Austen's plots highlight women's traditional dependence on marriage to secure social standing and economic security.
As an art form, the 18th-century novel lacked the seriousness of its equivalents from the 19th century,
when novels
were treated as "the natural vehicle for discussion and ventilation of what mattered in life".
Rather than delving too deeply into the psyche of her characters, Austen enjoys them and imbues them with humour,
according to critic John Bayley. He believes that the well-spring of her wit and irony is her own attitude that comedy is
"the saving grace of life". Part of Austen's fame rests on the historical and literary significance that she was the first
woman to write great comic novels. Samuel Johnson's influence is evident, in that she follows his advice to write
"a representation of life as may excite mirth".
Her humour comes from her modesty and lack of superiority, allowing her most successful characters, such as Elizabeth Bennet,
to transcend the trivialities of life, which the more foolish characters are overly absorbed in.
Austen used comedy to explore the
individualism of women's lives and gender relations, and she appears to have used it to find
the goodness in life, often fusing it
with "ethical sensibility", creating artistic tension. Critic Robert Polhemus writes,
"To appreciate the drama and achievement of
Austen, we need to realize how deep was her passion for both reverence and ridicule and her comic imagination reveals both the
harmonies and the telling contradictions of her mind and vision as she tries to
reconcile her satirical bias with her sense of the good."