Tess of the D’Urbervilles
Lecture 3
Phase the First – The Maiden
(Chaps 1 – 6)
Role of Phase I in the novel
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to set up the factors that lead to the Tess’s rape /
seduction (feckless family, economic necessity,
chance / random accident, Tess’s relationships with
her parents and Alec; Tess’s personality)
to present Tess as essentially a ‘pure’ woman
despite her sexual violation / experience – against
Victorian stereotypes
To what extent can Tess’s plight be attributed to the following
factors? By what means does Hardy show this?
Factors leading to Tess’s downfall:
- Bloodlines
- Family
- Money and Class
Literary methods
- Imagery (symbolism, metaphor)
- Setting
- Narrative voice and perspective
Overview
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Plot construction: the chain of mishaps that
forces Tess to claim kin with the D’Urberville
family and puts her at the mercy of Alec
begins with class and bloodlines and ends
with impending financial disaster (‘Distress, if
not penury, loomed in the distance’)
Tess’s family situation and relationships also
help drive the plot.
Bloodlines, lineage
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The opening of the novel reveals an intense concern
with bloodlines and ancestral lineages.
Blood – a motif that runs through the novel. Draws
attention to Tess’s ‘Norman blood’.
The discovery of the Durbeyfield family’s ancient
lineage sets the stage for the tragic string of events
that will end with Tess’s death on the gallows.
Contradictory attitudes towards family lineages
further complicate the plot later in the novel.
Bloodlines, lineage
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Family names and bloodlines are linked with wealth,
reputation, breeding.
‘Our names are worn away to Durbeyfield’.
Duality in the presentation of Tess (D’Urberville /
Durbeyfield – noblewoman / commoner?)
Alec’s family (the Stokes) append the D’Urberville
name to their own to whitewash their dubious family
history.
The events that lead to Tess’s rape / seduction –
based on deception
Family
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Contrast between Tess’s relative maturity as the
eldest child and her parent’s levity / silliness
Seen in the actions of the characters, the images
attached to them, and the use of dialogue.
Joan Durbeyfield – ‘a happy child’, John Durbeyfield
– ‘a slacktwisted fellow’.
Husband and wife reinforce each other’s
‘shiftlessness’.
Eg. Mrs D helps Mr D to bury Prince; their regular
escapes to Rolliver’s.
Family
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Use of dialogue continually emphasises the
differences in education levels between Tess and her
parents through the contrasting use of dialect and
approximately standard English.
Eg. “You zid somebody, I suppose?” vs “I saw her
son.” (Ch 6)
Because of her education, Tess has the potential for
financial independence and social advancement
through becoming a teacher. But this opportunity is
denied her by her parents’ plans for her to ‘claim kin’
with the D’Urbervilles.
Family
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In her relationships with both her parents, Tess is
divided between an instinct to act as their guardian
and to be skeptical of their ideas, and her perceived
duty as daughter to obey.
Repeated pattern of compliance motivated partly by
guilt about not doing enough for her family.
Her instincts prove her good sense; her sense of
guilt for what may not be wholly her fault proves her
conscience, and because she acts out of love and
filial obedience, the folly of some of her decisions is
mitigated / made to appear less severe.
Family
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Structural pattern drives the plot forward and reveals
Tess’s self-sacrificial tendencies that culminate in the
final image of her lying like a human sacrifice on an
altar at Stonehenge.
Irony – Tess’s good intentions and virtues prove to
be her undoing.
Both visits to the D’Urbervilles are prompted by ‘the
oppressive sense of the harm she had done’ in
causing (as she sees it) Prince’s death, despite her
misgivings. In each case, Tess’s decision to obey
pushes her further towards the eventual disaster.
Family
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Draws attention to the issue of women’s lack
of economic power due to the stereotypes
imposed on them by social expectations.
Highlights class differences that drive the plot
forward.
Money and Class
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Class differences are presented as barriers to relationship
between Tess and Angel.
