Includes a brief biography of the author, thematic and structural analysis of the work, critical views, and an index of themes and ideas.

THOMAS HARDY'S TESS OF THE D'URBERVILLES A detailed and incisive analysis of Thomas Hardy's classic 1891 novel, using the latest research in feminism, gay, lesbian and queer theory, and cultural studies. Illustrated. Bibliogaphy. Notes. www.crmoon.com Margaret Elvy offers a thorough reappraisal of Thomas Hardy's favourite heroine. Elvy incorporates much of recent Hardy criticism, in which Hardy has been reappraised in the light of materialist, psychoanalytic, gender, poststructuralist and feminist criticism. Tess of the d'Urbervilles is a novel of anger, a text which rages against time, God, industrialization, and social institutions such as marriage, Chrisianity, the Church, law and education. What does Tess Durbeyfield do that is 'wrong'? Thomas Hardy explains in the book: ' s]he had been made to break an accepted social law, but no law known to the environment in which she fancied herself such an anomaly.' Tess is forced, or is led, or falls into a complex situation by circumstances, confusions, innocence (or ignorance), bad communication and desire. She is 'made' to break 'an accepted social law': it is the same with Eustacia Vye in The Return of the Native, and Sue Bridehead in Jude the Obscure. Somehow, their very existence means transgressions will occur. Tess Durbeyfield transgresses society, goes against grain. She (unwittingly perhaps) places herself outside of society and the law. She learns that there are different kinds of laws, different sets of laws for different groups of people. She has to learn about social boundaries, and how to keep inside of limits. As it's a dramatic novel, Tess learns the hard way. She is seen to be transgressive. The education system fails her utterly, her mother and family also fail to protect her. Though she is proud of her education, it fails her utterly. A note in the Life, Hardy's autobiography, is usually cited in relation to Tess of the d'Urbervilles: ' w]hen a married woman who has a lover kills her husband, she does not really wish to kill her husband; she wishes to kill the situation.' The tragedy of Tess of the d'Urbervilles has been seen as a socio-economic destruction (Arnold Kettle); the result of commercial forces, in the Marxist model (Raymond Williams); the decline of the rural order (John Alcorn, Roger Ebbatson, Merryn Williams); the waste of human potential (Irving Howe); due to the sexual manipulation of two men (feminist critics such as Penny Boumelha, Kate Millett and Rosalind Sumner); or due to the heroine's own moral inadequacies (Roy Morrell); or as the breaking of social taboos (J. Lecercle), and so on.

Heart Of Darkness. The story of the civilized, enlightened Mr. Kurtz who embarks on a harrowing "night journey" into the savage heart of Africa, only to find his dark and evil soul. The Secret Sharer. The saga of a young, inexperienced skipper forced to decide the fate of a fugitive sailor who killed a man in self-defense. As he faces his first moral test the skipper discovers a terrifying truth -- and comes face to face with the secret itself. Heart Of Darkness and The Secret Sharer draw on actual events and people that Conrad met or heard about during his many far-flung travels. In portraying men whose incredible journeys on land and at sea are also symbolic voyages into their own mysterious depths, these two masterful works give credence to Conrad's acclaim as a major psychological writer.

A ne'er-do-well exploits his gentle daughter's beauty for social advancement in this tragic masterpiece. Hardy's 1891 novel defied convention to focus on the rural lower class for a frank treatment of sexuality and religion.

Tess of the d'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy from Coterie Classics All Coterie Classics have been formatted for ereaders and devices and include a bonus link to the free audio book. “Did it never strike your mind that what every woman says, some women may feel?” ― Thomas Hardy, Tess of the D'Urbervilles Tess of the d'Urbervilles is a heartbreaking tale of a woman going to every length to try and do what is right, only to have fate tease her at each turn.

CHAPTER I. It was half-past four o’clock (by the testimony of the land-surveyor, my authority for the particulars of this story, a gentleman with the faintest curve of humour on his lips); it was half-past four o’clock on a May morning in the eighteen forties. A dense white fog hung over the Valley of the Exe, ending against the hills on either side. But though nothing in the vale could be seen from higher ground, notes of differing kinds gave pretty clear indications that bustling life was going on there. This audible presence and visual absence of an active scene had a peculiar effect above the fog level. Nature had laid a white hand over the creatures ensconced within the vale, as a hand might be laid over a nest of chirping birds. The noises that ascended through the pallid coverlid were perturbed lowings, mingled with human voices in sharps and flats, and the bark of a dog. These, followed by the slamming of a gate, explained as well as eyesight could have done, to any inhabitant of the district, that Dairyman Tucker’s under-milker was driving the cows from the meads into the stalls. When a rougher accent joined in the vociferations of man and beast, it would have been realized that the dairy-farmer himself had come out to meet the cows, pail in hand, and white pinafore on; and when, moreover, some women’s voices joined in the chorus, that the cows were stalled and proceedings about to commence.

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