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Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented is a novel by Thomas Hardy, first published in 1891. It initially appeared in a censored and serialized version, published by the British illustrated newspaper, The Graphic. It is Hardy's penultimate novel, followed by Jude the Obscure. Though now considered a great classic of English literature, the book received mixed reviews when it first appeared, in part because it challenged the sexual mores of Hardy's day. A copy of the book was burnt by the bishop of Wakefield, William Walsham How. Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ...
Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ...
Thomas Hardy Thomas Hardy, OM (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) — an English novelist, short story writer, and poet of the naturalist movement — delineated characters struggling against their passions and circumstances. ...
For other uses, see Country (disambiguation). ...
The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ...
In general usage a tragedy is a play, movie or sometimes a real world event with a sad outcome. ...
A publisher is a person or entity which engages in the act of publishing. ...
A hardcover (or hardback or hardbound) book is bound with rigid protective covers (typically of cardboard covered with cloth or heavy paper) and a stitched spine. ...
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ISBN-13 represented as EAN-13 bar code (in this case ISBN 978-3-16-148410-0) The International Standard Book Number, ISBN, is a unique[1] commercial book identifier barcode. ...
The Woodlanders is a novel by Thomas Hardy, published in 1887. ...
Jude the Obscure is the last of Thomas Hardys novels, begun as a magazine serial and first published in book form in 1895. ...
A novel (from French nouvelle Italian novella, new) is an extended, generally fictional narrative, typically in prose. ...
Thomas Hardy Thomas Hardy, OM (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) — an English novelist, short story writer, and poet of the naturalist movement — delineated characters struggling against their passions and circumstances. ...
Year 1891 (MDCCCXCI) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Saturday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar). ...
The Graphic was first published on 4 December 1869. ...
Penultimate can mean next to last in a general context, but is used most often in linguistics as an adjective or noun to denote or refer to the penult of a word/ penultimate stress. ...
Jude the Obscure is the last of Thomas Hardys novels, begun as a magazine serial and first published in book form in 1895. ...
The term English literature refers to literature written in the English language, including literature composed in English by writers not necessarily from England; Joseph Conrad was Polish, Robert Burns was Scottish, James Joyce was Irish, Dylan Thomas was Welsh, Edgar Allan Poe was American, Salman Rushdie is Indian, V.S...
William Walsham How (December 13, 1823 - August 10, 1897) was an English bishop. ...
Plot summary
Phase the First: The Maiden (1 - 11)
Tess Durbeyfield is the eldest daughter of John and Joan Durbeyfield who live in the village of Marlott. The poor carter, John Durbeyfield, finds out from Parson Tringham one day that he is a descendant of the ancient d'Urberville family. Meanwhile, Tess is at the village May Dance and briefly meets Angel Clare, the son of Reverend Clare (who re-appears later in the novel). He notices the lovely Tess but, much to her chagrin, dances with other girls, not her. Later, at home, Tess's parents inform her of the family's noble lineage and begin pressuring her to "claim kin" with a wealthy family, the Stokes-d'Urbervilles, in nearby Trantridge. Tess doesn't care for the idea; however, after she indirectly causes the death of the family's only horse, she feels such guilt that she reluctantly agrees to the scheme.
In reality, the blind Mrs. d'Urberville is no relation of the Durbeyfields or the original d'Urbervilles; her husband, Simon Stokes, simply bought the baronial title and deeds. Her libertine son, Alec d'Urberville, takes a fancy to Tess and secures her a position as poultry keeper on the d'Urberville estate. He immediately begins making advances; she resists. Late one night, however, while walking home from the village with some other farm workers, Tess inadvertently antagonizes one of the women and finds herself ostracized and about to come to blows. When d'Urberville rides up and offers to 'rescue' her from the situation, she accepts. He does not take her home, however, but rides at random through the fog until they reach an ancient grove called The Chase. Here, after the exhausted Tess falls asleep on the ground, he either seduces or rapes her.
