The Readers Review: Literature from 1714 to 1910 discussion
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Jude the Obscure
Thomas Hardy Collection
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Jude the Obscure: Week 1 - Part First
Silver wrote: This episode also further highlights Jude's one heightened sensibilities and shows the way in which he is detached from the practical reality of the world. Jude is a dreamer, and does live more within his own head and his ideals, than he does within the reality of the world.I think you make an important point here Silver and I think too that we can see Jude as an 'outsider' in his society, which isn't uncommon amongst any student fraternity. Everyman sees him as acting 'totally contrary to the moral strictures of his society' which is what many young men, especially students, everywhere have always done. And Hardy, in writing about his sexual adventure with Arabella so early in his career in Christminster is, I think, trying to point out that the mores of Jude's society with regard to sex and marriage were unrealistic and something that young men and women were beginning to question. We can see his relationship with Arabella as just an immature sexual liaison, an 'immoral' one if we will but we can also see it as a symbol of the various changes that were taking place in Victorian society, some of which Hardy wished to highlight and support.
Bill wrote: "Christopher wrote: "No, Bill, but I don't quite follow why you ask the question? I thought it pretty clear that she threw it at him."Christopher, I guess it wasn't completely clear to me what pa..."
The text reads: 'A glance told him what it was--a piece of flesh, the characteristic
part of a barrow-pig, which the countrymen used for greasing their
boots, as it was useless for any other purpose.'
A barrow pig is one castrated before puberty so the inference is that Arabella threw this 'characteristic part' at Jude. I think the phrase would have been clearer to Hardy's readers than to us.
Chris: I think you make good points about what inspired Jude to try for a university career. That extract you quoted about Pillotson telling him of his dream to be a university graduate, coupled with his later words to Jude about being kind to animals and birds were, I think, significant. Again, we see the dichotomy between one sort of life and another, of the way in which Jude is likely to be divided between a city life and a rural one, a Christian one and a 'pagan' one, an idealistic one and a real one.It is also what Bill sees as the 'alienation [which] seems to intensify the sublime transcendent otherworldliness of Christminster.' I agree with Bill that Hardy 'is consciously making the effort emphasize this'.
I agree with Silver that Arabella is not a pagan; the word I would use to describe her is 'earthy'. She is described as a 'complete and substantial female human' with a 'coarseness of skin and fibre' - almost animal like (piglike?). There is nothing 'sublime' about Arabella, she is a pragmatist rooted in the here and now. She represents what Jude is trying to escape and, as you have said, she is portrayed as a temptress. (A Mary Magdalen??)
Silver's reference to St Jude is apt as that saint is often represented carrying a scroll or book and carrying a carpenter's rule. He was a Christian martyr and is associated with Pentecost - I can't find any references to Pentecost in Jude though.
...it seems unlikely that Hardy would completely write off this marriage to Arabella, so I perceive that in some way this marriage to her is going to have an effect upon him and his future.Their marriage cannot be written off because there is unlikely to be a divorce, which is perhaps one of the points Hardy wishes to make, given the difficulties that had caused in Victorian society.
http://www.clas.ufl.edu/users/agunn/t...
This was a famous divorce case going through the courts at the time Hardy was writing:-
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic...
Bill wrote:This is taken from a larger passage in Paul's second letter to the Corinthians in which he is explaining that God doesn't speak through moral codes engraved in hard stone..."Posts 10 & 17 in Background Information make reference to the relevance of St Paul to Hardy and to Jude. (Beware of Spoilers in Fass's article linked by Lily.)
Phew, this discussion is cooking! It almost takes as much time to read all the very insightful and interesting posts here, as to read the book itself.I think for the time being I'll just read, lurk, and learn. :)
In any case, with you guys around, who needs to consult any additional material? It's all right here. Thanks for making this such an interesting experience.
Come on Traveller - pitch in!:) Have you nothing to say about our seductress, our Siren, who 'had a round and prominent bosom, full lips, perfect teeth, and the rich complexion of a Cochin hen's''? Is she a Salome, worthy of a Beardsley illustration? Or is she the Delilah in the picture mentioned in chapter 7?
