and herself were encouraged reading a lot from books in the extensive library of their
beloved father.
For all Austen’s life, her sister Cassandra was closest to her in all sides, they
were both sent to boarding school for a better education. As Liukkonen (2008), almost
the first 25 years of her life, she spent in Hampshire (the time in boarding school was
quite short in fact). Then, her father was retired unpredictably and the whole family
moved to Bath. At that time, she focused more on creating literature work.
Jane Austen died in July 18
th
, 1817 which was quite young then. Even her life
was not long, her work was so huge and we can still enjoy them today.
1.4.2. Jane Austen’s literary career
As the Republic of Pemberly (2004), Austen’s novels are highly prized not only
for their light irony, humor, and depiction of contemporary English country life, but
also for their underlying serious qualities. Her works consist of the six novels and
some more minor works. The first novel of Jane was Northanger Abbey (1798-1799),
the second was Sense and Sensibility (published in 1811) which earned her a profit for
her family’s finance. Pride and Prejudice was her third novel, it was first entitled First
Impressions which “deals with the misjudgments that often occur at the beginning of
an acquaintance and how those misjudgments can change as individuals learn more
about each other.” (Liukkonen, 2008) The next novel of Jane Austen was Mansfield

Everything still goes well, until a day that Mr. Collins comes. He is Mr. Bennet’s
closest relative, and he is the one that will inherit all the property of the Bennet
once Mr. Bennet dies. He comes in the hope that he will get married to a Bennet
girl (Lizzy) so that he will not take their house after Mr. Bennet passes away.
For the two youngest Bennet sisters - who always in want of a soldier as a
husband - the militia has arrived in town and they are going to stay for a very long
time. They meet Mr. Wickham, who is handsome, gentle and he soon becomes a
good friend of Lizzy. He tells Lizzy about his sad story in which Mr. Darcy ruined
his life and Lizzy, unfortunately, totally believes in every single word he said.
Besides, Mr. Collin’s boss, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, turn out to be Mr. Darcy's
aunt.
A short time after making friend with Mr. Wickham, all the Bennet girls go to a
ball at Mr. Bingley's mansion. Everything is nice but the Bennets’ actions in the ball
are unbearable. Particularly Mrs. Bennet, she loudly announcing that they all expect
Bingley to marry Jane.
Nevertheless, the things get worse when Mr. Collins proposes Lizzy. However,
Lizzy hates him and refuses his proposal – which makes Collins irritated. He then
very soon engages to Miss Lucas – Lizzy’s best friend. At nearly the same time,
Jane gets a letter from Miss Bingley basically breaking up with her on her brother's
behalf. Jane’s parents suggest her goes to stay with her aunt and uncle in London to
get over it. Furthermore, she may have the chance to see Mr. Bingley to mend her
relationship with him. Lizzy travels too, she comes to visit Charlotte and when she
comes to see Mr. Collins’ boss, it’s so surprised that she meet Mr. Darcy there (he
is going to visit his aunt).
At this time, readers can see clearly the changes of Mr. Darcy: he acts like he's
glad to see Lizzy, and even comes to visit her at Charlotte's house. Lizzy gets the
information from Darcy’s friend that Bingley was going to propose to Jane until
Darcy intervened. Right after this shocking news, Mr. Darcy proposes Lizzy and
obviously, she refuses.
After the horrible proposal day, Mr. Darcy writes a letter to explain himself for

