Show how the theme of manners is explored in the novel Pride and Prejudice.

In the novel "Pride and Prejudice", Austen presents the society of the Regency Period (19th Century) as being moulded by what was considered to be socially acceptable. Correct etiquette was an unspoken rule. A person's character and attitude could be identified through his/her social propriety. In addition, in a society where marriage is valued and not viewed as optional, good manners and a socially adept behaviour made a person (especially a woman), a better match for marriage. Some characters are presented as role models of society, like Jane, Ms Gardiner, Elizabeth and Mr Darcy, others to be completely ignorant of what good manners are, like Mrs Bennet and Lydia. Others seems to grasp what is expected of them, bu still seem to be failing, like Collins, Miss Bingley and Lady Catherine.In this comedy of manners, characters create a comical effect through their ridiculous behaviour. First off, Lady Catherine, despite her aristocratic class, is presented as an inquisitive, rude and authoritative character. She feels greatly superior because of her social status; "with great condescension, arose to receive them". Through the oxymoron an ironic tone is created as she does follow the etiquette of rising to receive her guest, however, through the omniscient narrator, who's liability is not in question, the reader starts to feel disgusted by her snobbery and pompous attitude. Moreover, she insults Elizabeth who is "of inferior birth". Due to her sentiment of menace that Elizabeth will marry Darcy, who Lady Catherine had planned to marry her daughter, she becomes extremely rude. "Are the shades of Pemberly thus to be polluted?" Through the metaphor and the use of the word polluted, associated with a dilution of purity, and the rhetorical question, Austen passes the message to the reader that superiority of class does not coincide with superiority of intellect, ethics or tact.