MadgeUK wrote: "Come on Traveller - pitch in!:) Have you nothing to say about our seductress, our Siren, who 'had a round and prominent bosom, full lips, perfect teeth, and the rich complexion of a Cochin hen's''..."Well, there can be no doubt she's an eggcellent seductress.
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Christopher wrote: "I can't imagine not having had parents during those formulative years, and then being fobbed off on a quasi-distant relative. "It was not that unusual. Life was harsh, death among young parents was more prevalent than it is now. My paternal grandparents were medical missionaries in China, and my father and his brothers were sent back to England to spend their formative years living with aunts and uncles when they weren't in boarding school. They did have parents, of course, very fine parents, but they seldom saw them. This was not all that uncommon at the time; anybody who worked or spent time abroad outside of Europe often left their children in the care of others for long periods.
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Christopher wrote: I can't imagine not having had parents during those formulative years...,"Orphans were a favorite among Victorian writers. Think David Copperfield, Pip in Great Expectations, Esther, Rick, and Ada in Bleak House, Becky Sharp, Jane Eyre (and Helen Burns and the other orphans at Lowick), Jane Fairfax, Heathcliffe, Mary Lennox in the Secret Garden, and on and on.
Orphans are very useful to an author for several reasons. It is much easier to portray them as having to go out in and make their lives on their own way than it is to portray the children of a comfortable home with a father and mother that way. An orphan has no family to get in the way, no family to provide a safety net to run back to if things go badly, no family business or fortune to inherit, no parents he or she has to live up to or not disgrace. They are a blank slate that the author can form as he or she wishes, and almost every experience they encounter is a challenge to be overcome alone with only their own strength and wits to aid them.
Jude is a typical literary orphan, who has not landed in a loving, supportive home which would provide a safety net, but rather being raised as a matter mostly of duty and having to go out in the world and make his own way virtually alone.
Silver wrote: "BBut at the same time it seems unlikely that Hardy would completely write off this marriage to Arabella, so I perceive that in some way this marriage to her is going to have an effect upon him and his future. "At the very least, it means that if he does meet somebody he wants to marry, he will be legally prohibited from doing so. It will face him with the necessity of choosing to live without that person or choosing to live "in sin." I don't know whether this will happen, but it certainly poses a potential future problem for him.
MadgeUK wrote: "Everyman sees him as acting 'totally contrary to the moral strictures of his society' which is what many young men, especially students, everywhere have always done. "I said the first half of that, but I want nothing to do with the second half! I certainly did not act that way as a young student, nor did most of my friends.
Rajat wrote: she's an eggcellent seductress ..."LOL Rajat - good one!
Everyman wrote: I certainly did not act that way as a young student, nor did most of my friends. ..."You may have been pure and unsullied Everyman but literature and other surveys of the behaviour of young men and women show that it is usually otherwise. The amount of prostitution, venereal disease and illegitimacy in Hardy's time certainly bears this out for the Judes of his world and surveys on sex in the Swinging Sixties don't show your generation to be particularly pure either. (cf Masters and Johnson Human Sexual Responses 1966.)
Christopher wrote: "@ Everyman (no. 75)-- I know that you are correct, Everyman, and it really is a theme that we see time and time again in the literature that we are all reading. And I'm sure that it still occurs ..."There is surely a difference between being an orphan abandoned by your parents to being sent to a boarding school or living with relatives knowing that your parents were alive and would be coming back to you. The orphan had no status in society, no rights, whereas the child with parents did. Hardy and Dickens were deliberately portraying orphans as children without rights or status in society, children who were often exploited by their guardians, put to work very young or even sent into prostitution. These things did not usually happen to children whose parents were abroad but who placed them with decent guardians or in legitimate boarding schools (not of the Dotheboys Hall kind).
