Tess of the d'Urbervilles

Summary

Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman follows Tess Durbeyfield, the eldest daughter of a poor family in the Wessex village of Marlott, from girlhood to her execution. The plot begins when her feckless father, John Durbeyfield, learns from a parson that he descends from the ancient Norman family of d'Urberville. Hoping for help from supposed rich relations, her mother sends Tess to the Stoke-d'Urbervilles, a newly rich family who have bought the name. There the son, Alec d'Urberville, pursues her, and one night in the Chase he takes advantage of her; Hardy leaves the episode between seduction and rape. Tess returns home pregnant. Her baby, whom she baptizes herself and names Sorrow, dies in infancy, and the vicar refuses a Christian burial. Seeking a new start, Tess works as a milkmaid at Talbothays dairy in the fertile Valley of the Great Dairies, where she and Angel Clare, a clergyman's son learning to farm, fall in love. She tries to tell him about her past, but her letter slips under a carpet. On their wedding night Angel confesses an earlier affair of his own; Tess forgives him and tells her story, but he cannot forgive her and leaves for Brazil. Abandoned, Tess endures heavy labor on the starved upland farm of Flintcomb-Ash. Alec, now a converted preacher, reappears, abandons his religion and pursues her again. After her father dies and her family is evicted, Tess yields and becomes Alec's mistress to support them. Angel, changed by hardship, returns too late. Tess kills Alec, joins Angel, and the two spend a few days together in an empty house and at Stonehenge, where she is arrested. The novel ends with her hanging at Wintoncester, while Angel and her sister Liza-Lu watch the black flag rise. Hardy's subtitle, "A Pure Woman", challenged Victorian moral judgment of sexual 'fallen' women, and editors forced him to cut and alter the story for its magazine serialization. Its challenge to the moral judgments of its society, its scenes of rural work and its sense of fate made it one of the most debated books of the 1890s; it remains among the most widely read Victorian novels.

Plot or Argument

• Phase the First: The Maiden

  John Durbeyfield learns of his noble ancestry; the family horse is killed while Tess drives the cart; Tess goes to work for the d'Urbervilles, and Alec seduces or forces her in The Chase.

• Phase the Second: Maiden No More

  Tess returns home, gives birth to Sorrow, who dies after she baptizes him herself.

• Phases the Third and Fourth: The Rally; The Consequence

  At Talbothays dairy Tess and Angel Clare fall in love and marry, though her written confession never reaches him.

• Phase the Fifth: The Woman Pays

  On the wedding night Angel cannot forgive her past and leaves for Brazil; Tess labors at Flintcomb-Ash.

• Phases the Sixth and Seventh: The Convert; Fulfilment

  Alec returns as a preacher, then renews his pursuit; after her family is evicted Tess goes to him. Angel returns, Tess kills Alec, and after a brief flight with Angel she is arrested at Stonehenge and hanged.

Characters

• Tess Durbeyfield, protagonist

  Beautiful, proud and conscientious daughter of a poor Wessex family.

• Alec d'Urberville, antagonist

  Son of a newly rich family using the d'Urberville name, who seduces or assaults Tess.

• Angel Clare, major

  Clergyman's son and freethinker who loves Tess but cannot forgive her past.

• John Durbeyfield, minor

  Tess's father, a carter who takes pride in his ancestry and drinks.

• Joan Durbeyfield, minor

  Tess's mother, who hopes her daughter will marry well.

• Izz Huett, Marian and Retty Priddle, minor

  Fellow milkmaids at Talbothays who also love Angel.

• Liza-Lu Durbeyfield, minor

  Tess's younger sister, whom Tess asks Angel to marry.

Lessons

• Judgment and double standards

  Hardy calls Tess 'a pure woman' to challenge a moral code that blamed women for sexual wrongs done to them while excusing men. Angel's failure to forgive what he expects to be forgiven himself exposes the double standard.

  • Why does Angel's confession make his rejection of Tess more striking?
  • What does Hardy mean by calling Tess pure?

• Chance, character and fate

  A lost letter, a dead horse and a chance meeting push Tess's life toward disaster. Hardy invites readers to ask how much is fate, how much is society and how much is choice.

  • List the accidents that shape the plot. Do they feel like coincidence or design?
  • Where, if anywhere, could Tess have chosen differently?

• Land and labor

  The fertile Talbothays and the barren Flintcomb-Ash mirror Tess's fortunes, and the threshing machine shows rural work changing with industry. The novel records a disappearing way of life.

