Top Jane Austen Quotes For Love and Laughter

Meaning

• This is the opening sentence of the novel that highlighted the arrival of the wealthy Mr Bingley.
• It reflected society's expectation of the importance of marriage and wealth: a single, wealthy man should have a wife.

Significance

• It's especially important for the Bennet family, as they have five daughters who will not inherit anything once their father is dead.
• Austen is setting the stage for what's about to happen: finding a match for Mr Bingley out of one of the Bennet sisters.

Meaning

• One of the most earnest love declarations of all time, where Mr Knightley finds himself unable to speak more because he loves Emma so much.

Significance

• Austen showed another dimension of Knightley's character, where he was usually bold and eloquent.
• Sometimes the best love declarations are not the bold and long, dramatic ones. It could be short but deep, like this example.

Meaning

• Perhaps the most famous letter confession of all time, Captain Wentworth finally revealed he is still hoping for a second chance with Anne Elliot after she broke their engagement eight years ago.

Significance

• This quote is the epitome of how valuable and heart-wrenching a second chance in love can be, and when you get it again, you must never let it go.

Meaning

• What makes a good quality in love and relationships is always tenderness in character instead of external traits like wealth, beauty, or status.

Significance

• Austen is trying to highlight that a person's true attractiveness lies in their character, instead of their social standing.
• The line occurs within Emma's reflections about Harriet and the people around her.

Meaning

• Here, Mr Darcy's second proposal reassures Elizabeth that he still loves her, but this time, he recognises her freedom to reject him.

Significance

• The fact that Darcy swallowed his pride and proposed a second time also meant that he loved her more than the fear of being rejected again!

Meaning

• The speaker, Mr Darcy uses a witty metaphor to describe how admiration can be taken as a sign of an impending marriage.
• He was responding to Miss Bingley, who teased him about the possibility of becoming related to the Bingley family through Jane and Charles’s relationship.

Significance

• It's Darcy's observation and reflection on how even a small gesture or admiration from a man can be misinterpreted by the fellow ladies in a marriage-focused society.

Meaning

• It's not the norm for people to tell the complete truth when they communicate with others, especially when revealing their true thoughts, motives or feelings to another person.

Significance

• Sometimes, we are not always reliable interpreters of our own experience.
• It does not mean that we deliberately want to lie, but what we choose to reveal could be influenced by many factors like memory, self-interest or emotions.

Meaning

• The speaker, Mr Tilne, is advocating for the pleasure of reading fiction for everyone, both male and female, during a conversation on reading with Catherine Morland and his sister, Eleanor Tilney.

Significance

• This quote emphasises the importance of reading fiction and novels, where it's meant to be a great literary experience for everyone.

Meaning

• The speaker, Mary Crawford, is trying to use wit to excuse her bad behaviour, implying that her selfishness should be forgiven because it's "incurable".

Significance

• This was Austen's way of poking fun at human weakness and social manners
• You could admit your mistakes, but you are still inconsiderate of their effects on other people

Meaning

• The speaker, Elizabeth Bennet realises her judgement towards Mr Darcy and Mr Wickham has been clouded by her own pride and also prejudice.
• She believed herself to be perceptive and wise, but she was wrong.

Significance

• This was a major turning point in the novel where Elizabeth recognises her real mistake after reading Mr Darcy's letter.
• She was too certain of her ability to judge correctly and eventually accepted that her perception towards others (especially Mr Darcy) was limited.

Meaning

• Marianne Dashwood, the speaker, argues that true intimacy in a relationship is determined by a person's character or temperament rather than the duration of knowing each other.

Significance

• Marianne strongly believes emotional connection is something felt intensely and instinctively, especially when she regards her relationship with John Willoughby, whom she met briefly.
• However, the novel shows that while similar temperament may create closeness, only time will reveal a person's true character.

Meaning

• Austen observes that society tends to speak kindly to young people who are either experiencing dramatic events like marriage or death.
• In this case, Austen was referring to how Miss Hawkins became popular after her engagement to Mr Elton.

Significance

• It reflects how society in Highbury (the setting in Emma) is always forming opinions on others based on what happened to them, instead of their actual character.

Meaning

• Fanny Price, the speaker, believes that everyone has their own conscience and moral judgement and is better than the opinion of others, provided we listen to it.

Significance

• Fanny says this to Henry Crawford to remind him that she doesn't want to be the source of his moral decisions and he should judge his own conduct.

Meaning

• The speaker, Catherine Morland, responds to Henry Tilney with a self-deprecating witty line, implying that she doesn't hide her meaning behind complicated language.
• She jokingly suggests that her speech is too straightforward and doesn't have any intellectual sophistication.

Significance

• It's possible that Austen meant this quote to poke fun at people who habitually use elaborate or obscure language to appear clever.
• It's also a nod to Catherine's character, where she prefers to be simple and sincere in her words.

Meaning

• The speaker, Anne Elliot, explains that painful memories don't necessarily destroy a person's affection for a place.

Significance

• Anne is speaking about Lyme, where it was a place where the visit there ended badly due to Louisa Musgrove’s accident.
• However, she also acknowledges the city's beauty and somewhat pleasant memories, which somehow mirror her own relationship with Captain Wentworth.