That said, I once did quite a lot of research into the lives and psyches of boys put into boarding school and left by their parents for long periods and it did not make for happy reading. Winston Churchill, for instance, writes movingly about his unhappy boarding school experience, as have quite a few upper class Englishmen. I class it as institutionalised neglect:(.
I also disagree that Hardy and Dickens used orphans ('foundlings') in their novels because they were a 'blank page'. Not only were they an ever prevalent feature of their society but this was a time when a lot of campaigning was done about them by social reformers, when orphanages like Dr Barnardos were being opened. This is particularly true of Dickens who was very active in this sphere.
http://www.victorianweb.org/genre/chi...
Hardy therefore introduces Jude sympathetically: "He come from Mellstock, down in South Wessex, about a year ago--worse luck for 'n... "where his father was living, and was took wi' the shakings for death, and died in two days...It would ha' been a blessing if Goddy-mighty had took thee too, wi' thy mother and father, poor useless boy! But I've got him here to stay with me till I can see what's to be done with un...Just now he's a-scaring of birds for Farmer Troutham. It keeps him out of mischty. Why do ye turn away, Jude?" she continued, as the boy, feeling the impact of their glances like slaps upon his face, moved aside.
After this miserable exchange Jude took a walk along a path once trod by his dead relatives: 'How ugly it is here!' he murmured and later he thought that the rooks 'seemed, like himself, to be living in a world which did not want them...they were 'the only friends he could claim as being in the least degree interested in him, for his aunt had often told him that she was not...'(Chap 2.)
MadgeUK wrote: "You may have been pure and unsullied Everyman but literature and other surveys of the behaviour of young men show that it is usually otherwise. "Literature, by its very nature, focuses primarily on the exceptions, not the rules -- normalcy is usually very boring to read about. I don't know what surveys you're talking about, but they didn't ask me, and they didn't ask many, if any, of my friends.
Certainly there are some young men (and women!) who misbehave as college students, and they are the ones who make it into the newspaper and to the general attention of the public. There are (thank goodness) also a great many who just go though their college years behaving and studying hard and not getting into trouble and therefore not coming to public notice or being involved in defining what the public likes to think of as the norm. For example, while the common perception seems to be that virtually every young person in the 60s was a drug crazed hippie, in fact there were relative few hippies, it's just that they got all the media attention and all the many more young men and women who behaved themselves and lived normal lives didn't get noticed at all.
Defining a generation by its well publicized miscreants is akin to defining the National Health Service by its well publicized failures. Which of course nobody would ever do.
Back to Jude, I don't think that Jude was, or was intended to be, representative of all or most young men of his time, which is where this discussion started. I see him as an exception, not a rule.
When I wrote about orphans in literature, I should have said "actual or putative" orphans. Esther Summerton, for example, turns out eventually not to be an orphan; ditto Tom Jones. But both are, for the purposes of their books, treated as orphans for most of their literary lives.
I may be alone in this, but while I am finding a richness and complexity to the book itself Jude seems less than three-dimensional. One note might be a better way to put that. His interactions and relationship with Arabella feel like a temporary divergence from his normal character. They will unquestionably have a profound impact on the remainder of his life, but it seems as though he does not intend to change anything from where he was headed prior to that meeting. While in some ways this could be considered admirable, he does not seem to have learned, or learned the right lessons at least, from his experience. Even in considering it after she is gone, his primary thought seems to be that he and Arabella made a mistake when they married, without attention being paid to mistakes or oversights he made when they met.Also, and this is just a completely random note...how likely does it seem to anyone else that he'd been sleeping with her for however long without discovering that a large section of her hair was false? How tightly did that thing hold? ;)
Everyman wrote: Certainly there are some young men (and women!) who misbehave as college students, and they are the ones who make it into the newspaper and to the general attention of the public.I do not consider those engaging in sexual activity as 'miscreants', nor was I quoting newspaper articles or novels. There has been a great deal of research done in this field and sexual activity amongst young people is the norm not the exception and always has been. Teenage pregnancies were not uncommon but were generally followed by forced marriage. Unfortunately, attitudes like those which pervaded in Hardy's time kept the subject under wraps and still do to some extent, and in some societies.
