99 Fun Facts About Pride and Prejudice

In which era was Pride and Prejudice first published?

The Regency began in 1811, when the future George IV started ruling for his ailing father, and the Prince Regent liked Austen's novels enough to keep a set in each of his residences.

What was Jane Austen's working title for Pride and Prejudice?

First Impressions had been used for another novel by the time Austen revised her manuscript in 1811–12, which is the likely reason she renamed it.

What did Austen sell outright for £110 when Pride and Prejudice was published?

The copyright went to Thomas Egerton for a one-off payment, so when the first edition sold out within a year the profits were his, and he made more from the novel than its author did.

What completes Austen's line 'a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of...'?

A wife is the joke: the next sentence shows it is the local families doing the wanting, each treating such a man as 'the rightful property' of one of their daughters.

How is Jane sent to the Bingleys?

On horseback, because Mrs Bennet hopes rain will keep her there overnight, and it works too well: Jane arrives soaked and is laid up at the Bingleys' with a bad cold for days.

In which English county is the Bennets' Longbourn estate in Pride and Prejudice?

Hertfordshire puts Longbourn a mile from Meryton, where a militia regiment is quartered for the winter, which is how the Bennet girls come to meet the charming Mr Wickham.

Why is it so urgent that the Bennet daughters marry well?

A male cousin will inherit the estate because Longbourn is entailed on male heirs and the Bennets have no son, so Mr Bennet's death would leave Mrs Bennet and her daughters without their home.

What is Mr Darcy said to be worth a year in Pride and Prejudice?

£10,000 a year is the rumour that sweeps the Meryton ball within five minutes of his arrival, and the room admires him for half the evening until his proud manners turn the tide.

What is Mr Darcy's first name?

Fitzwilliam appears only twice in the novel, where nearly everyone calls him plain Mr Darcy; it is also the surname of his cousin the Colonel, from his mother's side of the family.

What is the name of the estate Mr Bingley rents near Longbourn?

Netherfield Park is only rented because Mr Bingley's fortune of nearly £100,000 came from trade: his father meant to buy an estate but did not live to do it.

Why won't Darcy dance with Elizabeth at the first ball?

He says she is 'not handsome enough' to tempt him, within her hearing, and Elizabeth gets her own back by telling the story 'with great spirit among her friends'.

What is Mr Collins's profession in Pride and Prejudice?

Clergyman: he owes his parish to his patroness, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, and even while proposing to Elizabeth he quotes her orders: 'Mr Collins, you must marry. A clergyman like you must marry.'

After Elizabeth turns him down, whom does Mr Collins marry?

Charlotte Lucas accepts him within days of Elizabeth's refusal, telling her shocked friend that she is 'not romantic' and asks 'only a comfortable home'.

How is George Wickham connected to Pemberley?

He is the son of the late owner's steward and was old Mr Darcy's godson; he tells Meryton that Darcy cheated him of a church living, when in fact he took £3,000 instead and squandered it.

What does Darcy hand Elizabeth the morning after she refuses him?

A letter, and a long one, explains why he parted Bingley from Jane and what Wickham really did; by the end of it Elizabeth admits, 'Till this moment, I never knew myself.'

Where does Darcy make his first, disastrous proposal to Elizabeth?

In Kent, while she is staying near Rosings, Darcy begins 'In vain have I struggled' and dwells on her family's inferiority, and Elizabeth calls him 'the last man in the world' she could be prevailed on to marry.

With whom is Elizabeth touring Derbyshire when she unexpectedly meets Darcy at Pemberley?

Her aunt and uncle Gardiner are in trade, just the sort of connection Darcy once looked down on, yet at Pemberley he invites Mr Gardiner to fish his stream as often as he likes.

Which Bennet sister runs off with Wickham?

Lydia, the youngest and her mother's favourite, leaves a note calling the elopement 'a good joke' and looking forward to signing her name 'Lydia Wickham'.

