Tess of the dUrbervilles. A Pure Woman [625190]

“Tess of the d'Urbervilles. A Pure Woman"
•is one of Hardy's Wessex novels,
•the action takes place in the Wessex region,
during the late 1800s,
•narrator: omniscient.
•inspiration and ideal of literary art: the Greek tragedy.

•Inner battle between instinct and power of reason.
•The fictional universe contains:
•signs of ill-omen ,
•accidents ,
•coincidences .
•Hardy adopted the Greek principle of fateand predestination .
•Arguably, his use of coincidences and unfortunate accidents might
be seen as excessive, stretching plausibility to the extreme.

The setting:
•topographically specific,
•pastoral, rural,
•vivid tableaux,
•many detailed descriptions of the landscape,
•the external world is in tune with Tess’s inner consciousness,
•the most important places are the two farms, Talbothay’s and
Flintcomb -Ash.

The plot
•is structured in 7 phases :
1.PHASE THE FIRST: The Maiden,
2.PHASE THE SECOND: Maiden No More,
3.PHASE THE THIRD: The Rally,
4.PHASE THE FOURTH: The Consequence,
5.PHASE THE FIFTH: The Woman Pays,
6.PHASE THE SIXTH: The Convert,
7.PHASE THE SEVENTH: Fulfilment.

Marlott
“The village of Marlott lay amid the north -eastern undulations of
the beautiful Vale of Blakemore, or Blackmoor , aforesaid, an
engirdled and secluded region, for the most part untrodden as
yet by tourist or landscape -painter , though within a four hours'
journey from London. It is a vale whose acquaintance is best
made by viewing it from the summits of the hills that surround
it—except perhaps during the droughts of summer.”

•By chance, Parson Tringham informs Jack Durbeyfield that he is a
descendant of the D’Urberville family .
•The first glimpse of Tess: during the celebration of May Day (May 1st):
Dressed in white, she is "a mere vessel of emotion untinctured by
experience . . . for all her bouncing handsome womanliness, you could
sometimes see her twelfth year in her cheeks, or her ninth sparkle from
her eyes; and even her fifth would flit over the curves of her mouth now
and then.“
•On this day, her first encounter with Angel Clare takes place, meeting
which they will later on contemplate.

"Thus the thing began."
•Her sojourn at Trantridge :
•Tess travels to The Slopes with the intent of claiming kin,
where she meets Alec (Stokes) d'Urberville .
•The environment is formal, but also contrived.
•Tess’s fate begins to unfold, regardless of her willingness to
participate in the events that follow.

The Chase
•“by this time the moon had quite gone down, and partly on
account of the fog The Chase was wrapped in thick
darkness , although morning was not far off. “
•“He knelt and bent lower, till her breath warmed his face,
and in a moment his cheek was in contact with hers . She
was sleeping soundly, and upon her eyelashes there
lingered tears .”

“…where was Tess's guardian angel?”
•Context:
“She was inexpressibly weary. She had risen at five o'clock every morning
of that week, had been on foot the whole of each day, and on this evening
had in addition walked the three miles to Chaseborough , waited three
hours for her neighbours without eating or drinking, […] it was now nearly
one o'clock.”
•The purity question: has Tess been harassed or seduced?
•She is not educated as far as worldly matters are concerned, thus she is
not particularly prepared for advances from a man like Alec
d'Urberville .

Talbothay’s
•A beautiful place in southern England.
•Uncultivated land.
•The place where Tess meets Angel Clare , placing him in contrast with Alec.
•Their romance is ethereal in nature, enhanced by the surroundings (lush and
rich natural setting).
•Angel calls Tess names such as Artemis and Demeter (Greek mythology), he
falls in love with his idealized version of her:

“Minute diamonds of moisture from the mist hung, too,
upon Tess's eyelashes, and drops upon her hair, like seed
pearls. When the day grew quite strong and commonplace
these dried off her…”
“Upon this river -brink they lingered till the fogbegan to
close round them —which was very early in the evening at
this time of the year —settling on the lashes of her eyes,
where it rested like crystals, and on his brows and hair.”

The first night of the marriage
•Is going to be spent in (and around) an old D'Urberville manor.
•There are “two life -size portraits on panels built into the
masonry”, which cannot be removed, as they are built into the
wall.
•they represent an omen: similar to the paintings, Tess’s past
cannot be erased and will forever be a part of her life,
•thus foreshadowing the scene depicting their confessions and
its outcome.

“But the complexion even of external things seemed to suffer
transmutation as her announcement progressed. The fire in
the grate looked impish —demoniacally funny, as if it did not
care in the least about her strait. The fender grinned idly, as
if it too did not care. The light from the water -bottle was
merely engaged in a chromatic problem. All material objects
around announced their irresponsibility with terrible
iteration. And yet nothing had changed since the moments
when he had been kissing her; or rather, nothing in the
substance of things. But the essence of things had changed.”

Flintcomb -Ash
•a desolate place with dry fields.
•Depictions of machinery: a train delivering milk to London from Talbothay’s
and a steam threshing machine which is used at Flintcomb -Ash (operated by
the “engine -man” with an “engine which was to act as the primum mobile of
this world“).
•the image of the demonic machine is associated with the image of Alec
D’Urberville, who came to see Tess again after she sees him preaching.
“He who has wrought her undoing was now on the side of the Spirit, while she
remained unregenerate”

Trouble in Tess’s family
•Tess’s father dies and the family is forced to move out
of their house.
•While helping with the move, Alec tells the story of a
phantom coach, revolving around a beautiful woman
who was abducted and a murder (story about which it
can be said that it ultimately plays out in reality).

The ending
•Thomas Hardy belongs to the 2ndgeneration of Victorian novelists,
therefore his fatalistic inclinations are present in the final phase.
•Angel returns to Tess seemingly too late:
“But he could not get on. Speech was as inexpressive as silence. But he
had a vague consciousness of one thing, though it was not clear to him
till later; that his original Tess had spiritually ceased to recognize the
body before him as hers —allowing it to drift, like a corpse upon the
current, in a direction dissociated from its living will.”

Stonehenge
"This happiness could not have lasted."
•Tess is arrested by the police for the murder of Alec
D'Urberville.
•They arrive at it during the night, in darkness.
•Inspires permanence, constant existence, similar to the
existence of Tess’s past (her struggle; fate).
•A place of sacrifice.

Tess Durbeyfield
•Strives to be happy, but can never reach that state and maintain
it.
•Her innate D’Urberville pride prevents her from asking for
exterior help (she is a genuine descendant; self -sufficient,
sacrifices herself for others).
•Parallel do Darwinism: evolution through adaptation.
•A tortured existence hiding behind her natural beauty.
•Her biggest weakness is that for her family.

The male protagonists
ALEC D’URBERVILLE
•promiscuous seducer
•shallow, selfish
•temporarily becomes a
preacher, until he returns
to his old personaANGEL CLARE
•is relatively
inexperienced
•well read, educated
•was supposed follow the
ways of the Church

The “woman question”
•Thomas Hardy rebelled against the stigmatisation of unmarried,
sexually active women.
•Theme: the fallen woman.
•Change from the rural, village culture to an urban, industrialized one.
•Bearing a very large number of children is no longer the main
focus, instead the importance falling on the impeccable virginity
and purity of the woman (also a man’s security that his children
are indeed his own).