Tess of the d'Urbervilles

Hardy's subtitle, 'A Pure Woman', was a scandal in 1891 because it insisted a woman could be morally pure after rape and illegitimate motherhood. The novel indicts a society that punishes the victim and forgives the man. It remains essential for anyone interested in Victorian sexual double standards, rural poverty, or the origins of modern tragedy.

1. 1

   Act 1

   The Maiden

   In the village of Marlott, a parson tells John Durbeyfield, a haggler, that his surname is a corruption of d'Urberville and that he descends from an ancient Norman family. John gets drunk to celebrate. His sixteen-year-old daughter Tess takes his place driving the family wagon of beehives to market, falls asleep at the reins, and collides with a mail-cart. The family's only horse, Prince, is killed. Guilt drives Tess to the wealthy d'Urbervilles at Trantridge to 'claim kin', though the family's name was merely adopted by the late Simon Stoke. Alec d'Urberville, the son, is attracted to her and offers her a job as his mother's poultry keeper at The Slopes. One Saturday night in September, after a fair, Alec rescues Tess from a fight with other women and rides with her into The Chase, a remote ancient woodland, where he seduces or rapes her.

2. 2

   Act 2

   Maiden No More / The Rally

   Tess gives birth to a sickly baby boy. No parson will christen a child born out of wedlock, so she baptizes him herself, naming him Sorrow. He dies shortly after, and she buries him in a corner of the churchyard reserved for unbaptized infants. Some years later she leaves home to work as a milkmaid at Talbothays Dairy in the Valley of the Great Dairies, where her past is unknown. There she meets Angel Clare, the youngest son of a clergyman, an apprentice gentleman farmer studying dairy management, and they fall in love. Angel chooses Tess over the other milkmaids Marian, Izz Huett, and Retty Priddle, who are all in love with him.

3. 3

   Act 3

   The Consequence / The Woman Pays

   Angel proposes marriage. Tess refuses at first, feeling unworthy, but eventually accepts. She repeatedly tries to tell him about her past with Alec before the wedding, but he insists they will share confessions after it. On their wedding night at an old d'Urberville mansion, Angel confesses he once had a brief 'eight-and-forty hours' dissipation with a stranger in London, and Tess then tells him about Alec, believing he will now understand and forgive. He is appalled. He tells her, 'You were one person; now you are another,' and 'The woman I have been loving is not you.' He concedes she was 'more sinned against' than sinning but feels her 'want of firmness' is a character flaw and cannot forgive her. He gives her some money and they separate: he travels to Brazil to attempt farming, she returns to her family home. After her money runs out, Tess takes grueling field work at Flintcomb-Ash, a starve-acre farm on a bleak, flinty upland, where she endures harsh conditions alongside Marian.

4. 4

   Act 4

   The Convert / Fulfilment

   Alec d'Urberville, now a preacher, encounters Tess again at Flintcomb-Ash. He is shocked to see her, renounces his new faith, and resumes his obsessive pursuit of her. He tells Tess, 'You have been the cause of my backsliding.' He continues to pursue her, insisting her husband will never return. Alec offers to house the Durbeyfield family on his estate if Tess will yield to him. Tess hears from her sister 'Liza-Lu that their parents are ill; she rushes home, her mother recovers, but her father John Durbeyfield dies, and the destitute family is evicted from their cottage in Marlott. She refuses and writes a passionate letter to Angel begging him to return. Angel's farming venture in Brazil fails and he nearly dies of fever. He repents of his harsh treatment of Tess and returns to England to find her. Angel finds Tess elegantly dressed in Sandbourne under the name 'Mrs d'Urberville'. She tells him, 'It is too late,' explaining that Alec persuaded her he would never return. Angel leaves reluctantly. After Angel leaves, Tess argues with Alec and stabs him to death in his bed; the landlady notices a spreading red spot on the ceiling. Tess overtakes Angel and tells him, 'I have killed him.' The couple flee together and find an empty house, where they stay for five days of blissful seclusion before being forced to move on to evade capture. Tess and Angel walk through the night and arrive at Stonehenge. Tess asks Angel to marry and look after her sister 'Liza-Lu when she is gone, saying, 'She has all the best of me without the bad of me.' She lies down to sleep on an ancient stone altar. At dawn, Angel sees they are surrounded by police. Tess wakes and says, 'I am ready.' Angel and 'Liza-Lu watch from a hill overlooking Wintoncester as a black flag is raised over the prison at 8 a.m., signalling Tess's execution. They then walk on hand in hand, fulfilling Tess's dying request.