How does Elizabeth first learn that Darcy arranged her sister's marriage?

The bride lets slip he attended, then remembers it was meant to be a secret; Elizabeth writes to her aunt Mrs Gardiner, who reveals that Darcy found the runaways and paid to bring the marriage about.

Whom has Lady Catherine long intended Darcy to marry?

Her daughter Anne and Darcy were, she tells Elizabeth, intended for each other from infancy: 'While in their cradles we planned the union,' she and Darcy's late mother being sisters.

How does Lady Catherine's angry visit to Longbourn end up helping Darcy?

It gives him reason to hope: Elizabeth refuses to promise never to accept him, Lady Catherine repeats this to her nephew in a fury, and he later tells Elizabeth, 'It taught me to hope.'

What does Mrs Bennet complain that her husband has no compassion for?

Her poor nerves get no sympathy from Mr Bennet, who says he has 'a high respect' for them: 'They are my old friends. I have heard you mention them with consideration these twenty years at least.'

Whose praise of Darcy at Pemberley shakes Elizabeth's opinion of him?

His housekeeper, Mrs Reynolds, shows the visitors round and says she has known him since he was four and 'never had a cross word from him in my life', the opposite of all Elizabeth believed.

To which seaside resort does the militia move from Meryton in Pride and Prejudice?

Brighton has the younger Bennet girls in despair when the regiment leaves for its summer camp there, and their mother joins in: 'A little sea-bathing would set me up for ever.'

Under what byline did Austen's novels appear during her lifetime?

Anonymously: her first title page said only 'By a Lady', and her name reached print only after her death, when her brother Henry identified her in a note published with two further novels.

In which Hampshire village was Jane Austen born in 1775?

Steventon is where the Reverend George Austen was rector, and Jane lived in its rectory until she was 25, drafting early versions of three of her novels before the family moved to Bath.

Which two Jane Austen novels were published together after her death?

Northanger Abbey and Persuasion came out together five months after she died. Northanger Abbey was the first novel she ever sold, for £10 in 1803, but the publisher never printed it.

Who played Elizabeth and Darcy in MGM's 1940 film of Pride and Prejudice?

Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier got the parts only after a 1936 plan to star Clark Gable and Norma Shearer died with producer Irving Thalberg; the finished film won an Oscar for its art direction.

Which famous novelist co-wrote MGM's 1940 film of Pride and Prejudice?

Aldous Huxley, author of Brave New World, shared the screenplay credit with Jane Murfin on a version that moved the story to a later period, reportedly so the costumes could be grander.

Who wrote the BBC's 1995 Pride and Prejudice series?

Andrew Davies built his script on the view that the novel is 'all about sex and money, about young people with pumping hormones', yet called Austen the one writer he adapts with 'awe and reverence'.

In the BBC's 1995 Pride and Prejudice, what is Mr Darcy famously seen doing?

Emerging from a lake in a wet shirt is not in the novel, and it was the tame version: the screenwriter wanted Darcy to plunge in stark naked, 'as chaps did back then'.

Why does Elizabeth reach the Bingleys' house with her petticoat 'six inches deep in mud'?

She walked three miles there to nurse her sick sister Jane, and while Bingley's sisters sneered at the mud, Darcy said only that her eyes 'were brightened by the exercise'.

Who played Mr Darcy in the 2005 film Pride & Prejudice?

Matthew Macfadyen was 29, a year older than Austen's Darcy, and was cast by a director who loved his television work; he did not become Succession's Tom Wambsgans until 2018.

Who played Elizabeth Bennet in the 2005 film Pride & Prejudice?

Keira Knightley nearly missed the part: the director thought Lizzie 'maybe should be someone slightly plainer', until he met her and found an 'independent-minded, scruffy tomboy'.

Pride & Prejudice (2005) was the first feature film of which director?

Joe Wright, in his early thirties, had never made a feature and had not even read the novel until the script arrived; he came to Austen from gritty television drama.