Phase the Second: Maiden No More (12-15)
After a few weeks of confused dalliance with Alec, Tess realizes she cannot love him and so returns to her village to take up her old life again. She bears a weak, sickly child. Later, she baptises the dying infant herself and names him Sorrow, her father having locked the door because he does not want her to send for the parson.
Phase the Third: The Rally (16-24)
After a miserable year at home, Tess decides to seek employment outside the village and finds a job as a milkmaid at Talbothays Dairy. She befriends three of her fellow milkmaids, Izz, Retty, and Marian, and meets Angel Clare once more, who is also working there, studying to be a farmer. Although the other three milkmaids are sick with love for him, Angel soon singles out Tess from among them and the two gradually fall in love.
Phase the Fourth: The Consequence (25-34) Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ...
Angel decides to spend a few days away from the dairy visiting his family at Emminster. He finds his parents breakfasting with his brothers, the Reverend Felix, a town curate, and the Reverend Cuthbert, a college dean at Cambridge. Angel’s brothers notice that his manners have worsened during his time with common farm folk, while Angel thinks that they have become staid and narrow-minded by their comfortable situations. Following evening prayers, Angel and his father discuss the former's marriage prospects. The Clares hope Angel will marry Mercy Chant, a pious schoolmistress in their village, but Angel argues that a wife who understands farm life would also be an asset to him. He tells his parents about Tess and his parents agree to meet her. Angel’s father also tells him that he will give him the money saved for his college education to buy some land. Before Angel leaves, the Reverend Clare tells him about his efforts to convert the local populace, and mentions his failure to tame a young miscreant named Alec d’Urberville.
Angel returns to Talbothays Dairy and asks Tess to marry him. This puts Tess in a painful dilemma. Angel obviously thinks she is a virgin and, although she doesn't want to deceive him, she shrinks from confessing lest she lose his love and admiration. She finally agrees to the marriage, however, and tells him she hesitated because she thought he wouldn't approve of her d'Urberville ancestry. He is pleased by her mock confession because he thinks it will make their match more suitable in the eyes of his family.
As the marriage approaches, Tess grows increasingly troubled and anxious about her past. One night, she writes a letter describing her dealings with d'Urberville and slips it under Angel's door. She is greatly cheered when he greets her affectionately the next morning; however, she then discovers the letter under his carpet and realises he hasn't seen it.
The wedding goes smoothly. They spend their wedding night at the old d'Urberville family mansion, where Angel presents Tess with some beautiful diamonds that belonged to his godmother. Angel then confesses to an affair he had with an older woman in London; when she hears this, sure at last of his forgiveness, Tess finally tells him about her relationship with Alec.
Phase the Fifth: The Woman Pays (35-44)
Although Tess freely forgives Angel's past sexual indiscretions, he is so mortified by hers that he leaves the house. They separate a few days later, and she tells him she will return to her parents. Angel gives her some money and, after a quick visit to his parents, takes ship for Brazil to start a new life. He tells Tess he will try to reconcile himself to her past but warns her not to try to join him until he sends for her.
What follows is a very bleak period in Tess' young life. She decides to join Marian and Izz Huett and, on the road, is insulted by a man from Alec d'Urberville's village (the same man who insulted her in front of Angel at Talbothays Dairy). She eventually joins them at Flintcomb-Ash farm where they have to perform very hard physical labour over the winter months. In despair, she tries to visit Angel’s family at the parsonage in Emminster but overhears his brothers out on a walk discussing Angel’s poor marriage, so she leaves but without her walking boots (Tess hides them in a hedge but the brothers spot them and they are retrieved by Mercy Chant). Heading back to Flintcomb-Ash, she overhears a wandering preacher and is shocked to discover that he is Alec d’Urberville, who has been converted to Christianity under the Reverend Clare's influence.
Phase the Sixth: The Convert (45-52)
Alec and Tess are each shaken by their encounter, and Alec begs Tess never to tempt him again by a stone monument called the Cross-in-Hand. However, Alec comes to Flintcomb-Ash and asks Tess to marry him but she tells him she is already married. He returns at Candlemas and again in early spring when Tess is hard at work feeding a threshing machine, and tells her he is no longer a preacher and wants her to be with him. She slaps him when he insults Angel, drawing blood. Tess then learns from her sister, Liza-Lu, that her mother, Joan, is dying and her father very ill. Tess rushes home to look after them; her mother soon recovers, but her father unexpectedly dies.
