Home
Creators
Search Recent Random
Posts
Search DMs Popular Hash Lookup Tags Random
Importer
Import FAQ
Register Favorites Keys Review DMs Logout
Community
Telegram ThePornDude
Home Creators Posts Import Register Favorites Logout

Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice: Lecture on Volume III (Ch. 43-61) (Patreon)

Published:
2024-05-26 20:53:11
Imported:
2026-06
Tags:
haven't archived this post yet. have a subscription? use the importer!

Downloads

  • Jane Austen Volume Three Book Club Lecture.mp3

Missing 1 full-res photo, 1 file, as this post has not yet been imported.

Content

'I often think that there is nothing so bad as parting with one's friends. One seems so forlorn without them.'

Today we draw to the close of Pride and Prejduice. The close of this masterpiece, but certainly not the end of our loving engagement with Jane Austen.

In our discussion, we're meditating upon character change, good foundations for marriage, responsibility, gratitude, esteem, affection, true love, and much more.

Timestamps:

0:00 ‘nothing so bad as parting with one’s friends’

1:00 overcoming the sadness of finishing a novel

2:00 my personal relationship with Jane Austen

4:00 how great novels reflect our change

6:00 did you notice the voice of the author herself?

8:00 approaching Pemberley with Elizabeth

10:00 estate as metaphor for Darcy’s character

12:00 ‘of this place I might have been mistress’

13:00 viewing the picture gallery of Pemberley

15:00 when did Lizzy’s feelings begin to develop?

17:00 unconsciously striving towards love

19:00 on the 1995 television adaptation

21:00 Elizabeth and Darcy meet at Pemberley

22:00 the psychological complexity of Lizzy

24:00 how we mark the change of others

26:00 setting a good foundation for marriage

27:00 when shyness is mistaken for pride

28:00 how to tell when someone likes you

29:00 Darcy’s chance at another first impression

31:00 gratitude is the emotional key of the end

32:00 how to have rewarding relationships

34:00 lessons for young men from Darcy

35:00 Wickham and Lydia run off together

36:00 why we all only want encouragement

37:00 woman’s chastity in Regency England

39:00 fallen women & the fall of mankind

42:00 Lydia’s behaviour threatens the family

44:00 Elizabeth goes to Mr Darcy for help

46:00 Mrs Bennet fears her husband will duel

49:00 Mary Bennet discovers a moral lesson

51:00 seeing the world through the lens of books

53:00 Mr Collins reacts to the scandalous news

55:00 Mr Bennet takes responsibility for Lydia

57:00 the marriage of Lydia and Wickham

58:00 the financial metaphors we live by

1:00:00 Lizzy’s changing attitude towards Darcy

1:02:00 measuring change by the stasis of others

1:03:00 Lydia returns home as Mrs Wickham

1:04:00 how Darcy saved the Bennet family

1:06:00 Shakespearean vs Cervantine substance

1:08:00 how to know if you should marry someone

1:09:00 this novel is a story about growing up

1:10:00 advice for courtship from Jane Austen

1:13:00 novel as guidebook for happy marriages

1:15:00 Lady Catherine vs Elizabeth Bennet

1:18:00 ‘I am a gentleman’s daughter…’

1:20:00 on the enduring fight for equality

1:22:00 the shades of Pemberley to be polluted?

1:24:00 how Mr Bennet empowers Elizabeth

1:26:00 why Lizzy needs to respect her partner

1:27:00 novel as women’s wish fulfilment fantasy

1:28:00 anima, animus, syzygy, union of selves

1:29:00 hearing the overt voice of Jane Austen

1:33:00 appreciating the novel’s happy ending

1:34:00 what I take away from Pride and Prejudice

1:35:00 what did you make of the reading experience?

Questions for You:

1) What will you remember most from your time spent with Pride and Prejudice?

2) What area connected with Jane Austen are you now most keen to explore?

3) What did you make of the ending of the novel?

4) How would you persuade another to read Pride and Prejudice? And what advice would you give to facilitate a meaningful reading experience?

And please do share with us your impressions and favourite passages from the end of Pride and Prejudice.

Congratulations on reading Pride and Prejudice, everybody!

Files

Previews only

Comments

Rick

I like to think of Jane Austen as one engaged in a subversive craft with her writing and characters like Lizzie Bennet.

Carol Keller

Oh boy. I'm in a clear minority here. I do not love this book. I appreciate Jane Austen’s writing and I’m happy I read it with the book club. (I read it years ago and, not loving it then either, quickly forgot the details.) 

Ben has said that the way we respond to a book reveals something about ourselves and I think we probably learn more in what we dislike than in what we like, so I’m considering what I have learned about myself and what I’m revealing. I liked Lizzie and could relate to her. I liked Darcy, but was unimpressed by what we actually see of him. (Neither does Colin Firth entice me.) I wanted to know Mary better and the rest of the characters are shallow and silly. Ben’s calling it a soap opera is right on and I can’t stand them! The soap opera aspect is what has me struggling to stay in The Tale of Genji also. For awhile I was really enjoying the relationship of Lizzie and her father and their special understanding of each other. Then, Mr Bennet ruined it for me when he said, “I admire all my three sons-in-law highly,…Wickham, perhaps is my favorite; but I think I shall like your husband quite as well as Jane’s.” What! After all the running around London for Lydia and the scandal of it all he likes Wickham best of all! Ben hinted that it was maybe a joke and while it’s comforting to think that, I’m not convinced.