How did the director of 2005's Pride & Prejudice win over Judi Dench?

With a cheeky letter: 'I love it when you play a bitch,' he wrote, and Dench duly signed on as Darcy's formidable aunt.

Which Derbyshire stately home played Pemberley in the 2005 film Pride & Prejudice?

Chatsworth House is often claimed as Austen's model for Pemberley, and the novel itself names it among the Derbyshire sights on Elizabeth's summer tour.

Which scene was added to the end of Pride & Prejudice (2005) for North American audiences?

The married Darcys kissing at Pemberley was kept for the US release, while the British cut ended on Mr Bennet's consent and his call for more suitors: 'if any young men come for Mary or Kitty, send them in.'

Which Oscar-winning screenwriter gave uncredited script advice on the 2005 film Pride & Prejudice?

Emma Thompson, who won a screenwriting Oscar for Sense and Sensibility, took the terrified first-time director for a walk on Hampstead Heath, then sat on a bench with his script and acted bits of it out.

Which 1996 bestseller about a single Londoner is a loose modern retelling of Pride and Prejudice?

Bridget Jones's Diary names its brooding hero Mark Darcy, and Bridget believes a charming cad's smears against him just as Elizabeth swallows Wickham's.

Bride and Prejudice (2004) relocated the story to which Indian city?

Gurinder Chadha's Bollywood-style musical stars Aishwarya Rai as Lalita Bakshi and casts Darcy as a wealthy American hotelier.

What did a bestselling 2009 mash-up novel add to Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice?

Zombies descend on Meryton in Seth Grahame-Smith's version, which reached number three on the New York Times bestseller list and went into a second printing before it had even reached British shops.

Which major award did the YouTube series The Lizzie Bennet Diaries win in 2013?

An Emmy, for interactive media, went to a retelling told as the video diary of a 24-year-old grad student, in which Darcy is the head of a company called Pemberley Digital.

Which crime writer continued Pride and Prejudice with the murder mystery Death Comes to Pemberley?

P. D. James picks the story up six years after the Darcys' wedding, when a coach races up to Pemberley with one of Elizabeth's sisters inside, shrieking 'Murder!'

Which novel beat Pride and Prejudice in the BBC's 2003 Big Read?

The Lord of the Rings won the public vote, but Pride and Prejudice came second and beat every Harry Potter book; the highest, Goblet of Fire, managed only fifth.

Who offered a London publisher an early draft of Pride and Prejudice in 1797?

Her father, the Reverend George Austen, only offered to send the three-volume manuscript, likening its length to Fanny Burney's Evelina, and the publisher declined by return of post without ever seeing it.

How does Mr Bennet respond when Mrs Bennet demands that Elizabeth marry Mr Collins?

He takes his daughter's side with a joke: 'Your mother will never see you again if you do not marry Mr Collins, and I will never see you again if you do.'

Where does Mr Bennet go to escape his family?

His library was the one room where he was 'always sure of leisure and tranquillity', until Mr Collins followed him in after breakfast and talked at him with little pause.

What is the name of Mr Darcy's shy younger sister in Pride and Prejudice?

Georgiana was only fifteen when Wickham talked her into an elopement, chiefly for her large fortune; she confessed the plan to her brother a day or two beforehand, and he put a stop to it.

Which American humorist wrote that reading Pride and Prejudice made him want to dig Jane Austen up?

Mark Twain said that every time he read it he wanted to beat her over the skull with her own shin-bone, which suggests he went back to it more than once.

Which actor shot to stardom as Mr Darcy in the BBC's 1995 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice?

Colin Firth was nominated for the Best Actor BAFTA for the part but was beaten by Robbie Coltrane of Cracker. His co-star had better luck and took home Best Actress.

Which banknote put Jane Austen and a Pride and Prejudice quotation in British wallets in 2017?

