Victims of Conventions: Morality in the Later Novels of Thomas Hardy

• Main Authors: Jeffrey E. Denton, 唐傑夫
• Other Authors: Pen-shui Liao
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2007
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/61503576817971132884

博士 === 國立高雄師範大學 === 英語學系 === 95 === Thomas Hardy, one of the best known Victorian novelists, was revolutionary in his approach to Victorian literature. His representation of the conflicts between conventional morality and his own ideas of a secular religion of humanity significantly moved the genre of the novel forward into what was to become the Modernist period with its associated characteristics. This study is based on the divergence of morality from the social conventions of dogma and doctrine found in Victorian writings which were the defining elements of the Victorian virtues making up respectability. Focusing on Hardy’s later novels, rather than his earlier novels, this study seeks to describe and explore how morality is depicted in connection with the Victorian idea of respectability. Since Hardy was the one Victorian writer who retained the Victorian style while heralding in the Modern period, his approaches and representations are important for the changing treatment of the themes prevailing in the two eras. Furthermore, Hardy’s later novels displayed his more mature and settled ideas regarding a moral code divergent from the traditional moral dictates. Social conventions, usually stemming from religion and the Church, are seen as oppression and a source of injustice to transgressors of that code of conduct. This conflict between what is best for an individual and what is expected from them in a larger community played an important role in the movement from the Victorian morality of the nineteenth century to the more liberal and agnostic twentieth century and Hardy was a forerunner in challenging dogmatic convention as well as freeing the idea of morality from it and from religion for the purposes of the novel as well as for the reading public. The three novels examined in this study (The Mayor of Casterbridge, Tess of the d’Ubervilles, and Jude the Obscure) were all denounced by many critics, and a goodly portion of Victorian society, for being “immoral.” This judgment on the novels indicates the divergence from the respectable that Hardy was working to create. This dissertation is divided into five chapters. The opening chapter serves to introduce underlying concepts, the rationale and motives for this study as well as to explain the overall organization of the dissertation and the texts involved. Chapter Two concentrates on the first of the three novels, The Mayor of Casterbridge, and, as with Chapters Three and Four, analyzes the content of this text in regard to episodes and characters that develop and expound on the themes of morality and Victorian respectability. Chapter Three explores Tess of the d’Ubervilles and Chapter Four, Jude the Obscure. The final chapter aims to bring together the first four chapters by summarizing main points and concepts in a coherent literary context and in demonstrating the underlying thesis that Hardy’s later novels represent a quest for a moral balance between society’s needs and justice for its individuals.