Contrast of Love in Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice

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Psychologist Robert Sternberg developed the "Triangular Theory of Love" which defines the three components of love needed for a "perfect" relationship as commitment, passion, and intimacy (companionship) (Wikipedia). "The amount of love one experiences depends on the absolute strength of these three components, and the type of love one experiences depends on their strengths relative to each other" (Wikipedia). In Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, she introduces five couples which enter into marriages in all different types of love. Mr. and Mrs. Bennet have an infatuated love that fades to no love at all, Charlotte and Mr. Collins enter into an empty love, Lydia and Mr. Wickham fall into a fatuous love, Jane and Mr. Bingley focus on a companionate love, and finally, Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy find an all consummate love for each other. Throughout the novel, Austen uses these five variations of love to employ characters and define their futures.

To begin, Mr. and Mrs. Bennet have a love of simple infatuation. This type of love is one without intimacy or commitment, and lies with pure passion. After the passion runs out, no love is left. Mr. Bennet married his wife because she had ample beauty, however, she exposed herself as unintelligent. He often warned his children not to do the same, just as he says to Elizabeth: "My child, let me not have the grief of seeing you unable to respect your partner in life. You know not what you are about" (Austen). The lack of love between her parents was quite obvious to Elizabeth as well. She saw that "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...

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... said, for attention to any other objects" (Austen). The intensity of love that they grew for each other throughout the novel gave them the components of a consummate love.

Throughout the novel, Pride and Prejudice, Austen uses five variations of Robert Sternberg's triangular love theory to describe characters and their views of love. With the love of Mr. and Mrs. Bennet as an infatuation, Charlotte and Collins as empty, Lydia and Wickham as fatuous, Jane and Bingley as companionate, and Elizabeth and Darcy as consummate, the characters make decisions which will bind them for their futures, all due to their intentions of love.

Works Cited

Austen, Jane. Pride and Prejudice. New York: Dover, 1995. Print.

"Triangular Theory of Love." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 17 Mar. 2012. Web. 22 Mar. 2012. .

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