Authors like Hardy and Dickens were not therefore citing the exceptions, they were citing what was in fact happening around them and trying to lift those prurient wraps to reveal the truth. And the life of Jude is part of that truth. (See Hardy's Preface of 1896 & 1912 - Spoiler.) http://neal.oxborrow.net/Thomas_Hardy...)
http://www.loyno.edu/~history/journal...
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If truly empathy, I don't see how it leaves Jude vulnerable, beca..."
I think it leaves him vulnerable because of the society in which he lives. He already feels unwanted plus he doesn't fit in because of his love of books and learning. Now add the empathy/sensitivity that a man isn't supposed to have with complete unworldliness. Leaves him vulnerable to cons because he'll trust when he shouldn't.
Everyman wrote: At the very least, it means that if he does meet somebody he wants to marry, he will be legally prohibited from doing so. It will face him with the necessity of choosing to live without that person or choosing to live "in sin." ..."Yes I had the same thought about it. That they will now by law and the moral code of the day, as well as considering Jude's own moral standard, be forever bond to each other.
Bill wrote: "Denae wrote: "Also, and this is just a completely random note...how likely does it seem to anyone else that he'd been sleeping with her for however long without discovering that a large section of ..."LOL Bill, good point. Perhaps glue was better in those days:).
Jude exists very much as a thematic device rather then an exploration of human character.
Another good point! Do you think that Jude not feeling guilty about premarital sex could have been something to do with him having lived in a hamlet (smaller than a village) and not having been so exposed to the 'carryings-on' around him or was it perhaps that in a rural society, where sex between animals was always on display, it wasn't such a big deal. I think he was rather a naive Victorian lad who had a sheltered upbringing with an old aunt, who wouldn't have warned him about the Arabellas of this world before he left home because sex wasn't spoken of.
Denae wrote: "I may be alone in this, but while I am finding a richness and complexity to the book itself Jude seems less than three-dimensional. One note might be a better way to put that. His interactions and ..."You are not completely alone. I agree with much of what you say about Jude, and I think you have put it quite well. It is one of the factors contributing to the difficulty I have with him as a character, at least as far as the fact that I cannot bring myself to really care about Jude that much or what happens to him. Why he is just so neutral to me. He himself does not really come of the page for me. There is something about him that feels kind of flat, so I cannot really develop any strong attachment or feelings for him. I do find the other characters around him much more interesting, even if I do not always agree with or like them all. Jude does lack a certain complexity.
I think it is also an interesting relfection about his not really learning anything from his experince with Arabella. It is true that it seems that the experience really did act as nothing more than a temporary interruption in his plans, and once they do part ways, his character does not really seem to develop or grow from the experience, nor does he really change in anyway or seem to take anything in from it, it is just like......oh well now that that is over with, back to Christminsiter.
I don't think seeing animals breeding significantly impinges on culturally instilled guilt over sex.Edited - my machine froze when I was in the middle of this post!
We do not know that he was 'culturally instilled' with guilt though, if he lived in a small place where sex was never spoken of, as was probably the case. I see him as a perfectly normal young man but rather dreamy and naive about the world he finds in Christminster, which is so very different to Marygreen. Those of us who have moved from small villages to large towns may better understand his feelings of alienation, sometimes described as being an 'outsider'. Perhaps those of us who, like myself, confess to having had premarital sex and a mistaken first marriage which shattered ambitions, can also empathise with him. If Jude has a sociopathic outlook on life at the age of 19 then so did I!:).
Nor does being alienated from your society necessarily make you a sociopath although if not dealt with it can lead to psychological difficulties. I do not think we see Jude as a sociopath at this stage of the book.
http://www.mcafee.cc/Bin/sb.html
Bill wrote: I disagree that this makes for a perfectly normal young man. It doesn't. It leans one toward a sociopathic outlook in life.."I think it is a bit far to say that Jude is sociopathic, or bordering upon sociopathy. As well I think you are making his alienation more extreme than it really is.