The £10 note quotes 'I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading!', a line spoken by Miss Bingley, who is only pretending to love books in order to impress Mr Darcy.

In which cathedral city is Jane Austen buried under an epitaph that never mentions her novels?

Winchester is where she died in 1817, and her brother's epitaph in the cathedral praises 'the extraordinary endowments of her mind' without once saying that she wrote novels.

Britain's war with which country explains the soldiers stationed near the Bennets in Pride and Prejudice?

France declared war on Britain in 1793, and with too few barracks to go round, the home-defence regiments were put up in huge camps in the countryside.

In Pride and Prejudice, which Scottish border village is Wickham first thought to be eloping to?

Gretna Green is where the bride's farewell note says they are going, but a friend of the groom doubts he ever meant to marry, and the pair are traced to London still unwed.

Which feature of Elizabeth Bennet does Mr Darcy tell Miss Bingley he has been admiring in Pride and Prejudice?

Her eyes are what he means by 'a pair of fine eyes in the face of a pretty woman'. Miss Bingley, who wants him for herself, keeps needling him about the remark afterwards.

Which pastime does Mr Darcy sneer at in Pride and Prejudice by remarking that 'every savage can' do it?

Dancing gets the put-down after Sir William calls it a refinement of polished societies. Moments later Darcy is manoeuvred into asking Elizabeth to be his partner, and she turns him down.

How many daughters do Mr and Mrs Bennet have in Pride and Prejudice, one more than the March family of Little Women?

Five is the number Mrs Bennet has to find husbands for, and Austen says that getting them married was 'the business of her life'.

Which Jane Austen novel, her first in print, came out two years before Pride and Prejudice?

Sense and Sensibility began life as a story told in letters called Elinor and Marianne, which Austen rewrote in the third person years before it reached the public in 1811.

How is the domineering Lady Catherine de Bourgh related to Mr Darcy in Pride and Prejudice?

His aunt is the sister of his late mother, a link that so thrills Mr Collins that he marches up to Darcy at a ball and introduces himself without waiting to be presented.

In Pride and Prejudice, which daughter does Mr Bennet stop mid-performance with 'You have delighted us long enough'?

Mary is 'the only plain one in the family', so she has worked hard at her accomplishments and is 'always impatient for display', here in front of all Mr Bingley's guests.

In Pride and Prejudice, what keeps Jane Bennet in bed at Mr Bingley's house after she goes there to dine?

A violent cold is the apothecary's verdict, and Mrs Bennet could not be happier: her scheme all along was for bad weather to force her daughter to stay the night.

What career has George Wickham just begun when the Bennet sisters first meet him in Pride and Prejudice?

Militia officer is so new a role for him that he has no uniform yet, and Austen jokes that he 'wanted only regimentals to make him completely charming'.

Which actor played Mr Bennet in 2005's Pride & Prejudice after reminding the director of his own father?

Donald Sutherland also struck the director as having the strength to handle a household full of women, meaning Mrs Bennet and her daughters.

According to Pride and Prejudice, what first captivated Mr Bennet into marrying a woman he soon ceased to respect?

Her youth and beauty were all it took. Her 'weak understanding and illiberal mind' soon ended his real affection, leaving him to treat her folly as a source of amusement.

What does Mr Bennet secretly do early in Pride and Prejudice after assuring his family that he will not?

He visits Mr Bingley among the very earliest callers, then teases Mrs Bennet a little longer before casually revealing that the introduction she wanted is already made.

Where does Elizabeth Bennet, aged twenty in Pride and Prejudice, fall by age among the Bennet sisters?

Second eldest puts her behind only Jane, and the pair are the 'two most deserving daughters' whom Mrs Bennet is so happy to be rid of on a single day at the end of the novel.

Where is Elizabeth Bennet when she finally accepts Mr Darcy's second proposal near the end of Pride and Prejudice?

