"Enslavement to forms": subjection and rebellion of three of Hardy's women.

Abstract

Throughout his career as a novelist Thomas Hardy shows concern about issues affecting women, especially their subordinate status in marriage and their subjection to the double standard of morality. As his career develops, he takes a more cogent stand on these and other subjects concerning women as evidenced by the increasing rebelliousness of his women protagonists against Victorian social conventions. This study first identifies the conventions that confined women to limited roles and kept them second-class citizens throughout much of the nineteenth century. The study then documents the increasing rebellion of three of Hardy's women protagonists: Elfride Swancourt of A Pair of Blue Eyes (1873), Eustacia Vye of The Return of the Native (1878), and Sue Bridehead of Jude the Obscure (1895). Like women in Victorian England, these women characters are viewed by their society primarily as sexual beings. Their sexuality is central to the novels in which they appear. For example, all three characters face the angel/whore dichotomy. These women accept in varying degrees the angel ideal which dictates that women be docile and chaste and that their only goal be marriage. Elfride Swancourt internalizes this ideal. Eustacia Vye, who wants "to be loved to madness," knows she has moved far beyond the angel ideal. Sue Bridehead makes an intelligent argument against women being forced into this role and tries to live her life accordingly but society will not allow it. These women also rebel in varying degrees against their society's refusal to view them as intelligent people capable of being independent. They are educated women, in their society's view, but they cannot use their education to improve their stations in life. Elfride tries to be a successful writer but she faces unfair criticism from her male critic. Although Eustacia has no clear idea of an occupation in which she would be self-supporting, she rejects the limited roles open to her: teacher of children, companion, wife/mother, and mistress. Sue desires a college education available only to men and also a job in which she would have the freedom to work independently. Faced with sharply restricted professional opportunities, all of these women are or become financially dependent on men. Hardy's awareness of how these and other Victorian social conventions affect women and his growing sympathy with women as victims of these conventions culminate in his portrayal of women characters who are intelligent and rebellious. In the end, however, convention not only denies them self-development and fulfillment but destroys them.