If he was so several alienated than I do not think he would have been able to have form the attraction and attachment to Arabella that he he had done, while a part of it may have been driven from a sexual attraction, I think there was also a part of him seeking a sort of companionship as well.In addition he would not have formed the bond it seemed that he had with Philotson.
I see Jude as being someone who might be described as "having their head in the clouds" he is a bit out of touch with the physical reality of the world, and he cannot find contentment in the simple daily chores of life, as it seems those around him do, but I do not think this makes him a borderline sociopath.
His lack of guilt about his sexual relations with Arabella, does seem a bit out of character of his usual moral standard, particuarly considering he was perfectly willing to marry her for the sake of invented child, even though that was not the life he wanted from himself. But than he was still a young man, who had an attractive and experienced woman come on to him and clearly he has not had a lot of past experince with sex and his lack of feeling guilt in the act, can be drawn from the fact that at this point in his life he had no reason to suspect he had in fact committed a great wrong becasue of his nativity and willing and readiness of Arabella.
Good summary Silver - I agree with the points you make here. Do you really consider that he had done 'a great wrong' though? If so, why?
MadgeUK wrote: "Good summary Silver - I agree with the points you make here. Do you really consider that he had done 'a great wrong' though? If so, why?"I personally do not think so, but it would have been considered so by the moral and social standards of his day.
What was the wrong if he married her? Getting married after seducing a lass was quite a common thing to do. When Hardy wrote Tess as going off on her own without marrying Alec, for instance, his publisher insisted on him putting in the (phony) marriage scene because the readers would then find her pregnancy acceptable. Sex before marriage, 'handfasting' which permitted sex, was usually OK as long as it led to marriage. It was however often different where there was money and property because the virginity of the bride was then paramount so that any inheritance went to the right person. Jude and Arabella were not in that position though. (His relationship with Sue is entirely different.)
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I don't generally disagree with what you say here, Everyman. While Hardy denied it, I might add that I think Jude is a lot more autobiographical than he wanted to admit. As we move through the novel, I think we'll see a great number of parallels to Hardy's own life.
Having said that, I also think Madge makes a valid point with her comment that--
"Authors like Hardy and Dickens were not therefore citing the exceptions, they were citing what was in fact happening around them and trying to lift those prurient wraps to reveal the truth. And the life of Jude is part of that truth."And this 'Truth" that Hardy was attempting to elucidate in "Jude" may not have been representative of all young men at that time, but surely must have been representative enough to have been recognized by his readers. In other words, most folks must have been at least somewhat aware of the difficulties of the lower class in trying to improve their lot in life (and by no means was Hardy the only Victorian author to address these themes, as several of you have pointed out). Hardy's Jude may have been 'Obscure', but then I'm guessing that most young men of his class and station were obscure. I think Hardy wanted his readers to become uncomfortable as they read about this man and his journey through his life.
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As I recall she actually took the damn thing off at night and hung it on a chair-back, or some such thing, didn't she? Hair extensions in the Victorian period--who'd a thunk it?
MadgeUK wrote: "What was the wrong if he married her? Getting married after seducing a lass was quite a common thing to do. When Hardy wrote Tess as going off on her own without marrying Alec, for instance, his p..."I meant that is having sex with her prior to thier being married would have been seen as wrong which would than have to be righted by a marraige after the fact.
When Jude first became involved with Arabella I do not think he had any thought or intent of marriage, but was just having a good time and enjoying himself with a pretty lass. He only agreed to marry her upon the discovery of the pregnancy, or rather his belief that she was pregnant, and thus he felt he had no choice.
We obviously read Jude's character in a very different way Bill.
