Both Thomas Hardy's tragic novel Tess of the D'Urbervilles, set in impecunious rural England, and Emily Bronte's gothic novel Wuthering Heights, established at two adjacent houses in the Yorkshire moors, question whether the imperfect male...

In Thomas Hardy’s tendentious Victorian novel, Tess of the D’Urbervilles, Hardy uses a format akin to that of a tragic hero to critique the double standards of Victorian society. His heroine, Tess, challenges Victorian standards by maintaining her...

Upon reading Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles, one may notice that references to pagan goddesses and ancient religions of the past are strewn throughout the book. These allusions range from the affectionate names of endearment by which...

Indubitably, Thomas Hardy's 'Tess of the D'Urbervilles' is largely reminiscent of the archetypal Grecian tragedy; evoking an overwhelming sense of pity/catharsis for the female protagonist. However, the constituents of said 'tragedy'; though in...

Both Tess of the d’Urbervilles and Rebecca are texts in which social class proves to be a factor in the relationships between lovers. Tess is born into a low class poor family, which significantly alters the outcome of events in her life....

Hardy’s novels are grounded in a realist portrayal of a society defined by constant advancement. The preceding Enlightenment era developed a sense of shedding traditional values in pursuit of intellectual evolution, and this only accelerated into...

In Thomas Hardy’s novel Tess of the d'Urbervilles, past events in Tess’s life affect how she views herself and her world, Hardy uses motifs and foreshadowing to express how one’s life is merely a product of fate. Therefore Tess’s experiences are...

The theme of ‘otherness’ is prominent throughout the opening chapters of Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë. Otherness can be interpreted as the exclusion of one party or the act of being dissimilar. This being the case, the opposite to this would...

Throughout the Victorian era people began to question societal norms. This time period is well known for its patriarchal society and the oppression of women through political, economic, social, and religious constructs. However, the role and...

Many religious traditions teach that the world is fallen or corrupt, affected at every turn by man’s sin. However, psychological research shows that people tend to believe that the world is a just place, where people get what they deserve....

Both James Joyce's Eveline and Thomas Hardy's The Son's Veto express the negative effects that service has upon an individual's life. While Joyce uses an intimate obligation, a promise to a dying mother, Hardy's story addresses a wider cultural...

The short story, “The Withered Arm” explores the role of women in society, their submission to men as well as their independence while at all times retaining an understanding of their struggles. The author, Thomas Hardy reflects on the view of...

Through the consistent allusion to fairy tales throughout both The Necklace and The Son’s Veto, de Maupassant and Hardy are able to present the vulnerability and suffering of the characters in an instantly recognisable template, portraying the...

‘A Wife in London’ is an anti-war whereby war is portrayed in an unflattering light. Hardy narrates the death of a soldier who fought in the African Boer War and conveys the devastating consequences this has on the soldier’s family. As such, Hardy...

In the poetry of Thomas Hardy, one can note that the poet conveys a deep sense of sadness. Throughout his poetry, the Going, for instance, Hardy makes use of authorial methods in order to heighten the tragedy, and thus, allow his poems to convey a...

John Keats’s “Ode to a Nightingale” and Thomas Hardy’s “The Darkling Thrush,” though written nearly a century apart, share many poetic elements that allow readers to effectively draw a surface parallel between the two poems. Though both of these...

Psalm 142, verse 2: “No man cared...” This Biblical verse applies perfectly to “In Tenbris”, a poem written out of despair for the society Hardy in which lived. He expresses his pity and contempt for the materialist citizens and power hungry...

Thomas Hardy wrote “The Shadow on the Stone” after his wife’s death, and the ghost he mentions is his wife’s. The poem focuses on the realities of time and death. The poet’s feelings are complex, which is reflected in the complex rhyme scheme of...

The question of fate is one that has been posed by human beings throughout the ages. Are our lives determined by that which is “bound” to happen, or is it simply by random chance? Thomas Hardy addresses this question in his poem “Hap,” which...

'In my memory / Again and again I see it strangely dark / And vacant of a life but just withdrawn.’

Edward Thomas’s The Chalk Pit suggests a number of ways of considering the correlation between memory and writing. The line is at once visually...

"At an Inn" is a poem written by Thomas Hardy, a composition showcasing Hardy’s longing for another woman who is not his wife, Florence. In this work, Hardy focuses on the misinterpretations of the nature of the two’s relationship from strangers...

The breakdown of a relationship is presented in many ways throughout both ‘Neutral Tones’ by Thomas Hardy and ‘Modern Love’ by George Meredith. For example, they both explore themes of memory, and loss (of love). I will be exploring and comparing...

The poems under study are Neutral Tones ("NT") and I Look Into My Glass ("Glass"). Both poems focus on loss of a different kind: "Glass" expresses the loss of Hardy's youth; "NT" focuses on the death of Hardy's estranged wife, it grieves the loss...

Thomas Gray and Thomas Hardy both explore the treatment of loss in their poems ‘Sonnet on the Death of Mr. Richard West’, ‘Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat, Drowned in a Tub of Goldfishes’, and ‘The Voice’. Each of these works provide a...