• TTess DurbeyfieldA sixteen-year-old country girl whose sense of guilt and duty drives every catastrophe. She is seduced or raped by Alec, abandoned by Angel, and finally hanged for murder.
• AAlec d'UrbervilleThe son of the late Simon Stoke, who seduces or rapes Tess, becomes a preacher, then renounces his new faith to pursue her again. He is stabbed to death in his bed.
• AAngel ClareA clergyman's youngest son and apprentice gentleman farmer who loves Tess but cannot forgive her past. He returns too late, then flees with her and walks on hand in hand with 'Liza-Lu.
• JJohn and Joan DurbeyfieldTess's parents: a haggler intoxicated by his supposed noble descent, and a mother. John's death leaves the family destitute and evicted.
• ''Liza-Lu DurbeyfieldTess's younger sister, described by Tess as having 'all the best of me without the bad of me'. She watches the black flag and walks on hand in hand with Angel.
• MMarian, Izz Huett and Retty PriddleTalbothays milkmaids, all in love with Angel, who lose him to Tess. Marian later endures Flintcomb-Ash's harsh field work alongside Tess.

Prince, the family horse

The Durbeyfields' only horse, Prince, dies when Tess falls asleep at the reins. His death is the first burden of guilt Tess carries, the wound that drives her to the d'Urbervilles and everything that follows.

The Chase

The remote ancient woodland where Alec seduces or rapes Tess. An old hunting ground becomes the site of a new hunt, with Tess as quarry, marking the moment innocence enters the novel's darkness.

The black flag

Raised over the prison at 8 a.m., it signals Tess's execution to Angel and 'Liza-Lu. It is society's final verdict on 'a pure woman', reduced to a single cloth against the sky.

Stonehenge

Tess sleeps on an ancient stone altar at dawn as police surround them. The pre-Christian temple frames her death as a sacrifice, older and more honest than the law that demands it.

Sorrow

Tess's sickly baby boy, named by his mother at her own baptism and buried in a corner of the churchyard reserved for unbaptized infants. His short life and name condense the book's account of what the world does to the innocent.

The black flag at 8 a.m. is Hardy's coldest image: an execution announced to Angel and 'Liza-Lu, watched from a hill. One reading is cosmic: the President of the Immortals ending his sport with Tess, her death a sacrifice on Stonehenge's altar completed at the prison. Another is social: the state and the church, which refused her baby a christening, now kill her with full ceremony. A third is romantic: Angel and 'Liza-Lu walking hand in hand fulfils Tess's dying request. The ending lands because Tess's last words, 'I am ready', accept death without accepting guilt.

1. 1.Compare Angel's 'eight-and-forty hours' dissipation and his condemnation of Tess: what does the novel argue about confession, forgiveness, and who is allowed a past?
2. 2.Trace how Tess's sense of guilt, from Prince's death to her final 'I am ready', is repeatedly misplaced, and what the novel suggests about who assigns blame to women.
3. 3.Read Stonehenge and the black flag as two systems of judgement, pagan and Victorian: which one does the novel finally side with, and how do you know?

Anyone drawn to Victorian fiction that actually attacks its era's morals, and readers who want tragedy where the heroine is both victim and the boldest person in the room. It is also essential for anyone thinking seriously about sexual double standards, then or now.

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