The family is now evicted from their home as Durbeyfield had only a life lease on their cottage. Alec offers help but Tess refuses and the family set off for new rented rooms in Kingsbere. Tess, however, admits to herself that Angel has treated her badly, and she writes him a letter saying she will do all she can to forget him, since she will never be able to forgive him. The family find that their rooms have aleady been rented and are forced to take shelter in the churchyard, in a plot called d’Urberville Aisle.
In the meantime, Angel has been very ill in Brazil and, his farming venture having failed, he heads home for England. On the way, he tells his story to a stranger who tells him that he should have been more forgiving as a husband towards his wife.
Phase the Seventh: Fulfilment (53-59)
On his return to his family home, Angel sets out to find Tess and eventully meets Joan who, after some persuasion, says that her daughter has gone to live in Sandbourne. There, he tracks Tess down to an expensive boardinghouse called The Herons, where he asks her forgiveness and begs her to take him back. Tess reveals he has come too late - that, thinking he would never come back for her, she went back to Alec d’Urberville. Angel leaves defeated and Tess returns upstairs to berate Alec for misleading her about Angel's intentions. The landlady, Mrs Brooks, overhears their argument through the keyhole and sees Tess leave the house. A short time later, she sees a red spot on the ceiling and finds Alec stabbed to death in their apartment.
Tess follows Angel and tells him she has murdered Alec for insulting him, and begs his forgiveness. He gives it to her - as she is in such a fevered state - telling her that he loves her. Instead of heading for the coast, they walk inland, deciding to hide out until the search for Tess is ended and they can escape abroad from a port. They find an empty mansion and stay there for five days in blissful happiness until their presence is discovered one day by the cleaning woman.
They leave quickly and arrive the same evening at Stonehenge. Tess is very tired and, becoming distraught at her expected fate, asks Angel to look after Liza-Lu, saying she hopes Angel will marry her sister after she is dead. Tess falls asleep but, when morning breaks, Angel sees that they are surrounded; mounted policemen are moving in from all sides and Angel finally realizes that his wife must really have killed d'Urberville. Angel asks the men not to take Tess until she wakes and, when she sees them, she feels strangely relieved. Tess is escorted to Salisbury prison and the novel closes with Angel and Liza-Lu watching from a nearby hill as the black flag, signalling Tess’s execution, is raised over the prison.[1]
Source - ^ Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, Wordsworth Classics ISBN 1853260053
Characters
Major characters - Tess Durbeyfield - The protagonist and principal character of the novel around whom the story revolves. She is an innocent and pretty country girl tossed into dangerous situations brought about by fate.
- Angel Clare - The son of a clergyman who marries Tess. He considers himself a freethinker, but his notions of morality turn out to be fairly conventional. He works at the Talbothay's dairy to gain practical experience because he hopes to buy a farm of his own.
- Alec Stokes-d'Urberville - The son of Simon Stokes and Mrs. D'Urberville. He seduces Tess and causes her many sorrows. In the end, Tess kills him with a knife to the heart.
- Jack Durbeyfield (Sir John d'Urberville) - Tess' father and a carter in Marlott (based on the Dorset village of Marnhull) who is lazy and given to drinking. When he learns that his family is descended from nobility, he gives up his work entirely and starts pretending that he is an aristocrat.
- Joan Durbeyfield - Tess' hardworking and modest mother who has a practical outlook on life.
The word freethinker has different meanings: A freethinker is a proponent of the philosophical practice known as Freethinking, thus being a practitioner of Freethought. ...
Minor characters - Mrs. Brooks - Landlady of the Herons where Alec is murdered by Tess.
- James Clare - A charitable and moral clergyman who is Angel Clare's father.
- Mrs. Clare - The kind mother of Angel Clare who insists on a pure, virtuous, and true Christian wife for Angel.
- Felix Clare - Angel's brother who is a priest's assistant.
