Is is terrible that we work at SPARKNOTES and we've never read this book? At least Lonks can help us fill the profound gaps in our literary expertise.—Sparkitors
Book #52: Tess of the d’Urbervilles
Author: Thomas Hardy
Reason for Reading: As I said before: Summer Reading.
Quote: "Did you say the stars were worlds, Tess?"
"Yes."
"All like ours?"
"I don't know, but I think so. They sometimes seem to be like the apples on ourstubbard-tree. Most of them splendid and sound—a few blighted."
"Which do we live on—a splendid one or a blighted one?"
"A blighted one."
Copyright Date: 1884
Length: 400 pages
Genre: Victorian Tragedy (Thank you to the ever-amazing SparkNotes who helped me figure this one out.)
Rating (out of 10 stars): 4 stars
Summary: Tess Durbeyfield is a country girl living in the late 19th century in an secluded English. Her father learns that he is the last lineal descendent of the D'Urbervilles—one of the oldest, most aristocratic, families in all of England. He foolishly assumes that his aristocratic heritage will suffice to pull his family out of poverty, and so he sends Tess off to "claim kin" (i.e., to borrow money on the strength of their distant family ties) from a wealthy branch of the D'Urbervilles. A very depressing, though highly eventful, life follows for Tess.
Review: If you liked this book, please skip my review. Because, though I really don’t want anyone to hate me, I must be truthful.
I despised Tess. However, I wouldn’t call this a “bad book”—it's just… depressing! Like, I’m sure that some people contemplated self-mutilation during the reading of this novel. But, I should say that, as a rule, I generally don’t like late 19th century literature. I hated The Scarlet Letter and I would rather shoot myself than read Emily Dickenson, but, hey, that’s just me.
While reading the book, I felt nothing but extreme pity for Tess. Now, Lit teachers would say that that is because Tess is a “sympathetic character,” but I say it’s because Thomas Hardy loved to torture fictional young women. EVERY. SINGLE. TIME something good happened to Tess, it was snatched from her on the next page and I just don’t want to read about that. But, despite of all that, Hardy’s writing was beautiful. I could certainly imagine every place Tess visited or lived and I can truly say that I knew the characters. Then again, I didn’t really want to know most of those characters, but I digress.
Another thing that I didn’t really care for in Tess was a lack of clarity in regards to the plot. I was probably a good 200 pages into the novel before I figured out what the main storyline was. To me, it seemed that every event that could be the main plot ended before it really got a chance to develop, and that bothered me.
Recommendation: I wouldn’t put anyone through the torture of reading this book, but I do know some people who like it (if you are one of them, please explain your reasoning to me in the comments). However, a lot of you will probably have to read it for school anyway, and I wish you luck.
A couple random updates:
I saw The Help movie last week and loved it! I definitely recommend it to everyone, whether you have read the book or not.
And I have a funny story to tell you. So, I started school back this past week, and remember when I read Out of the Silent Planet for my summer reading? For our assignment for that book, we have to post a review on a class forum… I just copied and pasted my SparkLife review. Yay for easy schoolwork!
'Fess up: Are you a die-hard Tess fan?
Related post: One Year, 100 Books
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