Thomas Hardy's Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Routledge Study Guide and Sourcebook

by Scott McEathron (Editor)

Overview

This sourcebook offers an introduction to Thomas Hardy's crucial novel, offering:

• a contextual overview, a chronology and reprinted contemporary documents, including a selection of Hardy's poems
• an overview of the book's early reception and recent critical fortunes, as well as a wide range of reprinted extracts from critical works
• key passages from the novel, reprinted with editorial comment and cross-referenced within the volume to contextual and critical documents
• suggestions for further reading and a list of relevant web resources.

For students on a wide range of courses, this sourcebook offers the essential stepping-stone from a basic reading knowledge to an advanced understanding of Hardy's best-known novel.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780415255271
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	02/22/2005
Series:	Routledge Guides to Literature
Pages:	212
Product dimensions:	5.44(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

Table of Contents

	List of Illustrations	xi
	Annotation and Footnotes	xii
	Acknowledgements	xiii
	Introduction	1
1	Contexts	9
	Contextual Overview	11
	Chronology	16
	Contemporary Documents	20
	'Candour in English Fiction' (1890)	20
	Excerpt from serialized version of Tess of the d'Urbervilles (1891)	25
	Selection of Poems	26
	Tess's Lament	27
	We Field-Women	29
	The Well-Beloved	29
	The Ruined Maid	31
	At a Hasty Wedding	32
	A Hurried Meeting	32
	The Turnip-Hoer	33
	Winter in Durnover Field	35
	Doom and She	36
	The Lacking Sense	37
	'The Labourer's Daily Life', Fraser's Magazine (1874)	38
	'Field-Faring Women', Fraser's Magazine (1875)	40
	'The Virgin Forest [of Brazil]', Bentley's Miscellany (1864)	41
	'Stonehenge', Quarterly Review (1860)	42
2	Interpretations	45
	Critical History	47
	Early Critical Reception	56
	From Illustrated London News (1892)	56
	From Athenaeum (1892)	57
	From Spectator (1892)	58
	From Blackwood's Magazine (1892)	58
	From 'Culture and Anarchy', Quarterly Review (1892)	61
	Modern Criticism	64
	The Character of Tess	64
	From Thomas Hardy (1967)	64
	From Thomas Hardy: His Career as a Novelist (1971)	66
	From The Novels of Thomas Hardy: Illusion and Reality (1974)	69
	From 'Tess's Purity', Essays in Criticism (1976)	72
	From An Essay on Hardy (1978)	75
	From 'Ways of Looking at Tess', Studies in Phiology (1982)	76
	From Thomas Hardy and the Proper Study of Mankind (1993)	78
	From '"Moments of Vision": Postmodernising Tess of the d'Urbervilles' (1994)	79
	Hardy's Philosophical Views	81
	From The English Novel: Form and Function (1953)	81
	From 'Colour and Movement in Hardy's Tess of the d'Urbervilles' (1968)	83
	From Hardy the Writer (1990)	85
	Tess and Sexuality	87
	From Thomas Hardy and Women: Sexual Ideology and Narrative Form (1982)	87
	From 'Tess and Alec: Rape or Seduction?' (1986)	89
	From '"You did not come": Absence, Death and Eroticism in Tess' (1990)	92
	From 'The Rape of Tess: Hardy, English Law, and the Case for Sexual Assault' (1997)	93
	From '"Three Leahs to Get One Rachel": Redundant Women in Tess of the d'Urbervilles' (2000)	95
	Hardy on Nature and Society	97
	From The Language of Fiction: Essays in Criticism and Verbal Analysis of the English Novel (1967)	97
	From Thomas Hardy and Rural England (1972)	99
	From The Great Web: The Form of Hardy's Major Fiction (1974)	101
	From '"The Perfection of Species" and Hardy's Tess' (1977)	104
	From 'Dreaming Holmberry-Lipped Tess: Aboriginal Reverie and Spectatorial Desire in Tess of the d'Urbervilles' (2000)	106
	The Work in Performance	110
3	Key Passages	115
	Introduction	117
	Key Passages	120
	From 'Phase the First: The Maiden'	120
	From Chapter 2: The Village of Marlott, and the May-Day Dance	120
	From Chapter 2: An Early Description of Tess	122
	From Chapter 4: The Death of Prince	123
	From Chapter 5: Discussion of the d'Urberville Lineage; Tess Meets Alec d'Urberville	128
	From Chapter 11: The Journey through The Chase, and Tess's Rape	132
	From 'Phase the Second: Maiden No More'	136
	From Chapter 14: The Midnight Baptism and the Burial of Sorrow	136
	From 'Phase the Third: The Rally'	140
	From Chapter 18: Introduction of Angel Clare	140
	From Chapter 19: Tess and Angel in the Garden	142
	Chapter 20: The Pastoral Interlude at Talbothays	146
	From 'Phase the Fourth: The Consequence'	150
	From Chapter 34: Angel Confesses his Past	150
	From 'Phase the Fifth: The Woman Pays'	153
	From Chapter 35: Angel's Immediate Reaction to Tess's Confession	153
	From Chapter 42: Initial Description of Flintcomb-Ash Farm	159
	From 'Phase the Sixth: The Convert'	165
	Chapter 47: Threshing Scene; Renewal of Alec d'Urberville's Attentions to Tess	165
	From 'Phase the Seventh: Fulfilment'	172
	From Chapter 55: Description of Sandbourne	172
	From Chapter 55: Angel Presents Himself to Tess	173
	From Chapter 56: Tess's Murder of Alec	175
	From Chapters 57 and 58: The Idyll at the Deserted Mansion	178
	From Chapter 58: Tess and Angel at Stonehenge	181
	From Chapter 59: Tess's Fate, and the Novel's Closing Paragraphs	183
4	Further Reading	185
	Primary Sources and Biographical Studies of Hardy	187
	General Studies of Hardy's Fiction and Poetry	188
	Studies of Tess	189
	Web Resources	189
	Index	190