“It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.” Thus begins Jane Austen’s most beloved and celebrated novel that has delighted and enthralled readers ever since its anonymous publication in 1813. In Austen’s time, Mr. Bennet’s estate can only be passed down to a male heir—a circumstance that will leave his five daughters destitute. To escape poverty at least one of sisters must make a wealthy match to support the others. Despite this pressure, the spirited Bennet girls are determined to marry for love rather than for money and prestige. Austen’s humor, wit, and narrative prowess infuse this highly entertaining story that offers, along the way, a keen examination of the nature of true happiness and independence and has served as inspiration for countless retellings up to the present time. This authoritative edition includes a new afterword, Virginia Woolf’s seminal essay Jane Austen, and a detailed timeline of Austen’s life.

Jane Austen (1775–1817) was an English writer who first gave the novel its distinctively modern character through her treatment of ordinary people in everyday life. Her six novels have become timeless classics because Austen’s astonishingly diverse characters all insist on their private judgment as an innate right even in the most confining circumstances. Few other books present such fully rendered individuals whose actions captivate readers to this very day.