A Jane Austen Education: How Six Novels Taught Me About Love, Friendship, and the Things That Really Matter

by William Deresiewicz

That was the first lesson that Pride and Prejudice taught me. Elizabeth’s errors were not accidents she could have avoided; they were expressions of her character—in fact, of the very best parts of her character, that quickness and confidence for which I loved her so. You don’t “fix” your mistakes, Austen was telling me, as if they somehow existed outside you, and you can’t prevent them from happening, either. You aren’t born perfect and only need to develop the self-confidence and self-esteem with which to express your wondrous perfection. You are born with a whole novel’s worth of errors ahead of you.

being happy means becoming a better person, and becoming a better person means having your mistakes pointed out to you in a way that you can’t ignore. Yes, the true friend wants you to be happy, but being happy and feeling good about yourself are not the same things. In fact, they can sometimes be diametrically opposed.

True love, for Austen, means a never-ending clash of opinions and perspectives.