(Set off warning: point out of sexual assault and rape)
A number of years in the past, after I was touring to my cousin’s marriage ceremony, I had a Thomas Hardy–themed weekend. I rented the superb 2015 adaptation of Removed from the Madding Crowd in my lodge room and later purchased a replica of Tess of the D’Urbervilles at a used bookshop subsequent to the marriage venue. I had an indignant, cathartic emotional response to using the outdated folks track “Let No Man Steal Your Thyme” within the film. Clearly, the phrase “thyme” is a play on time, but it surely’s additionally a metaphor for virginity. Subsequently, “let no man steal your thyme” is a warning to keep away from sexual predators, like a 19th century whisper community.
Tess instantly grew to become certainly one of my new favourite books. I don’t assume I’ve ever associated a lot to a 19th century heroine, even Jane Eyre or Lizzie Bennet. Hardy’s compassion and grasp of his feminine protagonist’s psychology appears extremely progressive for a male, Victorian novelist. I found this e book after I wanted it most, after I was nonetheless processing sexual assault.
Tess’s rapist, Alec, is predatory and dishonest, but disarmingly good-looking and dapper. He’s lecherous in direction of her proper from the start. At their first assembly, he violates her private boundaries, acts overly aware of her, and forces strawberries into her mouth in a suggestive approach. Tess intuitively distrusts him however ignores this as a result of her household desires him to assist them financially.
Tess laments that she “was doomed to be seen and coveted by the mistaken man.” By way of bodily power and crafty, Tess is not any match for Alec. A few of his phrases got here immediately from my sexual abuser’s mouth, and doubtless many others. He assumes no means sure and says flippantly: “That’s what each girl says.” He at all times downplays the damage his actions have prompted.
I can’t imagine that folks nonetheless write essays pondering the query: “Was Tess raped or seduced?” Regardless that the rape is alluded to in a circumspect approach that’s typical for Victorian novels, it’s the one interpretation that is sensible. She may need even been asleep, so there’s no risk of consent.
At first, it seems that Alec and Tess are distant cousins. Nevertheless, because the novel progresses, the reader finds out that Alec’s household usurped her household’s historic, aristocratic D’Urberville title. He feels threatened by Tess and uncomfortable with the considered her taking her true title. He is aware of that he’s an imposter, a pretend D’Urberville, and he or she’s an actual one. He’s by no means what he seems to be.
For some time after her rape, Tess is “in love along with her personal smash.” To me, this sounded melodramatic, virtually victim-blaming. Nevertheless, in context, I believe that Hardy is attempting to explain trauma and all of the flashbacks, disgrace, rumination, and despair that may come together with it, in an period that didn’t perceive trauma in these phrases. Additionally, Tess would have been thought of “ruined” until she may nonetheless get married. Even at present, trauma survivors are advised “to not let it outline us,” which might have been unimaginable for Tess.
In Tess’s society, she would want the love and acceptance of a person to redeem her, and her husband, Angel Clare, is unable to present that to her. He’s the epitome of Victorian hypocrisy, significantly double requirements for women and men. I knew he was dangerous information when he was nonetheless courting Tess however referred to her proudly as “my property.” I do know he’s a product of his time, however that is creepy it doesn’t matter what.
On their marriage ceremony evening, earlier than they’ll consummate the wedding, Angel confesses to her that he as soon as had intercourse. He expects her to just accept this, however when she “confesses” that she was raped, he can not “forgive” her. As an alternative of being outraged that somebody would violate Tess on this approach, he’s extra involved that one other man has “claimed” her earlier than him. He causes that Alec needs to be Tess’s lawful husband as a result of he “deflowered” her and continues to be alive. In his personal self-righteous approach, Angel is sort of as dangerous as Alec. It’s his betrayal that in the end destroys Tess. In her glorious, 2017 essay for Literary Hub, Rachel Vorona Cote writes that Angel Clare has many modern-day counterparts amongst self-proclaimed feminists and “good guys.” These are the individuals who use feminism as a canopy to get girls to belief them or who choose companions for his or her sexual histories.
Alec embodies the hypocrisy of the Victorian age in a way more carnal approach than Angel. Tess runs into him years later and finds that he’s grow to be a born-again preacher. Sarcastically, of their society, it’s simpler for a rapist to be redeemed than for his sufferer. Alec merely has to say that he’s had a conversion expertise, and the world accepts him. Tess lambasts the hypocrisy of males who smash others’ lives with impunity after which conveniently “convert” once they grow to be involved with their very own salvation. It’s doable to interpret this as an indictment not solely of Victorian social mores but additionally of the Christian doctrine of redemption.
As an alternative of being a one-dimensional archetype, Alec manages to be a barely morally ambiguous character. Maybe his conversion expertise was by no means honest, and he was by no means contrite. Or presumably, his non secular fervor, like his sexual ardour, is intense however momentary. Ambiguity like this provides the novel its depth, elevating it above the everyday, tragic Victorian morality story.
The novel additionally engages with Britain’s mysterious, pagan previous, contrasting it with extra inflexible Christian morality. Tess was most likely one of many first novels to take action, and it might have been thought of controversial on the time. I can see its clear affect in more moderen novels. Hardy makes use of historic mythological figures to represent an animalistic, amoral facet of sexuality. Only a few pages earlier than the rape, he describes dancers in a neighborhood pub as “satyrs clasping nymphs—a multiplicity of Pans whirling a multiplicity of Syrinxes; Lotis trying to elude Priapus, and at all times failing.” In case you get the classical references, this clearly foreshadows what’s about to occur to Tess.
In case you’ve ever questioned whether or not you have been fated to satisfy your abusers, why they selected you, or in the event that they’ve had extra victims earlier than and after you, studying Tess generally is a cathartic, relatable expertise. In the end, Alec is such a repellant and self-absorbed character that I spotted that folks like him didn’t deserve any extra of my ideas.