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I think this is a very perceptive observation, Denae. I tend to agree too. Jude is what I would call a "straight-line plodder". Once he makes up his mind to do something he starts down that path and really doesn't deviate from it, does he? This reflects, in my opinion, his overall naivete (one of the results of his having grown up lacking the love, nurturing, and teaching that he might have gained within a healthy family relationship?). This single-mindedness tends to make him somewhat 'stiff' or 'wooden' I think. Again, I think this is intentional on Hardy's part too. This is speculation, but I'd bet that Jude is a montage of young men that Hardy knew of or grew up with in and around Dorset.
I might add too, that it will be interesting for us to see if Jude's character matures and becomes more multi-dimensional as the novel moves forward.
I meant that is having sex with her prior to their being married would have been seen as wrong which would than have to be righted by a marraige after the fact. Oh yes, once those around them knew they have had sex or once a pregnancy was discovered marriage was a must: '"I have next to no wages as yet, you know; or perhaps I should have thought of this before... But, of course if that's the case, we must marry! What other thing do you think I could dream of doing?" !! This passage from chapter 9 says it all with great irony:-
'Those who guessed the probable state of affairs, Arabella's parents being among them, declared that it was the sort of conduct they would have expected of such an honest young man as Jude in reparation of the wrong he had done his innocent sweetheart. The parson who married them seemed to think it satisfactory too. And so, standing before the aforesaid officiator, the two swore that at every other time of their lives till death took them, they would assuredly believe, feel, and desire precisely as they had believed, felt, and desired during the few preceding weeks. What was as remarkable as the undertaking itself was the fact that nobody seemed at all surprised at what they swore.'
MadgeUK wrote: "I also disagree that Hardy and Dickens used orphans ('foundlings') in their novels because they were a 'blank page'. "Well, then, you're disagreeing with a lot of critics who say exactly that. But I realize that that involves referring to background information, and maybe you don't think that's a worthwhile way to go.
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Bill, I think you are reading way too much into this. I'm no psychologist, but I do not see Jude on any track whatsoever toward becoming a sociopath at all; in fact, far from it. That's a significant diagnostic opinion based upon what we've read to date. You're certainly entitled to that opinion, but I strongly disagree with it. Cheers!
Silver wrote: "His lack of guilt about his sexual relations with Arabella, does seem a bit out of character of his usual moral standard, particuarly considering he was perfectly willing to marry her for the sake of invented child, even though that was not the life he wanted from himself. But than he was still a young man, who had an attractive and experienced woman come on to him and clearly he has not had a lot of past experince with sex and his lack of feeling guilt in the act, can be drawn from the fact that at this point in his life he had no reason to suspect he had in fact committed a great wrong becasue of his nativity and willing and readiness of Arabella. "I would argue that Jude does not have much of a "moral standard" in the clearly defined way the term is normally used. Other than his feelings towards hurting animals, which was largely reinforced by his schoolteacher's statement, what evidence do we have that he is particularly moral, let alone particularly religious. His interest in a divinity degree seems to have more to do with prestige than strong religious belief. I would argue that he is largely living his life only half-consciously, everything focused on his eventual goal but little attention paid to the moments of each day to the point that he does not notice when people are talking about him if he is wrapped in thought. He is different than people he is around, he is very clearly alone, but I do not know that he is of a higher moral code than most.
Of course then we come to Arabella. He does not seem to notice anything specific about her other than that she pays attention to him. It does not seem as though he listens to her. Sure, some of that is daydreaming, but you have to admit he's remarkably self-absorbed. I think for him Arabella fills a role, in addition to being very cunning in her handling of him.
One last note, regarding guilt. At the beginning of Chapter 9, before she tells him she is pregnant (which, incidentally, it seems she very well might have been before meeting with the doctor) and convinces him to marry her, he comes to find her tells her he is going away, followed by "I think I ought to go. I think it will be better both for you and for me. I wish some things had never begun! I was much to blame, I know. But it is never too late to mend." Clearly he does feel guilt, but there is very little emphasis on the matter.
One thing I am enjoying very much so far is what, to me, seems to be a real divergence of thought between the author and the protagonist. While it seems likely that there is an autobiographical quality, it comes across more as one with the benefit of decades of life lived and discovered.
