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It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. So begins Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austens witty comedy of mannersone of the most popular novels of all timethat features splendidly civilized sparring between the proud Mr. Darcy and the prejudiced Elizabeth Bennet as they play out their spirited courtship in a series of eighteenth-century drawing-room intrigues.