Themes (AQA A-Level English Literature A): Revision Notes
Themes
Introduction
Themes are the central ideas or underlying meanings that an author explores throughout a literary work. They often address universal human experiences and societal issues.
Themes represent the core and often universal concepts that a literary work explores. In Tess of the d'Urbervilles, Hardy examines several profound themes that reflect both Victorian society and timeless human concerns.
The injustice of existence
Hardy presents unfairness as a pervasive force that shapes the lives of Tess and her family. This sense of injustice becomes so overwhelming that it appears to be an inherent characteristic of human life itself.
Punishment and suffering
Tess faces severe consequences throughout the novel, despite not intending harm. She is punished for Prince's death, even though the accident was unintentional. Similarly, she suffers for her own violation by Alec, and later for not seeking justice in heaven.
The pattern of Tess's suffering illustrates Hardy's view that suffering in this world offers no guarantee of compensation in the next. This challenges the Victorian Christian belief in divine justice and heavenly rewards for earthly tribulations.
Christianity's failure to provide comfort
The novel questions whether Christianity truly delivers the justice it promises. Mrs Durbeyfield never contemplates spiritual rewards, whilst the converted Alec promotes divine justice for earthly wrongdoers, yet his faith appears superficial and unconvincing. Even the sympathetic Mr Clare, described as a devout Christian, seems somewhat detached from life's harsh realities.
Christianity, as portrayed in the novel, provides minimal comfort to those experiencing hardship. This represents Hardy's critique of religious institutions that fail to address real human suffering.
Pagan forces and unpredictability
Rather than Christian justice, the novel's moral framework reflects pagan principles. The forces governing human existence prove entirely unpredictable and indifferent to human welfare. The pre-Christian customs practised by farm labourers at the novel's beginning, and Tess's final moments at Stonehenge, remind readers of an ancient world where divine powers were capricious and uncaring.
The narrator's closing statement that 'Justice' was done places the word in ironic punctuation, highlighting that true justice remains absent. What society labels as 'Justice' is merely one of the pagan deities engaging in cruel entertainment or frivolous sport.
Changing ideas of social class in Victorian England
Hardy presents intricate perspectives on how social class functioned in nineteenth-century England and the challenges of defining class through simple criteria.
The decline of aristocratic bloodlines
The Durbeyfields serve as a powerful symbol of how class evaluation shifted during Victorian times. Whilst their lineage connects them to medieval nobility (evaluated purely by ancestry without considering wealth or achievements), this purity of blood holds no practical value.
For the parson and most other characters in the novel, this genealogical information amounts to nothing more than historical curiosity. The disconnect between noble ancestry and actual social status reveals the changing nature of Victorian class structures.
Money over lineage
In the Victorian context, financial resources matter far more than family heritage. This explains how Simon Stokes, Alec's father, could use his substantial fortune to acquire an illustrious family name and reinvent his family as the Stoke-d'Urbervilles.
The Stoke-d'Urbervilles as Social Climbers:
The d'Urbervilles effectively purchase their supposed noble heritage and authentic aristocratic status, demonstrating that class boundaries have become fluid. This transformation from Stokes to Stoke-d'Urbervilles represents the Victorian reality that wealth could buy social position, regardless of bloodline.
Class confusion in the protagonists
The evolving and often contradictory understanding of social class creates confusion that impacts the Clare family. Their most accomplished son, Angel, abandons plans to become a farmer and marry a milkmaid, thus rejecting the conventional advantages of a Cambridge education and clerical career.
His readiness to work alongside farm labourers makes him appealing to Tess, and their relationship would have been impossible had he maintained more traditional, elitist attitudes.
The three central characters in the Angel-Tess-Alec dynamic all demonstrate significant confusion about their social positions, which stands as one of the novel's primary concerns. This confusion drives much of the plot's conflict and tragedy.
Men dominating women
A recurring theme throughout the novel examines how men exercise dominance over women, wielding power that stems fundamentally from their gender.
Alec's exploitation
Hardy demonstrates through Alec's actions the extent of male power. Sometimes this acknowledgement reflects the man's awareness, as when Alec exploits Tess for his own fleeting gratification.
Alec's violation represents the novel's most severe example of male domination over a female. However, less obvious instances of female submission to male authority also appear throughout the narrative.
Female devotion and obsession
After Angel discloses his preference for Tess, her friends Retty contemplates taking her own life whilst Marian turns to alcohol. Their earlier innocent affections for Angel transform into something troubling.
The Dairymaid's Obsession:
This devotion transcends simple romantic attachment, becoming an unhealthy fixation. These young women seem entirely controlled by their desire for a man who, readers learn explicitly, fails even to recognise their existence.
This form of unconscious male authority over women proves perhaps even more disturbing than Alec's deliberate cruelty and self-aware brutality.
Angel's idealization
Even Angel's affection for Tess, seemingly pure and tender, dominates her in detrimental ways. Angel creates an idealized representation of Tess's rural innocence, substituting it for the authentic woman he consistently refuses to truly understand.
When Angel addresses Tess using names such as 'Daughter of Nature' and 'Artemis', readers sense he may be rejecting her genuine identity in favour of a conceptual image he finds preferable. Consequently, her identity and lived experiences become suppressed, albeit unconsciously.
Reversal and consequence
The established pattern of male dominance over submissive women finally reverses with Tess's murder of Alec. For the first time in the novel, a woman actively opposes a man.
Naturally, this action only results in further oppression of women, as the collective of male police officers apprehend Tess at Stonehenge. Nevertheless, for a brief moment, the accepted pattern of female submission to male authority is disrupted, and Tess's action appears courageous.
Key Points to Remember:
- Injustice pervades the novel: Hardy presents life as fundamentally unfair, with pagan forces proving capricious rather than Christian justice being redemptive
- Victorian class is complex: The novel demonstrates that wealth superseded bloodline in determining social status during this period
- Class confusion drives the plot: Angel, Tess and Alec all experience confusion about their social positions, which significantly impacts their relationships
- Male power operates on multiple levels: Domination ranges from Alec's overt violence to Angel's subtle idealization, both limiting Tess's autonomy
- Tess's final act challenges gender norms: Her murder of Alec momentarily disrupts the pattern of female submission, though it ultimately leads to her downfall