Social, Historical and Cultural Pressures Revealed in Thomas Hardy's Writing
Thomas Hardy was born in Dorset on the second of June 1840; he was
born into the lower class. He was taught to read and write at an early
age making him want to write stories in the future. After he wrote and
got his first short story published he started to rise up the classes
into the higher middle class taking his sense of responsibility over
the rights for women of the era. His stories were based on his
personal experiences as you can tell with all the detail he uses in
his descriptions, one example is when he describes the hanging in the
Withered Arm as he described it to the final details, it's also shown
when he describes the clothes such as the milk maid in the Withered
Arm "in a long white pinafore or 'wropper'." This shows that hardy
knew exactly what the different clothes names were and exactly how
they looked. That quote also showed how the language used has changed
since before reading this story most wouldn't know what a wropper
meant.
Thomas Hardy wrote the kind of stories that were meant to make the
reader upset and feel sorry for the characters, such as: Rhoda,
Gertrude, Phyllis and Sophy. These all have unfortunate incidences in
the three short stories we read. Thomas Hardy was a visionary for
women's rights, so he wrote all of his books about women, some
examples are: 'The Withered Arm', 'The Son's Veto' and 'The Melancholy
Hussar of the German Legion.' These were about ladies outcast and
islanded in their communities. People in those times thought a lot of
things were wrong to do such as marrying out of their class, and
conceiving a bastard child people were also very superstitious
especially the lower classed people; they would rather go to a
conjurer than a doctor.
In 'The withered Arm' Rhoda is an outcast from society as a milkmaid
in this text says.
From an early age, Frederick Douglass refused to accept the life of confinement into which he was born. The way he learned to write is a fine example of his exceptional resourcefulness and persistence to rise above. In The Norton Anthology of World Literature, Douglass's depiction of his self-education can be found on page 94...
basic; elementary school, then trained in the classics by his father. His father, John Henry
Sherman Alexie describes in his essay “The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me” how he taught himself to read at the age of three from a Superman comic book. Alexie was raised by a low-class Indian family on a reservation. His teachers were white and being an "intelligent Indian"
Everyone remembers when they learned to read and write some more than others. Even well known people like Frederick Douglass and Malcolm X. They wrote narratives, “Learning to Read And Write” by Frederick Douglass and “Learning to Read” by Malcolm X, to show us when, where, and how they learned to read and write. Both authors go through struggles that we would never think could or would happen. Even though they go through struggles they still became eager to learn more to better themselves. It gave them power they never thought they could achieve. They have many similar and different trials that they went through so they could learn how to read and write.
It may be hard to believe, but Clerc didn’t attend school or learn to write until he was twelve years old. He didn’t have any means of communication or education until his uncle-godfather enrolled him in the Institut National des Jeune Sourds-Muets which was the first public school for the deaf in the world; becoming the model for many other schools for the deaf in the time to come. Clerc exceeded
Banneker was taught to read by his grandmother. He also attended a Quaker school for a short amount of time. Banneker was mostly self educated though. He was self educated in mathematics and astronomy. When he got older he inherited his grandparent’s farm.
father. In the two and a half months he attended, Bill learned to read and write
...ting, and “ciphering”. He never went to school for longer than one year total in his childhood. He read all the books he could get his hand on by borrowing. He never learned enough to qualify as an education with the exception of reading and writing. He acquired his education through self taught methods “under the pressure of necessity.” He was not an avid reader because of the limitations of books but he read as much as he could.
born Jewish. His teachers didn’t like him so they treated him without kindness and forced
Similarly, Bathsheba of Far from the Madding Crowd is destined to suffer and lead a miserable life. Bathsheba Everdene is paying a visit to her aunt and is seen by Gabriel Oak, a hardworking farmer. He falls in love with her and proposes to marry her but she declines his offer. Afterwards, Oak loses his sheep and becomes very poor. So he moves to Casterbridge in search for a job. He chances to arrive at the outbreak of a fire in Bathsheba’s farm and he puts it out. She offers to hire him as a shepherd and he agrees. In the meantime, she tries to attract Mr. William Boldwood but he is not interested in her and she comes to marry Sergeant Troy, a deceitful and inconsiderate husband. He squanders her money on gambling. He used to love Fanny Robin before getting married to Bathsheba and he chances to see her one day between Casterbridge and Weatherbury. He decides to go to her and help her but he finds her and her child dead. Feeling desperate, he quarrels with Bathsheba and leaves for America. Thinking that she is now a widow, Bathsheba decides to marry Boldwood. However, Troy returns a...
Being not able to read was a major problem for Pitts, but still he managed to become successful in life. After his parents’ divorce, his mother was emotionally distant, but did provide financial support since she was being busy working at two separate jobs. Even though he was technically an illiterate, he still managed to get through high school. During his younger years, he was sent down to the basement of his school to learn with mentally
high school.Due to his parents, not knowing English well, it was hard for them to advocate and
How Thomas Hardy Controls the Reader's Response to Donald Farfrae in The Mayor of Casterbridge
The Setting for Thomas Hardy's The Withered Arm and Other Wessex Tales. In the following essay I seek to show evidence of how Thomas Hardy was acutely aware of the social status of people, village and town. life was conducted, how men and women reacted to their own sexuality and to each other and the part religion plays in people's daily lives. Social class is raised a lot in Hardy's pieces.
As a child, Thomas Hardy heard various stories of supernatural occurrences from the family servants, rustics from the village, and his own mother who believed she once saw a ghost. Thus, Hardy learned to believe in the supernatural and to accept the superstitious ways of the rustic people. During an interview with William Archer, Hardy expressed, "when I was a younger man, I would cheerfully have given ten years of my life to see a ghost, - an authentic, indubitable spectre". Because of the superstitious influence of his upbringing and his own desire to believe, elements of weirdness, superstition, and magic play an interesting role in Hardy's works. Specifically, Hardy incorporated aspects of superstition and witchcraft into his writings. Such elements provide the reader with an understanding of how Hardy perceived his world.