In Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen creates vivid and engaging characters and fluid character development through her use of diction and syntax.
For example, one can analyze how Austen stresses Elizabeth’s reaction to Darcy’s letter. The reader quickly understands Elizabeth’s inquisitiveness and, turbulence existing within Elizabeth’s mind. But such as they were, it may well be supposed how eagerly she went through them, and what a contrariety of emotions they exited. Her feelings as she read were scarcely to be defined. […]. She read with an eagerness which hardly left her power of comprehension; and, from impatience of knowing what the next sentence might bring, was incapable of attending to the sense of the one before her eyes (Austen 181).
The diction Austen uses heavily …show more content…
The narrator reminds how anxious Elizabeth is as she reads his letter, signifying its importance.
In conjunction, many of the sentences uses long compound-complex sentence structure and noteworthy semicolon and comma placements, such that one can notice where Austen doesn’t’ use a comma to mimic anticipation. The reader imagines Elizabeth’s overflowing thoughts and emotions without having to stop, further augmenting the importance of the letter.
Overall, the passage uses mostly periodic sentences making the scene of Elizabeth’s eagerness more dramatic. If the text was written in a manner such that the sentences are written by using simple sentences, loose construction, or non-repetitive diction, the climax may have not progressed as smoothly from incomplete characterization.
In another instance, Austen’s style helps illustrate the incompatibility in the Bennet marriage. “Her father, captivated by youth and beauty, and that appearance of good humour which youth and beauty generally give, had married a woman whose weak understanding and illiberal mind had very early in their marriage put an end to all real affection for her (Austen