Readers Place

About the Book

Tess is an innocent young girl until the day she goes to visit her rich relatives , the D Urbervilles, in hope that they might help her alleviate her own family s poverty. Her encounter with her manipulative cousin, Alec, leads her onto a path that is beset with suffering and betrayal. When she falls in love with another man, Angel Clare, Tess sees a potential escape from her past, but only if she can tell him her shameful secret

Starting Points for Discussion

• Do you think the subtitle ‘A Pure Woman: Faithfully Presented’ is an accurate description of Tess? Why does Hardy use this epithet to describe her and how does he challenge accepted conventions of the time in doing so?

• Hardy remarks that ‘Tess’ own people … are never tired of saying among each other in their fatalistic way ‘it was to be’: do you think that Tess is a victim of fate or is she ultimately in charge of of her destiny?

• Joan Durbeyfield more than twice advises the ‘tractable’ Tess on courses of action that prove disastrous for her. How responsible is she for Tess’ sufferings?

• The discovery of Tess’ ‘ancient blood’ is the catalyst for the series of tragic events that follow. Do you think that Hardy is presenting aristocracy as a poisonous force in society?

• Do you think that Tess was seduced or raped by Alec D’Urberville? Why do you think Hardy leaves this unclear?

• Is Angel Clare to blame for the way he reacted to Tess’ confession, or is he merely a product of his times? How is Hardy attacking Victorian sexual hypocrisy here?

• In what ways are Tess’ moral and practical decisions affected by her status as a woman, and not a ‘proper’ woman at that? How does Hardy present the constraints of womanhood throughout the novel?

• ‘There was not a tree within sight; there was not … a green pasture – nothing but fallow and turnips everywhere’: this description of the ‘starve-acre’ farm at Flintcomb-Ashe fully reflects the downturn in Tess’ fortunes and her emotional state at this point. Where else does Hardy use landscape to reflect the moods and situations of his characters, and do you find this effective?

• Was Tess morally justified in finally accepting Alec D’Urberville’s offer of financial help, given the benefits it brought her family?

• Hardy often presents a simple, uneducated life close to the rhythms of nature as being physically and even morally healthier. We are told that ‘Angel  …preferred sermons in stones to sermons in churches and chapels on fine summer days’ and that the Talbothays milkmaids were ‘generous young souls’ due to having been brought up in ‘lonely country nooks’. In what ways could Hardy’s reverential attitude towards nature be seen as a reaction against the process of industrialisation?

• Was Tess justified in killing Alec D’Urberville? Does this alter your opinion of her as a ‘pure ‘ woman?

Other Books by Thomas Hardy

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  Far from the Madding Crowd…

  Bathsheba Everdene arrives in the small village of Weatherbury and captures the…

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  Hardy Poems

  Distringuished as both a great novelist and a great poet. Thomas Hardy (1840…

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  Jude the Obscure

  Jude Fawley is a young man who longs to better himself and go to Christminster…

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  Return of the Native

  Proud, passionate Eustacia Vye marries Clym Yeobright in the hope that he will…

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  Tess of the D’Urbervilles

  Tess is an innocent young girl until the day she goes to visit her rich re…

  Reading Guide

Suggested Further Reading

• Far from the Madding Crowd ~ Thomas Hardy
• North and South ~ Elizabeth Gaskell
• Lady Chatterley’s Lover ~ D.H.Lawrence
• The Woman in White ~ Wilkie Collins
• Dracula ~ Bram Stoker