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Title: Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy, Sarah E. Maier ISBN: 1-55111-066-0 Publisher: Broadview Press Pub. Date: March, 1996 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $9.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.14 (162 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Sad, ambiguous, troubling, and beautiful.
Comment: My review is based on the Oxford Classics Edition.
Thomas Hardy seems to have been interested mostly in sad, unhappy characters who lead troubled, disappointing lives, struggle against fate, and lose. There is beauty in artistically represented sadness, though, and notably so if we are only spectators. I am not giving away the ending by writing that "Tess" is a sad novel. I think most people who choose to read this book do so because they know it is a sad story, or they have read Hardy before. In my case, I had to read it for school, and what truly surprised me is the ambiguity that Hardy so masterfully portrays in order to make his heroine more of a real person instead of a mere character. By the book's end we really do not know whether Tess was raped or seduced by Alec; whether he took advantage of a sleeping girl and forced himself upon her, or she allowed it in a moment of weakness, tired after a strenous day and grateful to him for "saving" her from the other workers. However it happened, Tess's life is radically changed after the fact and this event will have grave consequences for her and Alec.
The ambiguity is troubling with the entrance of Angel, the hypocrite who falls in love with Tess because she looks angelic, virginal, and beautiful as a child, but rejects her when she tells him that she is not a virgin (therefore not a child) anymore. Her other qualities are there, but Angel equates purity with virginity --something many people still do when it refers to women-- so he can construct a perfect excuse for his terrible behaviour towards the woman he has said he loved. In spite of the forebodings that Hardy drops before Chapter 35, this particular chapter, at the beginning of Phase the Fifth, is very powerful and almost surprising in its intensity. The level of troubling ambiguity goes up several notches at the end of the novel, when it appears that Angel may indeed get his "little girl" as a replacement for the one he just lost.
"Tess" is a sad and beautiful story. There is much more to write about this novel, but I have decided to concentrate on what Hardy seems to have intended when he wrote so beautifully about so sad a theme, but in such an ambiguous way. He calls Tess "A Pure Woman," and she is that. But as only a truly great writer would, he does not present her as an outright victim: there are plenty of opportunities for Tess to escape Alec before they have sex, and plenty of opportunities for her to deal in a different way with the cruel hand that fate has dealt her. She does not escape Alec, and she chooses Angel (rotten luck with men). There are tragic flaws in Tess, and that is what makes her human while making "Tess" into a true tragedy. Hardy knows this. His prose is elegant and, at times, it reads more like poetry, going from good to beautiful.
This edition of the novel is helpful, but it could be better. I prefer foot-notes rather than end-notes. If they have to be end-notes, they should have numbers. The Introduction by Simon Gatrell is original, although I do not agree with its main premises: that there are two Thomas Hardys at work in "Tess," and that "A Pure Woman" refers not to purity, but to "essential, wholly" woman. This is valid as an opinion but unsupported by evidence. I recommend "Tess of the d'Urbervilles." If you have never read Hardy, read this. If you have read him, you know what to expect.
Rating: 1
Summary: WARNING - Don't read the Introduction first!
Comment: My 1 star rating is due to the fact that Oxford University Press gives away the plot twists and even the shocker ending in the second paragraph of their Introduction. Most of the fun of reading any novel is trying to find out what will happen next. Oxford spoils this by giving it away at the start (what were they thinking?!!!). If you pick up this edition, just skip the Intro, or read it AFTER the book. Otherwise, Hardy's novel is a great story with insight into noble character. Hardy gets 5 stars, Oxford U Press gets 1.
Rating: 4
Summary: Tragically Beautiful
Comment: Tess's father, Mr. Durbeyfield, is told by a minister that his family is the direct lineage of an old, noble family that was once thought to be completely gone. There's nothing left of the family's land and fortune, except the family name (d'Urberville).
However, Mr. Durbeyfield and his wife see this as a chance to move up on the social ladder. They devise a plan to send their daughter to become acquainted with a rich woman who's last name is d'Urberville. From then on, Tess is left to try to maintain her dignity and honor and to pick up the pieces of her broken life that resulted from her parents' need to be important.
This is my first time reading anything by Thomas Hardy. I was warned that he was cynical man, and I'll agree that Hardy's prose is cynical, yet heartrending. I couldn't help feeling bad for Tess through all her troubles. This is not a happy novel. For a moment, you think that things will get better for Tess, but the fates seem to be against her.
The landscape of the novel changes with the mood of what's happening. The land itself almost seems to be a living person that he described.He uses vivid, beautifully described imagery to describe people and places in his novels. There are themes of theology (Hardy had internal conflicts with believing in God), virtue, the boundaries of love. He employs everything from Greek mythology to modern (or what was modern in his day) poetry.
There are no illusions of a happily-ever-after in this story. This was simply a beautiful novel, a novel that portrays its female heroine as the strong woman she was. She could put more modern women heroines to shame.
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Title: Tess of the d'Urbervilles (Cliffs Notes) by Jeff Coghill ISBN: 0764586580 Publisher: Cliffs Notes Pub. Date: 17 November, 2000 List Price(USD): $5.99 |
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Title: Wuthering Heights by EMILY BRONTE ISBN: 0553212583 Publisher: Bantam Pub. Date: 01 October, 1983 List Price(USD): $4.95 |
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Title: The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy, J.I.M. Stewart ISBN: 0375760067 Publisher: Modern Library Pub. Date: 14 May, 2002 List Price(USD): $7.95 |
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Title: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen ISBN: 0553213105 Publisher: Bantam Pub. Date: 01 December, 1983 List Price(USD): $4.95 |
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Title: Jude the Obscure (Penguin Classics) by Thomas Hardy, Dennis Taylor ISBN: 0140435387 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: September, 1998 List Price(USD): $7.95 |
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