-
Statutory Rape
[QUOTE=kelby_lake;1253112]The problem is, Tess can't fully consent. /QUOTE]
There's a crime called statutory rape in some places. If a female has sex prior to an age, say 18, at which age she is presumed to have the mental capacity to consent to sex, sex even if the girl requests it is deemed rape. In Tess' case, she was sixteen, unsophisticated and confused by sex. Whether in Wessex the crime of statutory rape was in place hardly matters to modern readers. We understand the concept and appreciate that Tess was simply too young and unsophisticated to consent. Statutory rape in my country can send the offender to jail for years and is considered a crime in par with rape of a woman past the age of majority.
Kelby's post is on the money.
-
At the risk of repeating previous opinions, have we considered that it may not be an either/or question, not legally speaking of course, the law is based on absolutes after all?
Hardy continuously and persistently describes Tess as seemingly more mature physically, than emotionally and psychologically, which is usually the case for most people of 16.
As having the unique experience of being in contact with an almost identical real life version of Alec, I can attest to the fact that things were not and are not as simple as this or that. It is possible for attraction and desire to understand to coexist with disgust and disapproval, so while one may only have a physical representation, I believe both had a psychological one as well in Hardy's novel. While, indeed, Tess would not have had many choices either way, I do believe it is alluded to a certain connection between Tess and Alec at that point in the narrative, so it is possible the act conveniently not described could be both seduction and rape from a different standpoint in Tess' mind, since we are discussing the character, not the legal definition of the term. (I don't know how clear I'm being, I always have difficulty explaining whatever it is that sounds logical in my mind).
Overall, my point is that while Hardy left the act to the imagination and judgement of the reader, in my opinion he did so intentionally to stress on the duality of it and the conflict within Tess.
-
It is very clear that although Alex loves Tess he is also trying to seduce her. In my opinion as a woman who has been in a similar situation (where my rapist tried to seduce me at the age of 15), I feel that Tess was raped. Her rights were limited due to the time frame as well as being a woman in those times. She showed uncertainty toward him and yet he pressed his suit. Also, please take into account that when Alex arrives back from his persuit of directions, Tess is asleep... no one seems to have taken this into account. In a groggy and foggy minded state she might not have registered the situation as clearly as she might have.
"She had been made to break an accepted social law, but no law known to the environment in which she fancied herself such an anomaly." - part 2 end of chapter 3
No slings or arrows, just a different POV. :)
-
I would also like to say that Tess could not have been 16 at the time of her rape. In part two when Tess leaves home for the second time she has been home for 2 years. when she is walking along by the river it is stated that she is 21. By those statements alone and adding on that she only stayed by Alex for no more than a few months. she was no younger than 17 or 18 at the time.
-
As it is a Victorian novel, the sexual facts are much more implied than stated:
"She had been made to break an accepted social law". An interesting quotation which, to my mind, sums up the relationship between Tess and Alex.
Some clue might be in this significant use of the passive voice. Even considering that Tess might not have undestood, what was going on the first time when Alex actually raped her (for he knew what he was doing) there is an fatal atraction. When he is around she acts as she wouldn´t in other circunstances. The last of these acts is the murder.