Discuss the double standard behavior of the patriarchal society in Tess of the d’Urbervilles Novel by Thomas Hardy.
Double standard behavior of society
Tess of the d’Urbervilles is a novel written by Thomas Hardy. Tess of the d’Urbervilles can be considered to be such a remarkable tragedy as its author defines it. As one of the most influential and well-received books in world literature, Tess brought Hardy great fame and honor as well as incurring harsh rebukes from conventional society.
In the novel, Hardy portrays a poor innocent country girl who is victimized by the combined forces of Victorian patriarchal society the injustice of social law, the hypocrisy of social prejudice, and the inequality of male dominance and demonstrates his profound sympathy for Tess, the protagonist, symbolic of rural women who were mercilessly ravaged in a male-dominated world. Tess’s tragic fate has evoked generations of readers’ sympathy and aroused their interest in her twisted life journey full of setbacks and mishaps.
Tess’s tragic misfortune is closely linked to the betrayal and domination of the two men. The hypocrisy of the bourgeoisie and the male dominance in Angel and Alec helped to drive Tess to destruction.
In the conventional world, self-guilt and self-reproach with a strict view of virginity and chastity embarrassed her throughout her life. After sexual abuse, the immovable society gives her no chance of rebirth.
As Hardy suggests in the novel, patriarchal society, the heroine’s abode, is the root of her tragedy, shaping her unfortunate form. He sympathizes with Tess, arguing that he created most of the misery from his conventional side. He points out that Tess and Alec and Angel are examples of the destructive effects of social pressures and conferences on a naturally pure and uninterrupted country girl.
Victorian society saw much of the morality of Christianity in terms of morality in black and white terms, and issues such as women’s dignity, and any woman who stood out of the moral codes, morality and compromised her purity would be condemned by society, and this idea comes with Hardy’s descriptions of Tess’s hardships.
by Md. Rabby Sharif Ador
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