Deirdre Fairfax

I am so happy to have finally entered the world of Jane Austen. Now in my first year of retirement, I am reading books that I was familiar with by title only. I get it now. I loved this book. I was laughing so much at the family dynamics and the drama. Great lecture Ben. Thank you for a wonderful introduction to this classic ☺️

Denise Powers

I was so sorry to have reached the end of this work again; I feel like I said goodbye to a group of close mates. Ben, your lectures on this were so helpful in bringing to light more of the history and culture at the time, which definitely deepened my understanding. I was reading the Penguin Classics version, edited by Vivien Jones, and there was great notes included in the text which also provided some very useful context that deepened my understanding. I love this as a feminist work, but it also raised some interesting things for me. I was initially shaken by the idea that Mr Bennet wanted Lizzie to marry someone she felt her superior, because my first (strong) reaction was that two people should come together as equals. But upon reflection and the lecture, I do believe that my stance on this has changed: yes, I do want to be a better person for my husband and strive to be the person that I think he sees in me. And that is a good thing for a relationship. Partly because I didn't want the book to end and it left me wanting more, I felt a little disappointed with all the pieces falling into place so neatly. But when I read the last few pages again, I realised that although the ending was packaged up with a tidy bow, the few sentences contained glimpes of truths of the ongoing challenges in relationships (the Bingleys moving further away from Mrs Bennet, for example). I also found the lack of description and dialogue around Darcy's second proposal amazing in that it was so sparse - just enough to leave to our individual imaginations what we would want to see happen. It was rather an unusual turn, I thought, coming from Austen, who creates whole novels based almost entirely on dialogue and then she left it to us at the end. It is almost as if she is so confident that we know these characters so well by that stage of the book that she knows that we will get it, while giving Darcy and Lizzie a bit of privacy in their happy moment. I am already looking forward to my next reread of this wonderful piece.

Kristen Egener Chaddah

My goodness Benjamin you have persuaded me to change my opinion about Pride and Prejudice, your lecture on Volume 3 is so extraordinary! I found volume 3 picked up the pace considerably, like wind filling a sail. I had the pleasure last night of watching the 2005 movie directed by Joe Wright and I absolutely loved it. I certainly felt the passion and emotion moving through every scene and the cinematography was exquisitely beautiful. One word about Lady Catherine, played by Judi Dench, she (Lady Catherine) is a dark character for me, as she is the image of an in-law who treated me condescendingly and dismissively. She gives me the chills. Your analysts of the showdown between Lizzie and Lady Catherine makes me wish I had half of Lizzie’s self confidence. What a marvel she is and what a verbal match for the pompous, entitled, vainglorious older woman. It makes for an interesting personal fantasy on my part to imagine doing the same instead of being utterly tongue tied and deflated and turn with tail between my legs and slink away. Benjamin, you make me want to take another run at Pride and Prejudice. I thank you for these superb lectures on the novel.

Kristen Egener Chaddah
>>140198520

I relate to your position of perhaps being in the minority in your reaction to the novel and am frankly relieved. By the way, I also feel the same as you about The Tale of Genji. I’ve given up on it. I can’t stand the sexual impropriety of Genji. It completely repulses me. I find myself wanting to embrace P&P because Ben is so enthusiastic about it, but I’m conflicted. I’m going to give it another chance at some point.

Cherian Philipose

Ben, love your analysis of Lizzy and Darcy. Also love your insight into how introverted people are sometimes mistaken for being arrogant.

Cherian Philipose
>>140392753

Lizzy changes towards Darcy after visiting Pemberly, i.e after seeing his great wealth and privilege, and possibly his aesthetic sense and the way he treated his housekeeper. There is a line there, where she thinks that it may not be such a bad thing to be mistress of Pemberly. A telling choice of words. Austen does not say 'Darcy's wife' but the mistress of a an English stately home. It is only after this realisation, that Lizzy emerges out of the house, and into the grounds and meets Darcy. She finds him changed and respectful. He asks after her family. But by then, she has already changed toward him. Her mind might have been made up.

Leah

I finished the book last week and I absolutely loved it. This lecture had a huge impact on me upon listening to it. I think when you read a book for the first time you have to spend most of your energy on absorbing the story and what is happening so these lectures highlight so much more beyond what I was able to see. I didn't realize the extent of how much can be learned from this book. I now feel that I have learned so much more about what I need, how I have not gotten what I needed the the past, and ways in which I want to improve myself. I even went from thinking that I didn't particularly relate with any specific character to realizing that I have been as blind as Lizzy in the past and that I so much want exactly what she found. Thank you!!

Samuel Thompson

I absolutely adored this read, it was my first time readying the book, I had already seen the movie of course and so the story more or less was familiar to me! I’ll always love the scenes where Mr. Bennett is making fun of his wife for her silliness, and of course the overarching story of how Lizzy and Darcy evolve to understand and love each other! I will likely read persuasion next and gear up for Emma this fall so I can be caught up with the book club on Austen reads!😊 The ending was so pleasant and I really adore how Austen wraps everything up, very pleasant and very sweet.

Celine Fu

I have read this book for more than 12 times and it is one of my favorite books. Thank you for introducing this book in another light.

Judith klinghoffer

The last two words were "united them." For me, that is the real essence of a good marriage. A marriage in which life is faced together.