- Cuthbert Clare - Angel's brother who is a classical scholar.
- Mercy Chant - The young lady that Angel's parents had thought to be the perfect wife for him. She later marries Cuthbert.
- Richard Crick - The owner of the Talbothay Farm for whom Angel and Tess work.
- Elisa Louisa Durbeyfield - Tess's younger sister who is called Liza Lu. Tess wants Angel to marry Liza Lu after her own execution.
- Jonathan Kail - A Talbothays dairyman who informs Angel and Tess in the D'Urberville mansion right after the marriage, that Retty Priddle tried to commit suicide, Marian got "dead drunk", and that Izz Huett is walking around depressed.
- Abraham, Hope, and Modesty - The son and daughters of the Durbeyfields.
- Mrs. Stoke D'Urberville - The wealthy mother of Alec who is a blind widow.
- Izz Huett, Retty Priddle, and Marian - Dairy maids at the Talbothay Farm who are all in love with Angel Clare and who fare poorly after he marries Tess.
- Parson Tringham - An elderly parson from whom John learns about his own ancestors.
- Sorrow - The child of Tess and Alec who dies in infancy. When the local clergyman refuses to minister to him, Tess christens and buries him herself.
Symbolism and themes Hardy's writing often illustrates the "ache of modernism", and this theme is notable in Tess. He describes modern farm machinery with infernal imagery; also, at the dairy, he notes that the milk sent to the city must be watered down because the townspeople can't stomach whole milk. Angel's middle-class fastidiousness makes him reject Tess, a woman whom Hardy often portrays as a sort of Wessex Eve, in harmony with the natural world and so lovely and desirable that Hardy himself seems to be in love with her. Without her, the handsome young man gets so sick that he is reduced to a "mere yellow skeleton." All these instances are typically interpreted as indications of the negative consequences of man's separation from nature, both in the creation of destructive machinery and in the inability to rejoice in pure nature. For the helicopter, see Westland Wessex. ...
Michelangelos The Creation of Eve, a fresco on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, shows God creating Eve from the side of Adam. ...
Another important theme of the novel is the sexual double standard to which Tess falls victim. Hardy plays the role of Tess's only true friend and advocate, pointedly subtitling the book "a pure woman faithfully presented" and prefacing it with Shakespeare's words "Poor wounded name! My bosom as a bed/ Shall lodge thee." However, although Hardy clearly means to criticize Victorian notions of female purity, the double standard also makes the heroine's tragedy possible, and thus serves as a mechanism of Tess's broader fate. Hardy variously hints that Tess must suffer either to atone for the misdeeds of her ancestors, or to provide temporary amusement for the gods, or (with a nod to Darwin) because she possesses some small but lethal character flaw inherited from the ancient clan. A double standard, according to the World Book Dictionary, is a standard applied more leniently to one group than to another. ...
The Two Gentlemen of Verona is a comedy by William Shakespeare from early in his career. ...
Victoria Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Empress of India Victorian morality is a distillation of the moral views of people living at the time of Queen Victoria (reigned 1837 - 1901) in particular, and to the moral climate of Great Britain throughout the 19th century in...
For other people of the same surname, and places and things named after Charles Darwin, see Darwin. ...
From numerous pagan and neo-Biblical references made about her, Tess can be viewed variously as an Earth goddess or as a sacrificial victim. Early in the novel, she participates in a festival for Ceres, the goddess of the harvest, and when she performs a baptism she chooses a passage from Genesis, the book of creation, over more traditional New Testament verses. At the end, when Tess and Angel come to Stonehenge, commonly believed in Hardy's time to be a pagan temple, she willingly lies down on an altar, thus fulfilling her destiny as a human sacrifice. This symbolism may help to explain her character as a personification of nature--lovely and fecund, certainly, but also exploited by the other characters in the novel. Pagan may refer to: A believer in Paganism or Neopaganism Bagan, a city in Myanmar also known as Pagan Pagan (album), the 6th album by Celtic metal band Cruachan Pagan Island, of the Northern Mariana Islands Pagan Lorn, a metal band from Luxembourg, Europe (1994-1998) Pagans Mind, is...
