Women and Sexuality in the Novels of Thomas Hardy

by Rosemarie Morgan

Overview

The women in Thomas Hardy's novels appear to have no control over their conduct or their destiny. In this book, Rosemarie Morgan argues a contrary case. Hardy's women struggle, sometimes winning, often losing, but they are not tame objects to be manipulated. Their resistance emerges in their sexuality, a quality which Hardy was often forced to cloak or disguise. Rosemarie Morgan resurrects Hardy's voluptuous heroines and restores to them the physical, sexual reality which Hardy sees as their birthright, but which the male-dominated world they inhabit seeks to deny them, both within and beyond the novel.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780415754972
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	04/10/2014
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.60(d)

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments vii

Abbreviations viii

Introduction ix

1 The Heresy of Passion: A Pair of Blue Eyes 1

2 Subverting Orthodoxy: Far From the Madding Crowd 30

3 Elemental Forges: The Return of the Native 58

4 Passive Victim? Tess of the d'Urberuilles 84

5 Passion Denied: Jude the Obscure 110

6 Conclusion 155

Appendix: The Internal Dating of Far From the Madding Crowd 164

Notes 166

Bibliography 192

Index 201

Editorial Reviews

‘ the most profound and comprehensive discussion I know of the representation of women and of female sexuality in the novels of Thomas Hardy ... It is a major revisionary study of Hardy's study of female sexuality and of the political and social implications of that treatment.' - J. Hillis Miller, University of California

‘She is perceptive, not to say exhaustive, in her detection of sexual imagery and metaphor ... her main case is irrefutable and ... shrewdly underlines Hardy's achievement in questioning the traditional portrayal of female sexuality.' - Times Literary Supplement

‘Dr Morgan has many illuminating insights, especially in her shrewd analysis of Sue's and Jude's weaknesses.' - Contemporary Review

‘Dr Morgan's book, and particularly her analysis of human relationships in Jude the Obscure ... bear witness to Hardy's importance as a novelist who significantly helped to change the attitudes of later generations.' - Western Gazette

‘Just as Hardy's novels called for a reassessment and revision of woman's social condition, so the author of this study call for reappraisal of criticism of the novels.' - EMW, Studies on Women Abstracts

‘... clear and accessible.' - Merryn Williams, Notes and Queries

From the Publisher