On a country walk, Jane and Bingley lag behind and Kitty peels off to call on a friend, so Elizabeth seizes the moment alone with Darcy to thank him for his kindness to her family.

Which adverb completes Mr Darcy's first proposal in Pride and Prejudice: 'how ___ I admire and love you'?

Ardently is the word, but the proposal goes downhill fast: he dwells on her family's inferiority and calls the match a degradation, which is no way to win Elizabeth Bennet.

What does Wickham falsely tell Elizabeth Bennet that Mr Darcy cheated him out of in Pride and Prejudice?

A church living was indeed left to him, but Wickham gave up all claim to it in exchange for three thousand pounds, then came back for the post once the money had run out.

Which actress, cast without an audition, played the excitable Mrs Bennet in the BBC's 1995 Pride and Prejudice?

Alison Steadman wore a wig as Mrs Bennet because of her own thick, heavy hair, while her screen daughter Elizabeth needed three to hide a short blonde crop.

Which pastime does Mr Darcy invite one of Elizabeth Bennet's party to enjoy at Pemberley, to her astonishment?

Fishing comes with an offer to lend the tackle and point out the best stretches of the stream, a warmth towards her companions that Elizabeth can hardly believe.

Which region was Elizabeth Bennet meant to tour before her summer trip was shortened to Derbyshire?

The Lake District was the plan until a business delay cut the holiday short, a change of route that lands her on Mr Darcy's doorstep instead.

To which sister did Jane Austen complain that the newly published Pride and Prejudice lacked 'shade'?

Cassandra was her only sister and closest friend, and she later destroyed the bulk of the correspondence she had received, leaving gaps that biographers still puzzle over.

What is the name of Mr Collins's home, where Elizabeth Bennet stays as a guest in Pride and Prejudice?

Hunsford has a garden 'separated only by a lane' from his patroness's park, as Mr Collins proudly informs the Bennets on his first visit to Longbourn.

Which part of London do Mr Bingley's sisters laugh about because Elizabeth Bennet's uncle lives near it?

Cheapside sets the sisters laughing, but Bingley retorts that uncles enough to fill all of it would not make the Bennet girls 'one jot less agreeable'.

In which Hampshire village was Jane Austen living, in a cottage now a museum, when Pride and Prejudice came out?

Chawton gave her a settled home on her brother Edward's estate from 1809, and every novel she published in her lifetime went to press while she lived there.

Which actress won a BAFTA for playing Elizabeth Bennet in the BBC's 1995 Pride and Prejudice?

Jennifer Ehle declined to cash in on the serial's success and joined the Royal Shakespeare Company at Stratford, while her leading man became a household name.

In which Derbyshire town is Elizabeth Bennet staying when news of her sister's elopement reaches her?

Lambton is the little town where one of her travelling companions once lived, a short drive from Pemberley, and Darcy walks in at the very moment she finishes reading the news.

Which brother-in-law of Mr Bingley is said in Pride and Prejudice to live 'only to eat, drink, and play at cards'?

Mr Hurst loses all interest in Elizabeth at dinner once she prefers a plain dish to a ragout, and on an evening without cards he simply stretches out on a sofa and goes to sleep.

Which book does Mr Collins choose to read aloud to the Bennet girls after protesting that he never reads novels?

Fordyce's Sermons lasts barely three pages before the youngest sister interrupts with gossip, and an offended Mr Collins gives up and plays backgammon with Mr Bennet instead.

Which Scottish novelist noted in his journal that he had read Pride and Prejudice 'for the third time at least'?

Walter Scott added that the 'Big Bow-wow strain' of fiction was something he could do himself, but that her 'exquisite touch' with ordinary life was denied to him.

Which narrative technique, a hallmark of Pride and Prejudice, voices Elizabeth's thoughts through the narrator?

Free indirect speech keeps readers inside Elizabeth's judgments, which is why they share her mistaken views of Darcy and Wickham until she corrects them herself.

