is tess a pure woman?

[sjannat]

hey everyone.. in my book club at school we were discussing whether or not Tess is a pure woman. Please share what you think and give reasons from the book.

[sameh_niceman]

hello to evey one thank you for your advanced and fantastic web site

[JBI]

My opinion would be, in Victorian standards no, in modern standards yes.

[sameh_niceman]

hey everyone.. in my book club at school we were discussing whether or not Tess is a pure woman. Please share what you think and give reasons from the book.

thank you very much

[man-of-istanbul]

either in victorian age or in modern world ,Tess stands as a figure who is destinied by the man and in this male oriented society any woman like Tess can not hold a position in society even if she is pure or corrupt cuse she doesnt feel like a woman cuse she cant..when we have a close look at at the book the sentences and grammer are often in conditional terms..these conditions have nothing to do with Tess..all the circumctances in the novel at that time and today are caused by the men.shortly the word " pure" is deceitfull in its context because although she is trying to be pure she is pulled into that complex world of man gradually and at the end of the novel she behaves as if she is a man killing somebody with a phallic symbol..you can look at the novel in different terms..in feminist terms the novel tells the desperate situation of a woman..in darwinian terms " the fittest to live"' Tess has to kill a person to keep on living..Marxist view of the novel is also similar to Darwinian aproach..in Freduian terms Tess has the potential to kill somebody ... i hope this would help...

[Luna1968]

There is an excellent quote from an interview with Hardy in the Norton Critical Edition of the novel. In response to the question as to why Hardy calls Tess a pure woman, he replies, "I consider that she was to all intents and purposes a pure woman till her last fall [her final moving in with Alec in phase 7]. Then she was a mere corpse drifing in the water to her end - an absolutely irresponsible being." (388 Norton 3rd ed)
So, for Hardy, who sees Tess as a woman of nature and not of society, she wasn't responsible for her earlier affair with Alec, and thus was pure until the end of the novel.

[chamrock]

To answer this question, I would have a look at the different meanings of the word "pure" - it's a relative notion, after all. In Victorian society and applied to a woman, it does refer to virginity - and in this sense Tess can't be considered as pure - but doesn't Hardy try to go against the grain? He says Tess's purity is not dependant on her physical intactness, so it must signify something else...

The problem is that Tess doesn't correspond to most of the meanings of the word... for example, she's not "untainted by admixture", because she is both of noble and commoner blood (and the reader is reminded of this on several occasions, as she recalls that it's her mother who gave her her looks, for instance). She doesn't want to be the essence of womanhood (another possible meaning, I find), since this puts her individuality in danger (but perhaps she's mistaken?).

It's really difficult to understand because Hardy keeps contradicting himself, as well!!! and the different viewpoints in the novel (Tess's, Angel's, the narrator's, Alec's...) also go against each other!

[jinjang]

There is an excellent quote from an interview with Hardy in the Norton Critical Edition of the novel. In response to the question as to why Hardy calls Tess a pure woman, he replies, "I consider that she was to all intents and purposes a pure woman till her last fall [her final moving in with Alec in phase 7]. Then she was a mere corpse drifing in the water to her end - an absolutely irresponsible being." (388 Norton 3rd ed)
So, for Hardy, who sees Tess as a woman of nature and not of society, she wasn't responsible for her earlier affair with Alec, and thus was pure until the end of the novel.


Regretfully I was not here one year ago to discuss with you all about how pure Tess was. I ventured to disagree with even Hardy to say that I would not consider Tess lost her purity when she sacrificed herself to help her mother, little brothers and sisters who were out in the street. She was pure even then as I consider Sonja pure in Crime and Punishment. Her last fall should be the murder, even though it is done out of her desperation.

[CarolC]

Here is the quotation I found.

http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/novel_19c/hardy/index.html

"... I still maintain that her innate purity remained intact to the very last; though I frankly own that a certain outward purity left her on her last fall. I regarded her then as being in the hands of circumstances, not morally responsible, a mere corpse drifting with the current to her end."

Yeah, I disagree too, purity doesn't just apply to your loyalty to your husband, it applies to your loyalty to your other loved ones. Hardy was probably talking of her conscious purity she lost in quotation. Though Hardy obviously does not blame Tess for her loss of purity (staying with Alec) because of circumstances.

[kelby_lake]

Pure can also mean an unspoilt essence. Tess is not a sophisticated woman but an earthly instinctive one.

[rabiyatou]

hi everyone, i am trying to write my M.A dissertation on hardy's book, tess..., want some clues and help, thanks