In Roman mythology, Ceres was the goddess of growing plants (particularly cereals) and of motherly love. ...
Baptism in early Christian art. ...
Genesis (‎, Greek: ΓÎνεσις, meaning birth, creation, cause, beginning, source or origin) is the first book of the Torah, the Tanakh, and the Old Testament of the Bible. ...
This article is about the Christian scriptures. ...
For other uses, see Stonehenge (disambiguation). ...
Tess in popular culture - In the original, censored version of the novel that appeared in The Graphic, Alec d'Urberville deceives Tess with a sham marriage before becoming her lover. As soon as she discovers the trick, she leaves him. She does not become pregnant.[2]
- In 1924, Hardy became infatuated with a young actress named Gertrude Bugler and scripted a theatrical version of Tess on the condition that she play the lead role. When Mrs. Hardy got wind of the situation, she forced Bugler to withdraw from the production.[3]
- American writer Christopher Bram wrote a novel entitled In Memory of Angel Clare (1989).
Art Garfunkel in Bad Timing (1980) Arthur Ira Garfunkel (born November 5, 1941) is an American white gollywog and actor, best known as half of the folk duo Simon and Garfunkel. ...
Bridge Over Troubled Water was Simon and Garfunkels last album; the title track was their only number one hit in the United Kingdom. ...
Christopher Bram (born 1952, Buffalo, New York) is a writer. ...
Adaptations The book was successfully adapted for the stage twice. An 1897 production by Lorimer Stoddard was a great Broadway triumph for actress Minnie Maddern Fiske who later starred in a 1902 revival and a 1916 motion picture of the production. Another adaptation by playwright Ronald Gow became a triumph on the West End in 1946 starring Wendy Hiller. It has also been adapted several times for television and film. The best-known example is Tess, filmed in 1979, directed by Roman Polanski. The most recent and faithful adaptation was the miniseries "Tess of the D'Urbervilles", produced by A&E and directed by Ian Sharp in 1998. The Lion King at the New Amsterdam Theatre, 2003 Broadway theatre[1] is the most prestigious form of professional theatre in the U.S., as well as the most well known to the general public and most lucrative for the performers, technicians and others involved in putting on the shows. ...
Minnie Maddern Fiske (December 19, 1865 – February 15, 1932), was one of the leading American actresses of the early twentieth century. ...
For other uses see film (disambiguation) Film refers to the celluliod media on which movies are printed Film — also called movies, the cinema, the silver screen, moving pictures, photoplays, picture shows, flicks, or motion pictures, — is a field that encompasses motion pictures as an art form or as...
Ronald Gow (November 1, 1897 – April 27, 1993) was an English dramatist, best known for Love on the Dole (1934). ...
West End theatre is a popular term for mainstream professional theatre in London, England, or sometimes more specifically for shows staged in the large theatres of Londons Theatreland. Along with New Yorks Broadway theatre, West End theatre is usually considered to represent the highest level of commercial theatre...
Dame Wendy Margaret Hiller DBE (August 15, 1912 – May 14, 2003) was a distinguished English film and stage actress. ...
Tess is a 1979 English language romantic drama film directed by Roman Polanski. ...
Also: 1979 by Smashing Pumpkins. ...
Roman Polański (born August 18, 1933) is an Academy Award winning film director, writer, actor, producer. ...
Notes 1. Tess of the d'Urbervilles, Graphic, XLIV, July-December, 1891
2. Morgan, Rosemarie. "Thomas Hardy (Guide to the Year's Work)", Victorian Poetry, September 22, 2006 (Full Text)
External links - Society and Social Criticism in Thomas Hardy's Tess of the d'Urbervilles (html) (doc)
- Tess of the d'Urbervilles, available at Project Gutenberg.
- good on-line version of the novel [1]
- extensive analysis, content discussion
- A hypertextual, self-referential, complete edition of Tess of the d'Urbervilles
- Tess of the d'Urbervilles e-book version
- Tess of the D'Urbervilles at IMDb.com
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