ll-mannered, but Jane insists that they are charming in close conversation, while Eliza continues to harbor a dislike for the two.
             The author then provides us with Bingley's background: we learn that he inherited a hundred thousand pounds from his father, but for now, in spite of his sisters' complaints, he lives as a tenant. His friendship with Darcy is "steady," despite their opposite characters, which are illustrated in their reactions to the Meryton ball. Bingley, cheerful and sociable, has an excellent time and is taken with Jane; Darcy, more clever but less tactful, finds the people dull and even criticizes Jane for smiling too often.
             Bingley's sisters, on the other hand, find Jane to be "a sweet girl," and Bingley therefore feels secure in his good opinion of her.
             The opening sentence of Pride and Prejudice -- "It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife" -- is one of the most famous first lines in literature. It immediately establishes the centrality of marriage to the novel: first, by introducing the arrival of Mr. Bingley, an event that sets the plot in motion; second, by its implication that the real truth is that a single woman must also be in want of a husband.
             The first chapter is nearly all dialogue. Its last paragraph, in which Mr. Bennet is described as a "mixture of quick parts, sarcastic humour, reserve, and caprice," and his wife as "a woman of mean understanding, little information, and uncertain temper," only affirms what the reader has already learned from their conversation. The character of the mother, indeed, remains on the level of ill-breeding and one-note hysteria throughout the novel. And while Mr. Bennet's retreat into his wit and his library seem less sympathetic by the end of the book, the pattern of his behavior is accurately portrayed in the first conversation with his wife.
             This opening typifies Austen's method of c...