Contrast between the middle-class Clare brothers (‘of a
superior class’) and the group of ‘country hoydens’ that Angel
stops to dance with.
Class - symbolically represented by clothing: note the formality
of the eldest brother’s ‘white tie, high waistcoat, and thinbrimmed hat’.
For Tess and Alec, however, class differences act as a catalyst
for (a disastrous) relationship, with Tess and her family being
financially dependent on the D’Urberville family.
Money and Class
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Tess’s early contributions to the family’s finances (via
haymaking, harvesting, milking, butter-making) are
presented hyperbolically, often with adjectives that
accentuate her positive character traits, sharpening
the perceived difference between parents and
daughter.
“Tess became humanely beneficient towards the
small ones, and to help them as much as possible
she used, as soon as she left school, to lend a
hand….. and being deft-fingered it was a kind of
work in which she excelled.”
Money and Class
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The decision to ask Tess to ‘claim kin’ with the
D’Urbervilles is founded on the hope of gaining some
financial benefit. There is also the hope that an
alliance may be formed between the rich relatives
and the Durbeyfields – through a hoped-for marriage
for Tess.
These strategies for economic advancement are
seen by her parents as superior to Tess’s plan to
look for work as a means of raising the income
needed to buy a new horse after Prince’s death.
Money and Class
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‘…she could not understand why her mother should
find such satisfaction in contemplating an enterprise
of, to her, such doubtful profit’.
Language of business and finance used to describe
the project of ‘claiming kin’ with the D’Urbervilles,
with Tess’s beauty (and body) being the items up for
sale.
Money and Class
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The metaphor of the family as a ship headed into
desperate straits puts Tess (and her siblings) in a
position of powerlessness – they are ‘captives under
hatches’, like slaves trapped in a slave-ship (Ch 3)
NB: Britain’s involvement in the slave-trade up to the
early 19th century.
Money and Class
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Suggests that Tess is a commodity about to be ‘sold’
for a profit, which in fact is what happens to her
when she ‘sells’ her labour to contribute to the family
finances, and later when Alec attempts to ‘buy’ her
sexual surrender with gifts to her and her family.
Metaphorical journey made by Tess and her family
 paralled in Tess’s literal journeys from place to
place in the novel.
Setting
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Use of setting as a symbolic structuring
device to mark ‘phases’ in Tess’s life journey.
Contrasting settings and Tess’s movements
between Marlott and Trantridge show in rich
concrete detail the dire economic
circumstances of the Durbeyfield family and
the contrasting wealth of the D’Urbervilles.
Setting
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Marlott (Vale of Blackmoor / Blakemore) 
Trantridge  Marlott  Trantridge
Draws attention to Tess’s vulnerability in
relation to Alec, who cleverly exploits her
family’s financial need to make Tess feel
indebted to him.
Setting
The Vale of Blackmoor / Blakemore
- Natural landscape coded as ‘feminine’
- Duality symbolically signalled in the use of names –
Blakemore / Blackmoor.
- Symbolically linked to the duality in Tess’s character:
virginal (‘sheltered’, ‘engirdled and secluded’, ‘for the
most part untrodden as yet’) yet sensual (‘fertile’,
‘languorous’, ‘every contour of the surrounding hills’).
- Shelters Tess from the outside world: ‘The Vale of
Blackmoor was to her the world’.
Setting
The Durbeyfield cottage
- Concretises the poverty of the Durbeyfield
family
- Eg. ‘unspeakable dreariness’: stone floor,
‘the yellow melancholy of this one-candled
spectacle’, cradle in the same room as the
washtub, thatched outhouse
Setting
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Represents the domestic sphere where
women’s work like childrearing and
household chores are done (or not done).
Associated with drudgery and hardship - a
place from which to escape. Tess’s
temporary escape comes in the form of the
May-Day dance; the Durbeyfield parents
escape to Rolliver’s, the local alehouse.