Mr. Darcy in his first appearance.
First, Mr. Darcy’s prejudice was the same with the rich and upper class in all
faces. For instance, when he thought about the Bennet girls, he stated that “it must
very materially lessen their chance of marrying men of any consideration in the
world,” (Austen, p.52) This opinion was just exactly be the double of the noblemen in
that era; the couples getting married must be at the same class so that the two family
can match each other and the life of the couples, obviously will be happy ever after
then. In other words, this idea of the aristocrat showed the scorn to the proletarian
class and once this belief is claimed by Mr. Darcy, it meant that this “gentleman” was
no different from any man of his stratum. One other evidence for the horrible way of
thinking of Mr. Darcy was his thought about Elizabeth Bennet. After some situations
happened and he had chance to meet and talk to Elizabeth, he suddenly “began to feel
the danger of paying Elizabeth too much attention.” (Austen, p.86) As aforementioned,
the aristocrat took it for granted that a man and a woman must love and get married to
someone match them in all sides, especially they must come from the same class. As a
consequence, from the strange affection which Darcy felt for the “tolerable” girl, he
made himself stop thinking or noticing her any longer. This convention of Darcy and
other noble man accidently created the distance among himself and all citizens in
Hertfordshire.
From his prejudice of the poor, his way of thinking about anything and anyone
in the ball made him become an eyesore to everyone; his thought of dancing can be an
obvious example. The very first idea came into his mind when he was asked to dance
at the night; he did not hesitate when expressing his attitude towards dancing: “I
certainly shall not. You know how I detest it, unless I am particularly acquainted with
my partner.” (Austen, p.14) All inhabitants in Hertfordshire are always eager to have a
ball. That’s a perfect way for them to meet people and break the ice among strangers.
However, it is contrary to Mr. Darcy: dancing is something horrible that he even
“detests” and he will only do it when his partner was someone very close to him. Apart
from that, from this beginning, Mr. Darcy particularly showed his “prejudice” of the
upper class towards the lowers: “Your sisters are engaged, and there is not another

not handsome enough to tempt ME; I am in no humour at present to give consequence
to young ladies who are slighted by other men.” (Austen, p.14) As can be inferred
from his speech; a woman in want of a man like him: rich, gentle, well-educated firstly
should be the beautiful one. However, the girls in Hertfordshire were not as beautiful
as the standard that Darcy set. The most beautiful one was Ms. Jane Bennet – who was
in favor of Mr. Bingley – and the rest in the room he “had seen a collection of people
in whom there was little beauty and no fashion, for none of whom he had felt the
smallest interest and from none received either attention or pleasure.” (Austen, p.22)
That is why when Mr. Bingley asked Darcy to choose someone to make acquaintance
but Darcy refused, and when Bingley introduced Elizabeth to him, he coldly answered
that she is “tolerable” only. And a tolerable woman does not have enough honor to be
invited to dance by him. From these pride and prejudice of Mr. Darcy, he was disliked
by the people in the religion, although at the first sight he attracted people by his
appearance and wealthy. In here, once again, the prejudice split Mr. Darcy with the
rest in the ball, particularly Elizabeth.
In this part, we can observe that Mr. Darcy at the first impression of others was an
prejudice” person, which “not all his large estate in Derbyshire could then save him
from having a most forbidding, disagreeable countenance, and being unworthy to be
compared with his friend.” (Austen, p. 12) From this sentence of the author, readers
can easily image a hateful man. In the 19
th
society, of course the prosperous was a big
deal and it was considered as the first criterion to choose a husband or a wife. The
richer a person was, the more people want to get married to him/her. However, Austen
stated that his large estate still cannot save him from his contemptible characteristic,
then he must be really, truly and extremely bad.
1.2. Mr. Darcy’s cocksure and prejudiced behavior
Not only stop at “being disliked” by means of thinking, Mr. Darcy even
received the abomination from inhabitants in Hertfordshire for all his behavior. If his
thoughts can be hidden from other’s view, people still thought that he was rich and

