Language In Clarissa, Evelina And Pride And Prejudice

according to his or her status, social and financial,"
including her titled characters (298).
Class distinction was part of Austen's personal life
as much as of her charactersf lives. Her characters
often demonstrate that title does not always signal worth
or good character. For instance, Trickett notes Lady de
Bourgh and Sir William Lucas are of very different
backgrounds; and while both are comic characters, Sir
William is affectionately portrayed (298) . The "trade-
ups and trade-downs," as Edward Copeland calls the
marriage scenarios in the novel, are made in "values" and
worth in order to "put to the side or mitigate, the harsh
economic system . . . which runs ninety percent of the
novelf s actions" (43) .
The "harshness" of the economic system, however, is
a product more of marriage settlements and strict
settlement practice than of mundane economic matters.
The novel's circumstances are specific to marriage and
inheritance practice regulated by specific procedures put
in place to preserve the power and wealth of the landed
gentry and nobility. Specifically the entail puts in
place a line of male heirs to an estate that cannot be
changed. Mr. Bennet loses his estate to an entail, and
Mr. Wickham learns very early that blood not love, family