  • How do the landscapes reflect Tess's state of mind?
  • What does the threshing machine scene suggest about modern farm labor?

Context

The novel is set in Hardy's Wessex, a fictionalized Dorset and surrounding counties, in the 1870s and 1880s, when agricultural depression, mechanization and migration were transforming rural England and old families were declining while new money bought their names.

Composition

Two magazines rejected the manuscript before the Graphic serialized a censored version in 1891, with the seduction replaced by a sham marriage and other episodes removed. The three-volume edition published by Osgood, McIlvaine restored much of the original late in 1891.

Reception

The book sold well but provoked fierce attacks for its subtitle and its treatment of sexuality and religion. Along with Jude the Obscure, the hostility helped turn Hardy away from fiction to poetry. Tess has since been adapted repeatedly for film and television.

Comparisons

• Jude the Obscure

  Hardy's last novel extends Tess's attack on marriage, class and religion and drew even harsher criticism.

• Far from the Madding Crowd

  Hardy's earlier Wessex novel treats rural love and labor with more comedy and a happier ending.

• The Scarlet Letter

  Hawthorne's Hester Prynne is another woman punished by a community for a sexual transgression.

• The Mayor of Casterbridge

  Hardy's earlier tragedy of character and chance set in the same Wessex.

• King Lear

  The closing line about the President of the Immortals echoes Gloucester's 'As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods.'

Quotes

For Students

A reading companion for classical Christian high school students. See the student guide.

Reading Guide

Watch for

• Accidents and coincidences, and how Hardy frames them.
• The color red and images of blood.
• The landscapes of Marlott, Talbothays, Flintcomb-Ash and Stonehenge.
• Characters who judge Tess, and on what grounds.

Key terms and names

Wessex

Hardy's name for the fictionalized region of southwest England where his novels are set.

Fallen woman

Victorian term for a woman who had sex outside marriage, regarded as disgraced.

Serialization

Publication of a novel in installments in a magazine, often subject to editorial censorship.

Naturalism

Literary approach that shows characters shaped by heredity, environment and chance.

Seminar Questions

1. Comprehension Why does Tess go to the d'Urbervilles' estate?
2. Comprehension What happens to the letter Tess writes to Angel before their wedding?
3. Interpretation Why does Angel forgive himself but not Tess?
4. Interpretation What does Stonehenge mean as the place of Tess's arrest?
5. Big Question Does Hardy blame fate, society or individuals for Tess's tragedy?
6. Big Question Can a person be morally pure while breaking a society's rules?

Faith Connections

• John 8:1-11 (Scripture)

  Christ's response to the woman taken in adultery offers a model of mercy against which Angel's and the community's judgments can be measured.

• Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound (Great Conversation)

  Hardy's 'President of the Immortals, in Æschylean phrase' points to Greek tragedy's picture of gods who torment humans.

Logic and Rhetoric

Central argument: If moral worth lies in intention and character rather than in social reputation, then a woman wronged by circumstance and by others can be pure, and the society that condemns her is the guilty party.

Rhetorical device: irony. The scare quotes around "Justice" in the final chapter turn the hanging into an accusation against the law and the gods.

Debate: Resolved: Angel Clare bears more responsibility for Tess's fate than Alec d'Urberville.

Memory Work

“Justice” was done, and the President of the Immortals, in Æschylean phrase, had ended his sport with Tess.

Writing Prompts

Essay: Trace the role of chance in Tess and argue whether Hardy's universe is indifferent or hostile.

Comparison with The Scarlet Letter: Compare how Tess and Hester Prynne respond to public shame, and what each novel says about the community that judges them.

Medical Lens

The novel depicts the death of Tess's infant and the period's attitudes toward illegitimate birth, and Hardy shows rural poverty's toll on health.

• Phase the Second, Chapter XIV

  Tess baptizes her dying infant, Sorrow.

  Childbirth Maternal Death Dying

Creative Prompts

• Fiction

  Write the letter Tess slips under Angel's door, in her own voice, telling her story before the wedding.

• Essay

  Argue whether Hardy's subtitle 'A Pure Woman' is justified by the novel, using at least three episodes.

• Classroom

  Hold a mock trial of Tess in which the defense argues that society shares responsibility for Alec's death.

Further Reading

• Jude the Obscure, Thomas Hardy

• Thomas Hardy: The Time-Torn Man, Claire Tomalin

• Tess, Roman Polanski (director)

  Film, 1979.