Setting
Trantridge - The Slopes (the D’Urberville residence)
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Contrasts with the Durbeyfield cottage – concretises
the wealth of the nouveau riche D’Urberville family:
‘acres of glass-houses’, stables, ‘extensive lawn’,
‘ornamental tent’
This newly-acquired wealth is highlighted by the
simile, ‘Everything looked like money – like the last
coin issued from the Mint.’
Setting
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Represents modernity – ‘almost new’
The ‘family name’ is also newly-acquired – ‘Stoke
D’Urbervilles’
Colour symbolism – the ‘rich red colour’ of the
buildings is set in contrast against the subdued
evergreens of the surrounding forest
Contrast between nature and the artifice of the
bogus D’Urberville family
Narrative voice and perspective
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Narrator as a distinct character who tells
Tess’s story ‘faithfully’ (ie. makes claims for
the truth of the story)
Omniscient narrator – intrusive comments
that guide the reader’s response.
Eg. “In the ill-judged execution of the welljudged plan of things the call seldom
produces the comer, the man to love rarely
coincides with the hour for loving.”
Narrative voice and perspective
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Strength of feeling in telling Tess’s story
Omniscient narrator shows readers Tess’s
inner responses to her parents to highlight
her conflict between duty (and guilt) and
instinct.
Heightens the reader’s sympathy / pity for
Tess.
Narrative voice and perspective
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The narrative locates the blame for the family’s
economic hardship squarely on the Durbeyfield
parents.
In contrast, it absolves Tess of blame by presenting
her as contributing to the family finances despite her
youth.
Pointed narrative comments about the Durbeyfield
parents’ irresponsibility
“The very shiftlessness of the household rendered
the misfortune a less terrifying one… Nobody
blamed Tess as she blamed herself.” (p.34)
Narrative voice and perspective
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Use of comedy and commentary by the intrusive
narrator – accentuate the ‘shiftlessness’ of the
Durbeyfield parents
Comedy and irony serve to poke fun at the
Durbeyfield parents, accentuating their silliness /
folly, and, by contrast, putting Tess in a better light.
Eg: Use of bathos in the description of John
Durbeyfield  his attempt to elevate himself by
claiming the name of ‘Sir John D’Urberville’ is set in
comic contrast to his use of rural dialect and the
ludicrous image of him lying ‘stretched… among the
daisies’.
Narrative voice and perspective
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Eg: Irony in John Durbeyfield’s refusal to sell
Prince’s carcass for a few shillings on
account of his family lineage.
At times, Hardy’s humour approaches the
slapstick.
Eg. ‘… he was sufficiently unsteady to incline
the row of three at one moment as if they
were marching to London, and at another as
if they were marching to Bath’ (p.28)
Narrative voice and perspective
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Self-characterisation of narrator as being unique in
his vision -eg. “Yet few knew, and still fewer
considered this… to almost everybody she was a
fine and picturesque country girl.”
Self-conscious narrative - draws attention to the way
the story is put together. Highlights points of
uncertainty and limited knowledge.
Eg. “The name of the eclipsing girl, whatever it was,
has not been handed down.”
Narrative voice and perspective
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Use of multiple perspectives (mediated
through the 3rd-person omniscient narrator)
to construct the character of Tess
Tess’s PoV: her thoughts and experiences
are presented in a way that heightens the
reader’s sympathy for her situation /
admiration for her character.
Narrative voice and perspective
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Eg. Description of Tess’s anxious thoughts while
waiting for her parents’ return from Rolliver’s (p.24)
Highlights
a) her sense of responsibility (“Tess began to
perceive that a man in indifferent health, who
proposed to start on a journey before one in the
morning, ought not to be at an inn at this late hour”)
b) her power of imagination (“took a mental journey”,
“the village was shutting its eyes”).
Narrative voice and perspective
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Mrs Durbeyfield’s view of Tess at Rolliver’s
reminds readers that Tess is only a girl
Heightens our sympathy for the way Tess is
forced to grow up, too fast, too soon
“Even to her mother’s gaze the girl’s young
features looked sadly out of place amid the
alcholic vapours…” (p.28)