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Persuasions #15, 1993 Pages 23
In the Service of Comedy DONNA STREETO Wethersfield, CT Jane Austen, the quintessential female wit, holds a unique place in
literary history. The greatest female
literary artist of her time, she altered the steps of fiction’s dance. As Regina Barreca explains in her new book
on women and humor, They Used to Call Me Snow White … But I Drifted,
“women have been labelled as ‘unfunny,’ as less likely to laugh than their male
counterparts. It’s been an unspoken but
unwavering assumption that women and men have different reactions to humor, as
well as different ways of using it. The
noted psychologist Rose Laub Coser, argues: … ‘women are expected to be passive
and receptive, rather than active and initiating’. ”1 Austen endows her most beloved heroine,
Elizabeth Bennet, with a devilish tongue.
Elizabeth’s intelligence helps her control her unfortunate indenture to
a society which underrates her. Every
joke she makes at Darcy’s expense brings her closer to marriage with him. It is a marriage achieved through a series
of games she plays with her partner to prove her worth. Austen suggests that intelligence is as
valuable as social position. She celebrates
the human intelligence. As Barreca
says, making a joke is a political gesture – a response to one’s feelings of
powerlessness.2 Critic Emily
Toth asserts that “women humorists attack – or subvert – the deliberate choices
people make; hypocrisies, affectations, mindless following of social
expectations.”3 Elizabeth’s
quips are her ticket to the upper echelons of a society for which she is
frankly unqualified by birthright or education. Elizabeth is undaunted by her lack of weapons in life. She does not feel her “bow” is too light;
her aim is true and the arrow of her wit flies straight to its mark. She is a heroine we can embrace two hundred
years after her birth as an example of what a woman’s intelligence can
accomplish. She succeeds to the fullest
extent possible given her society’s limits.
Indeed, this is all any of us can hope to do. Austen extends the limitations of Elizabeth’s world to allow for
an unexpectedly happy future for her.
Collins is the logical choice for Elizabeth’s partner, but Austen shows
us how ridiculous such a match would be.
In making her readers see this too, she challenges the very foundations
of her society. Elizabeth’s dancing
feet take her to the altar with the partner of her choice. NOTES 1 Regina Barreca, They Used to Call Me Snow White . . . But I Drifted
(New York: Viking Press, 1991), p. 6. 2 Barreca, p. 15. 3 Barreca. p. 13. |
