Uniqueness and Universality in Tess of the D'Ubervilles
She can flirt, she can listen, she can sympathize, she can work with her hands. (Hardy 131)
The above line from Hardy's Tess of the d'Urbervilles demonstrates a great deal about the themes of the novel as well as the character of Tess. The line reprinted above is supposed to reveal the versatility of Tess' character. However, it also reveals a good deal that helps us understand Hardy's central theme of the book. This is because the versatility of Tess' persona is what makes her unique. However, she is purity, fortitude, woman and suffering personified. Nonetheless, she is herself and no other person, unlike any other woman. This contrast of her universal qualities but her individual differences is significant to understanding one of Hardy's core themes if not the core theme in the novel: Tess is a symbol of the common predicament of all mankind-we are meant to suffer, love and endure. However, despite this universality Tess' pain is made to seem unique by Hardy's skill. In her unique vitality and versatility we understand the universality and unique phenomena of tragedy.
The character of Tess is one that symbolizes the positive aspects of life, but she represents the unrealized potential that is within all human beings as much as she comes to symbolize how so very often we end up differently than we might. Of course, her universality is also embodied within the Christian community wherein she exists, but she also represents as do others in the novel the pagan nature of mankind underneath the surface of social appearances. Like the line reprinted at the outset, Tess' unique nature despite being an example of common mankind is also evidenced when she rejects the vicar and his church. The vicar refuses to give her child a Christian burial and Tess replies, "'Then I don't like you!', she burst out, 'and I'll never come to your church again'" (Hardy 147). However, this is not meant to show Tess rejecting God or men of God, but, instead, it is designed to show us how sensitive and clear-headed Tess is when facing those who are so heartless that even when they are a man of God they could heartlessly act. She once again symbolizes the common lot of mankind (to be sensitive to heartlessness and human deprivation), but she also symbolizes a
Tess of the D'Urbervilles is a movie based on a novel by Thomas Hardy. The story involves a young girl named Tess who will be the victim, the prey, and sometimes the lover of many men. She will go through this without ever understanding what it is that those men want of her.
...gime seizing power or trampling their rights and stealing their possessions, they can live in a state of contentment, and even happiness. As for the populace's role in government, anyone can have an impact on the game of power if they know what to do and have the support to do it. Power is not restricted to one type of people or one class, but is "up for grabs" and waiting for the boldest to seize it. For Machiavelli, the people are more than just a mass to be divided and placed in a proper order, but a powerful force that must be considered and respected by the one who would rule over them. But for both Plato and Machiavelli, government seems to be a necessary and natural state under which humankind can operate and survive.
Many people in history have written about ideal rulers and states and how to maintain them. Perhaps the most talked about and compared are Machiavelli's, The Prince and Plato's, The Republic. Machiavelli lived at a time when Italy was suffering from its political destruction. The Prince, was written to describe the ways by which a leader may gain and maintain power. In Plato?s The Republic, he unravels the definition of justice. Plato believed that a ruler could not be wholly just unless one was in a society that was also just. His state and ruler was made up to better understand the meaning of justice. It was not intended to be practiced like that of Machiavelli's. Machiavelli, acknowledging this, explains that it is his intention to write something that is true and real and useful to whoever might read it and not something imaginary,"?for many have pictured republics and principalities which in fact have never been known or seen?(Machiavelli 375)." Therefore, because one ruler is realistic and the other imaginary, the characteristics of Machiavelli's ruler versus Plato's ruler are distinctly different.
Plato states being a just person ultimately lead to being a happy person. By giving the definition of what it is to be just, he is giving the definition of what it is to be happy. Plato shows through the definitions of being just he has given us the key to happiness. Through rationality and harmony we can achieve happiness. The definition in its self is a solution to becoming happy. And I thank Plato, for showing me the light.
Prince’s death, the rape and her arrest all happen to her whilst asleep. The community and her unsupportive parents’ cold treatment towards Tess following these events emphasize the hegemonic male perspective of society towards women. Furthermore, Hardy shows how women are seen by society through the male gaze as sexual objects, as Tess is blamed for Alec’s lack of self-control. He attempts to justify his cruel actions as he calls Tess a “temptress” and the “dear damned witch of Babylon” (Hardy 316), yet he later says that he has “come to tempt [her]” (340). Tess is also objectified by Alec when he says that if Tess is “any man’s wife [she] is [his]” (325). The narrator’s repeated sexualized descriptions of Tess, such as her “pouted-up deep red mouth” (39), further demonstrate how women are commonly seen through the male gaze in
Hardy initially presents Angel Clare, the “reverends son” as the “hero” come to rescue Tess at the May Day dance. Here his affability towards Tess and her companions socially segregates him from his contemptuous brothers; “I do entreat you…to keep…in touch with moral ideals.” When the reader meets him at Talbothays, the “gentlemen born” pupil has an air of attractiveness that invites trust, with his “young…shapely moustache” and “reserved” demeanour. Indeed the very name ‘Angel’ has connotations of benevolence and divinity; a saviour for th...
