How do you understand it better now?

I understand now how Austen uses gender in her novels. She never really has her characters be physical, it's rare for them to touch or kiss or do anything physical. She was also not a big writer of romance. She liked her women to be strong as well and kind of give them more power at times then the men. It is mentioned that she gave Elizabeth the power to decline the offer of marriage proposed by Mr. Collins. This was Austen giving the gender power to women in her novels. Gender played an important role in that time period. Men were thought to have the power over women but Austen does give women power in her novels over their own life. Austen wanted equality of the sexes and she tried to make that clear in her novels. I better understand gender now because of the background information that was given and how men and women were viewed in that time period. It is clear throughout all of her novels how she feels about "happiness" and marriage and the union of two people.