Themes
The Vale of Blackmore, the main setting for Tess. Hambledon Hill towards Stourton TowerHardy's writing often explores what he called the "ache of modernism", a theme notable in Tess, which as one critic noted, Hardy draws on imagery associated with hell to describe modern farm machinery and suggests the effete nature of city life as milk sent there must be watered down before townspeople can stomach it.[3]
On the other hand, the Marxist critic Raymond Williams in The English Novel from Dickens to Lawrence questions the identification of Tess with a peasantry destroyed by industrialization. Williams sees Tess not as a peasant, but as an educated member of the rural working class, who suffers a tragedy through being thwarted in her hopes to rise socially and desire for a good life (which includes love and sex), not by industrialism, but by the landed bourgeoisie (Alec), liberal idealism (Angel) and Christian moralism in her family's village (see Chapter LI). Earlier commentators were not always appreciative. Henry James and Robert Louis Stevenson in Bournemouth "loved to talk of books and bookmen: Stevenson, unlike James, was an admirer of Thomas Hardy, but agreed that Tess of the D'Urbervilles was 'vile'."[4]
References, personification, character, experiences
Because of the numerous pagan and neo-Biblical references made about her, Tess has been seen variously as an Earth goddess or a sacrificial victim.[5]
Tess has been seen as a personification of nature, an idea supported by her ties with animals throughout the novel. Tess's misfortunes begin when she falls asleep while driving Prince to market and causes the horse's death; at Trantridge she becomes a poultry-keeper; she and Angel fall in love amid cows in the fertile Froom valley; on the road to Flintcomb-Ash, she kills some wounded pheasants to end their suffering.[6]
However, Tess emerges as a powerful character not through this symbolism but because "Hardy's feelings for her were strong, perhaps stronger than for any of his other invented personages."[7]
When Hardy was 16, he saw the hanging of Elizabeth Martha Brown, who had murdered a violent husband. This fascinating, yet repellent experience contributed to the writing of Tess.[8][9]
Morality and society
The moral commentary running through the novel insists that Tess is not at fault in imposing mythological, biblical and folk imagery on a story of a young girl seduced and abandoned to create a "challenging contemporaneity". It was controversial and polarizing, setting these elements in a context of 19th-century English society, including disputes in the Church, the National School movement, the overall class structure of English society, and changing circumstances of rural labour. During the era of first-wave feminism, civil divorce was introduced and campaigns were waged against child prostitution, moving gender and sexuality issues to the forefront of public discussion. Hardy's work was criticized as vulgar, but by the late 19th century other experimental fiction works were released such as Florence Dixie's depiction of feminist utopia, The Story of an African Farm by Olive Schreiner, and Sarah Grand's work The Heavenly Twins. These raised awareness of syphilis and advocating sensitivity rather than condemnation for young women infected with it.[10][11]
Rape/seduction
Hardy's description leaves it unclear whether Alec d’Urberville rapes Tess or whether he seduces her, and the issue has been the subject of debate.[2][12]
Mary Jacobus, a commentator on Hardy's works, speculates that the rape/seduction ambiguity may have been forced on the author to meet publisher requirements and the "Grundyist" readership of his time.[13]
