The review that stuck out to me most was Raymond Williams "Love and Work." He talks mostly about how Hardy writes about where he comes from and who he is. However, in doing this he is neither one thing nor another. "He is neither owner nor tenant, dealer nor labourer, but an observer and chronicler, often again with uncertainty about his actual relation" (464). Even more interesting Williams suggests that Hardy "was not writing for them but about them" (464). Williams implies that Hardy was more about the abstract.
This review really stuck to me because it doesn't really praise Hardy completely nor put him down like most critics do. Instead it analysis where Hardy is coming from. I think by knowing more about his character we can understand Tess and the novel more. By Hardy not being one specific thing but rather being an observer I think that the missing pieces in the novel make more sense. In other words, he was "uncertain about his actual relation" and I think we too see this in Tess. Therefore, I think this is why we don't get an explanation of why Tess runs back to Alec, kills Alec, etc. He leaves it up for the reader to decide because he doesn't know the relationships and he wasn't "writing for them but about them." It is interesting to think that maybe Hardy didn't put these big moments in his novel because he doesn't know the answer to why or how they played out the way they did.
I find this very interesting. In explaining why he left out certain details of relationships, I feel like it helps us to see what we want to see. Perhaps Hardy was not filling in all the blanks not because he didn't know the relationship between the characters, but because he wanted us, as readers, so put ourselves and our relationships into them, that way we would be able to connect better to the characters and the whole novel in a more intimate way.
ReplyDeleteThat's a really cool perspective; that maybe even Hardy didn't quite know what he was doing. It makes the writing a bit less impressive to think of it that way, but also more satisfying, somehow. That could also explain why we feel like Hardy's characters are more relatable and "real" - in real life, you'll never fully understand a person and why they act the way they do, so maybe it's only natural that neither would the author.
ReplyDeleteI think this goes back to what we discussed in class with Hardy being contradicting. He allowed the characters to take hold of their own destiny even though they are not supposed to have free will because he was just observing. By being there and not being there he is just creating honesty within his novels. Unless a writer is writing from completely personal experience, they are normally not privy to the information that they are giving out.
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