The Conflicts

There are several conflicts in Pride and Prejudice, some are external and others internal.

External conflicts

Elizabeth is quite different compared to her sisters, she has very strong opinions and she shows them very clearly. She disagrees with her mother in various matters and one in particular is the matter of marrying for money. Elizabeth believes that you should marry for love and not the other superficial things such as looks, money and status. Whilst her mother only cares about the latter and try to marry off her daughters to men who are rich, noble or with high statuses. When William collins, Mr. Bennet's cousin comes to visit with hopes of marrying one of the Bennet daughters. When he hears that the eldest daughter Jane already is taken, he sets his eyes on Elizabeth. Mrs. Bennet is delighted because Mr. Collins is a clergyman of fairly high status however he also is the heir to the Bennet estate. And if Elizabeth were to marry Mr. Collins Mrs. Bennet wouldn't have to worry about were to live is it were to happen that Mr. Bennet passed away. Nevertheless, Elizabeth refuses to marry him and rejects him when he proposes, Mrs Bennet becomes furious and says she won't speak to her daughter again if she doesn't marry him. But unlike her mother, her father, Mr. Bennet doesn't want to see his daughter unhappy and says that he wont see her again if she does marry him. However, one should not pity Mr. Collins because he recovers and becomes engaged with Elizabeth's close friend Charlotte Lucas. I put Elizabeth's beliefs of not wanting to marry for money in external conflicts due to the example above. But it could also fit under Internal conflicts because it is something internal.

Internal conflicts

I believe that the main conflict in the novel is the one between Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy and their pride and Prejudice since the title is Pride and Prejudice. When Elizabeth has her first meeting with Mr. Darcy she gets the impression that he is very ''stuck-up'' and has too much pride, leading her to get a negative image of him. She has this image of him due to her being prejudice and assumes that all high noble people are like that.

Throughout the novel she develops complicated feelings for Mr. Darcy which she can't explain since she doesn't understand how she can like someone that behaves and are like Mr. Darcy. While she is unsure about her feelings towards him, various things happen that make her confused of hoe Mr. Darcy actually is.