The injustice within Tess of the D’Urbervilles (1881) and Robert Frost’s poetry is unjustified and causes major suffering to those illustrated in both the novel and the poetry. Numerous variations of injustice are portrayed within these works such as; social injustice, religious injustice and moral injustice. These injustices often combine together to form an upsurge of ill-treatment within the characters’ lives. Furthermore, Frost’s poems often address heavy topic matters such as suicide, child morality and human morality. Harriet Monroe supports this argument by stating ‘Such art passes local boundaries as lightly as an aeroplane and swings out into wider circles of space and time.’(Monroe: 1924:149). Hardy’s ‘Tess’ addresses problems such as the unjust treatment of women in society by their own peers, which leads to the eventual downfall of Tess in a tragic tale of cruelty and its consequences. Moreover, Wuthering Heights (1847) displays a tragic, injustice and complex world for those who suffer the infortunes of being born into this isolated microcosm.
Thomas Hardy challenges the sexual principles of the late nineteenth century in his novel Tess of the D'Urbervilles. Tess Durbeyfield, a young woman, looks for work at Trantridge, where she meets the charming Alec Stoke-d'Urberville. Alec becomes attracted to Tess and later rapes her in a forest. This drives Tess to look for work elsewhere, and she meets Angel Clare at Talbothays Dairy, where they fall in love with each other and marry. However, when Tess tells Angel what happened to her at Trantridge, he leaves her and goes to Brazil. Hardy presents two men who inflict different types of pain on Tess; while Alec harms Tess physically, Angel harms Tess psychologically. Hardy establishes that people are victims of fate and, although both men have many faults, Angel is the better man.
The subtitle of the novel, however an after idea, focuses on the basic virtue of its champion. In spite of the fact that she is fallen, she is to be judged not by her ethical inconvenience but rather by her goal, her life and her temperament seen all in all. One side of Tess is the question of male strength, run of the mill of the Victorian time frame, the respectably traditional and preservationist age. At the time of Tess, even in late Victorian period, a lady ought to be rationally and physically devoted to men, called a "blessed messenger in the house." Else she was a "fallen heavenly attendant." Tessʼs dispositions as a Victorian lady are spoken to in her externalization by her honest to goodness spouse Holy messenger, and her physical
Tess, the protagonist and heroine of Hardy's novel, becomes a victim of rape and in turn, her life grows to become degraded, humiliating and depressing; of which none of these things she deserves. Although initially striving to be heroic and providing for her family, (after she was responsible for the death of Prince) the position she takes on at the d'Urbervilles' ultimately leads to her death as she is raped and then pursued by her seducer Alec d'Urberville until she must murder him. This courageous yet dangerous decision to murder Alec epitomises her character as a heroine as she is brave enough to perform such a malicious act in order to kill her suffering at the root rather than being passive and perhaps choosing to take her own life instead.
The novel Tess of the D’Urbervilles written by Thomas Hardy was an interesting novel with lots of suspense. The main protagonist is Tess D’Urbervilles, a young, attractive, intelligent, and sensitive girl. In the first chapter, Tess’s father finds out he’s the last descent of one of the oldest families in England, the D’Urbervilles. Tess’s family lives in poverty and faces difficult to get through life. In the process of all this happening Tess experiences many bad things. The book introduces many symbols; one of the many was Red and White. These colors foreshadow future events in the novel such as pureness, beauty, carelessness, innocence, sin, evil and more.
Plato’s thoughts about power and reason are much different than Aristotle. Plato looked at the meaning of justice and different types of governments. Plato looked into four different types of governments
The concept of God can be a difficult one to grasp especially in today's world - a world in which anyone that believes in God is trying to define exactly what God is. To even attempt to grasp such a concept, one must first recognize his own beliefs in respect to the following questions: Is God our creator? Is God omnipotent (all-powerful) or omniscient (all-knowing) or both? Does God care? Is God with us? Does God interfere with life on earth? These questions should be asked and carefully answered if one should truly wish to identify his specific beliefs in God's existence and persistence.
In order to understand how unity and harmony tie the ideal state together, one must first understand the coloration of unity with justice. Simply defined justice, according to Plato, is specialization. Each person doing their own craft is what justice entails. However, this definition of justice leads to something larger within the individual and the state. According to Plato, "... we must compel these Guardians and Auxiliaries of ours to second our efforts; and they, and all the rest with them, must be induced to make themselves perfect masters each of his own craft. In that way, as a community grows into a well ordered whole, the several classes may be allowed such measure of happiness as their nature will compass" (P, p. 111). The theory of justice as specialization leads to the happiness of the whole.
It is said that a man should not marry a woman that he can live with but instead with a woman he cannot live without. Although this statement may hold true for some relationships, it does not pertain to the marriage of Tess and Angel in Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles. Although Tess and Angel are married, they spend almost the entirety of their marriage separated from each other with no communication. As a modern reader, it is difficult to relate to these parts of the story. Nowadays, would a man leave his newly wed wife for over a year? More than likely this would never happen, but the themes of marriage in Tess of the d’Urbervilles are still very relevant to modern relationships. Today people still rush into marriage and believe that marriage will fix all just like in Tess and Angel’s situation. People also still utilize marriage a resource for