Pride & Prejudice post 1

After reading Heart of Darkness, Jane Austen's writing style is SUCH a breath of fresh air. She uses vocabulary that is older, but I use a lot of the words she writes in my every day conversations. I connected to the characters immediately. Most people probably view this as a "girl" book, because (thus far) the story centers around the 5 Bennet girls. I know Elizabeth will end up being my favorite of the sisters, but my favorite character overall is the father. He's absolutely hilarious. He plays with his wife's nerves, and clearly has a reputation for joking around. This makes him very different than the other stereotypical father figures we see in this era. Another interesting thing is that the mother has such a large pull in the family. Although we are looking at the family through the social and homemaking eye, and not the professional one, I still think the mother has more leverage in the family than was typical for the time. She certainly has a better relationship with her husband than was typical.