regulation.’ (Austen, p.84) These words were a defense and even praise of him to his
personality. He knew he was proud, but to the man like him – wealthy, good-looking,
polite, elegant and above all, he had a “real superiority of mind” – the pride in his
characteristic was obvious. For this action on Mr. Darcy, we (again) have a look at
another side of a true noble man: arrogant and overconfident about himself.
As can be read from the last part of this research, Mr. Darcy had a very strict
standard of an epitome woman. That was the reason why to Elizabeth Bennet, “Mr.
Darcy had at first scarcely allowed her to be pretty; he had looked at her without
admiration at the ball; and when they next met, he looked at her only to criticise.”
(Austen, p.32) To him, such a lovely girl turned into a “tolerable” one; and to him, this
charming girl was a ridiculous, poor and not well-educated one. It appeared that Mr.
Darcy was not only looked down on other people – who are at the lower stratum – but
had the sharp eyes to pick holes on other’s coat. Such a “gentleman” he was!
From the beginning up to the first few chapters of the masterpiece, there is the
fact that no one can deny the author successfully built the character Darcy. At the first
few lines about him, he was introduced to be a rich and handsome guy; but right after
his coming into the ball room, he was discovered to be no more no less than a rich
haughty over proud about himself. Besides, the more people got to know him, the
more despicable of him that they found. In the first picture in the ball, readers can
image that Austen carved two gentlemen into the picture. However, for all their
thoughts and behaviors, “Bingley was sure of being liked wherever he appeared, Darcy
was continually giving offense.” (Austen, p.21) Perhaps, it was the intention of the
author in constructing these two close-knit friends in such opposite direction of
personality. Putting these two men in one scene and one close relationship, Austen had
successfully highlighted them by using the image of each other. Bingley – a rich guy
who was easy-going, friendly and a bit foolish was totally contrast to Mr. Darcy –
even richer but reserved, unfriendly, clever and always over proud of himself. Two
friends with two conflicting natures made Mr. Bingley’s more lovable and Mr. Darcy’s
more hateful; yet the author herself did not have to explain too much about how great
Mr. Bingley was and how evil Mr. Darcy was. This process not only save the time for

in “scaring” lovely Elizabeth. The request made her astonished so that she could not
say a word, feeling sweet and arch for his gallantry. This action can be said to be the
first link of the changing chain of this man later on.
The second link for the chain was the admission of Mr. Darcy about the beauty
of Elizabeth. In chapter eight (p.56), Mr. Darcy gave a detailed description of a perfect
woman that seemed really hard to find someone as exactly in his list. Furthermore, at
the first look at Elizabeth, Mr. Darcy found her only “tolerable”; however, till his
affection for Elizabeth was ascertained, under the obligation of Ms. Bingley, he had to
confess that “for it is many months since I have considered her as one of the
handsomest women of my acquaintance.” (Austen, p.408) The situation of the novel
now seemed to turn into another matter – the matter of all eras – love. If it not had
been for love, then how can stable norms be change for only someone in the opposite
sex? How a “tolerable” woman turned into the “handsomest” one in the eyes of a rich
haughty man? It was appeared that love had a strong power to change – at least – the
strict concept of the beauty of a prejudice man into a very simple one.
Another thought of Mr. Darcy which had been changed was shown clearly at
the end of the novel, when he made the second proposal to Elizabeth. It was when he
and Elizabeth strolling and Darcy decided to make clear his affection to her once more
time. So amazed it was to him that she approved the proposal as softly and sweetly as
a girl can. It went without saying how blissful he was: “The happiness which this reply
produced, was such as he had probably never felt before; and he expressed himself on
the occasion as sensibly and as warmly as a man violently in love can be supposed to
do.” For this detail, reader no longer see Darcy’s pride and prejudice, because he
totally jettison them to grasp happiness in love.
In this part, for the new Darcy, Austen merely gave three thoughts in very far
chapters. In addition, each thought expressed a completely new way of thinking; this
can be seen as the landmark for the changing process of Mr. Darcy. As the thoughts
were thinly sown in the novel by Austen, readers may observe the rudeness was
lessened whilst the gentleness was increased. At first, Mr. Darcy considered Elizabeth
as a usual poor girl, but after a short time, he could see the inner beauty of her. And as