@Bill Does narcissist fit the bill?
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Frankly, I think there's more of a chance that Arabella has 'issues' than Jude, eh what? Cheers!
Denae wrote: "His interest in a divinity degree seems to have more to do with prestige than strong religious belief. "Or perhaps because divinity was the standard degree from the universities in those days. I'm not sure what other degrees, if any, were actually offered, but basically if you wanted a university education, wanted to be seen as learned, getting a divinity degree was basically the way to go, whether or not you ever intended to enter the church. Law, medicine, etc. were mostly trade schools (St. Bart's Hospital, in London, for example, rather than a university, was where many of the doctors were trained, and lawyers largely learned their trade by reading law with another lawyer basically as an apprenticeship).
Some other universities (Edinburgh, for example) may have offered other degrees, but Oxford and Cambridge were for the training of the ministry.
When I was younger, Jude's age in the first part or a little younger, I also felt very alienated from society. I didn't have many friends, I was going through a rough patch with my family, etc. I turned out OK as soon as I found a group of people I felt I belonged to. I don't think a sense of alienation from humanity leads to a lack of compassion towards it. I think some of the people in history with the most compassion have also felt alienated- St. Francis, perhaps.
In fact, I might argue that a sense of personal alienation leads to GREATER compassion; it can lead to a strong sense of identification with the poor and needy, those living on the fringes of society.
I'd place Jude in this group, at least at this point in the novel.
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A beautifully eloquent and heart-felt posting, S. Rosemary! This sums up precisely my assessment of Jude at this point. Well done! Cheers!
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I have to say that I love your enthusiasm and your desire to dig into the novel, its plot, and characters with a real gusto. I have the luxury of having read this book before and knowing what's to come; so, it is quite enjoyable to experience your reaction to it through your comments, Bill. As I said above, there's much, much more to come, so RAFO!
Denae wrote: "Silver wrote: "His lack of guilt about his sexual relations with Arabella, does seem a bit out of character of his usual moral standard, particuarly considering he was perfectly willing to marry he..."The fact that he had agreed to do the right thing by marrying Arabella shows that he must have some sort of moral base, as theoretically he did not have to do agree to marry her. When Arabella and her friends first hatch the plan they themselves contemplate the danger if the man they try to entrap does not prove to be a "good man" who will stand by them, but they feel safe that Jude is such a man who would not try and flee from the responsibility.
He did not "have" to marry her, though it would have been disapproved of by the society if he refused, he does not seem to pay much heed to what others think of him and is not driven by a need to conform socially, and being his desire to leave Marygreen, I do not think he would be motivated by the fear of being exiled. So his choice to do right by Arabella displays some inclination to some moral understanding within him.
As far his expressions of regret about it in the hand. That does make me think a bit of when one commits a crime and get caught they are than sorry for it, and the greater remorse is not for having done the thing at all, but for having gotten caught and having to pay the consequences. Is Jude truly feeling guilt over thier intercourse? Or does he regret having to suffer the consequences of the action after the fact?
Bill wrote: "Arabella: She seduces a grown man, in order to entrap him into marrying her, then abandons him when she learns he isn't her type.."I do not think that Arabella's leaving Jude is really so much about Jude not being her "type" but I think it is becasue she discovered Jude's inability to truly provide for her in the way in which she hoped.
When she first set out after Jude she thought he looked like a young man who had the potential to make a decent living for himself, but upon discovering how much Jude was lost within his thoughts and his books, and after the incident with the pig seeing his complete impracticality in the real world, she realized that to stay with him would be most likely to lead and impoverished life and that the marriage would not acutally be advantageous to her.
That is a bit different than him just not being her "type"
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RAFO=Read And Find Out ;-)
The Readers Review: Literature from 1714 to 1910
Books mentioned in this topic
The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life (other topics)Lark Rise to Candleford (other topics)
Cranford (other topics)
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:) Definitely apocalyptic. Some call Daniel the Old Testament Revelations! :o