Which 2008 ITV series sends a modern Londoner through a bathroom door into the plot of Pride and Prejudice?

Lost in Austen has its heroine, Amanda Price, find Elizabeth Bennet standing in her Hammersmith bathroom, then blunder into the story herself and send it disastrously off course.

Jo Baker's 2013 novel Longbourn retells the events of Pride and Prejudice from whose point of view?

The servants take centre stage, led by Sarah, an orphan who works for the Bennets and is drawn to a handsome but mysterious new manservant.

How was the Bingley fortune made, a fact Mr Bingley's proud sisters prefer to forget in Pride and Prejudice?

Through trade in the north of England, though the sisters, polished at a smart London seminary, feel entitled 'to think well of themselves and meanly of others'.

Which sister of Mrs Bennet lives in Meryton and keeps her nieces supplied with the latest town gossip?

Mrs Philips married her father's clerk, who took over the family business, and her noisy supper party is where Elizabeth first hears Wickham's tale of being wronged.

Which suddenly wealthy young woman does Wickham start courting after his flirtation with Elizabeth Bennet cools?

Miss King has just come into a fortune, yet Elizabeth excuses the pursuit as prudence; only later does she call his attentions 'solely and hatefully mercenary'.

What does Mr Collins admit to rehearsing in advance so that he can please ladies such as Lady Catherine de Bourgh?

Elegant compliments, he explains, are arranged beforehand but delivered with 'as unstudied an air as possible', a confession Mr Bennet relishes while keeping a perfectly straight face.

What does Elizabeth Bennet jokingly tell Jane first made her fall in love with Mr Darcy?

His grounds at Pemberley are her teasing answer, and Jane has to beg her to be serious before she will admit that the feeling came on too gradually to date.

What present has Mr Darcy just sent to Pemberley for his sister when Elizabeth Bennet tours the house?

A musical instrument has just come down for her, and Elizabeth is also shown a sitting-room freshly fitted up only because the girl took a liking to it on her last stay.

To which northern English town is Wickham's new regiment posted after his patched-up marriage in Pride and Prejudice?

Newcastle is where his new commission in the regular army takes him, and Mr Bennet flatly refuses to go along with Mrs Bennet's scheme for the whole family to follow.

Which Fanny Burney novel, with 'pride and prejudice' in capitals in its closing pages, probably gave Austen her title?

Cecilia ends with a doctor blaming the lovers' whole ordeal on 'PRIDE and PREJUDICE', a phrase printed three times in block capitals in a novel Austen is known to have admired.

At which seaside resort did Wickham once try to elope with Mr Darcy's fifteen-year-old sister?

Ramsgate is where the girl was talked into believing herself in love, but she confessed everything when her brother turned up unexpectedly a day or two before the planned flight.

Which children's author adapted Pride and Prejudice for the stage in 1936 under the title Miss Elizabeth Bennet?

A. A. Milne was primarily a playwright before Winnie-the-Pooh overshadowed the rest of his work, and the success of his children's books came to annoy him considerably.

Which Cheshire estate supplied the exterior of Pemberley in the BBC's 1995 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice?

Lyme Park only did the outside: management problems forced the crew to film Pemberley's rooms at Sudbury Hall, a different house in a different county.

Which former companion of Mr Darcy's sister does he bribe for Wickham's London address in Pride and Prejudice?

Mrs Younge had been dismissed for abetting Wickham before, and by now she let lodgings in Edward Street, the very first door he knocked on when he reached town.

Which Whitehall bookseller brought out the first edition of Pride and Prejudice in January 1813?

Thomas Egerton had already issued Austen's debut two years earlier; only with her fourth novel did she move to John Murray, the house that published Lord Byron.

Which festival do Mrs Bennet's London brother and sister-in-law spend at Longbourn each year in Pride and Prejudice?

Christmas brings them as usual, and this time they take Jane back to London in the hope that a change of scene will lift her spirits after Bingley's departure.