All about Woman

When I read the novel Tess of the D’Urbervilles ten years ago for the first time, I was merely shocked by Tess’s miserable and tragic fate. What a lovely and kind girl! She did nothing wrong but she had to bear all these adversities that she didn’t deserve. At that time I was just a naive little girl in junior high school.

Now reviewing this famous novel again, I realize that there is still much to be found and thought about in it. Great as Hardy is, he definitely wanted to tell readers more than a tragic story purely.

Tess was the eldest daughter of her family and she had no choice but to bear the responsibility of rallying her family and repaying the debts. She was beautiful, innocent and pure without big ambition or desire for things that didn’t belong to her. Nobody ever doubted that she deserved happiness and peace.

But things seldom go on as we expected. Tess was deprived of virginity and she was no longer ‘pure’ as she used to be. What’s worse, she got pregnant as a result. Tess gave birth to the baby and decided to raise the baby all by herself. At that time, she showed her admirable qualities—being tough and decisive. We all hope that she can start a brand new life and cut off all contact with the past after her baby’s death. However, for the second and third time, God cheated and mocked her.

Sometimes I wonder why a nice woman couldn’t end up with a nice man. Is it just like the saying that beautiful women suffer unhappy fates? Tess always missed her Mr. right and her Mr.wrong always disturbed her life and wouldn’t let her go. All the three person misunderstand what’s love. Alec thought love to be deprival and occupation; Angel thought love to be purity and ideal; Tess thought love to be toleration and waiting. They stuck in their illusion of love of which they never managed to get out. Alec and Tess was dead. As for Angel, he might as well be dead.

Who is to blame for this tragedy? Alec, Tess or Angel? Or ridiculous fate?

I believe it was Tess herself. Certainly, that bad age and those hypocritical men were executioners that push Tess into the abyss of destruction. But Tess should have led a better life if she don’t treat herself as a satellite of men. How stupid is she to spend her life waiting for a man who betrayed her and escaped away when she was dying for help! When there is no help offered by men, women should fight on their own instead of waiting for men’s mercy and forgiveness since there is nothing needed to be forgiven.

Women’s tragedy will never come to an end until they treat themselves as totally independent, which means they can lead a normal life with or without men.

第二篇：苔丝论文

Tess’ Inevitable Tragedy

Something happened in the world seems incidental, but actually it is inevitable. Tess, a simple farmer’s daughter, should have been like other women in Wessex country, who married a man and give birth to babies that led peaceful lives. However, the God of the Destiny played with her, pushing her to the very despair step by step. How could a venerable, sensitive and helpless girl struggle to free herself from Fate? When associated with the family name “D’Urberville”, she began suffering a miserable life. In my view, Tess’s tragedy is inevitable. Four main forces united killed this young and pretty girl.

First, home is where first sorrow happened. It was ridiculous that her father John Durbeyfield had so much passion to an old-fashioned family name, from which he thought his family can get benefits. But the fact was that it pushed Tess to walk towards a deep abyss. A vain mother and a conventional father caused the misfortune of their daughter. “All these young souls were passenger in the Durbeyfield ship---entirely dependent on the judgment of the two Durbeyfield adults for their pleasure, their necessities, their health, even their existence. If the heads of the Durbeyfield house-hold chose to sail into difficulty, disaster, starvation, disease, degradation, death, these helpless creatures sailed with them.”① Unfortunately, they chose the latter one that made all the difference.

Second, Alec was the devil in Tess’s life. He was a conventional,

bold, bad seducer. Tess came to Alec’s house where she experienced the wretched world the first time just like that a young lamb come to the edge of wolf’s mouth. She was so innocent that she was not able to resist him and protect herself. Alec seduced her that destroyed her life. “Why do the bad so often ruin the good? Why is beauty damaged by ugliness?”② The bad man took possession of Tess twice in advantage of her weak place. “Tess’s heart quivered-was touching her in weak place. He had seen her main anxiety.”③ The misfortune tangled her like a sticky candy.

Third, was Angel really the angel of Tess? He was a nice man and loved Tess deeply and in turn, Tess regarded him as all. If only they would become life-long husband and wife, the pain Tess suffered in the past would be compensated. “But this well-meaning young man, despite his advanced ideas, was still limited in his thinking and was yet the slave to custom and conventionality. He could not see that Tess was in character as pure as the pure wife in Bible.”④ There lay the pity. When Angel was aware it, it was too late. For this late awareness, Tess sacrificed her life.

These three reasons account for the Tess’s tragedy as a social background, the harshness of custom and moral law, man’s inhumanity, and the situation of the rural poor. The world Tess lived was man’s lot where woman is a mere appendix.

However, Tess was never willing to be an appendix. This is the

strongest force, her detached personality and noble soul. She chose fighting against the world, rather than make a compromise with the common custom. Thus her exceptional beauty and the fixed identity as a female became the source of her tragedy. If she took her beauty as a kind of resource and played up to man, she may become a wealthy lady; if she followed mother’s suggestion that concealed her past, she could be Angel’s life-long wife. But she never did that and, if she did, she was not Tess any more.

Why the character Tess is so impressive is that she was lifelike. The greatness of Thomas Hardy was that he put the detached character into a social system perfectly. He used the contrast of Tess’s tragedy to reflect the wretched world that was like a net, wherever she was, she couldn’t flee out of the whole net and the only result was dying. Like dark Car said in the book said, “Out of the frying-pan into the fire”.⑤

If Tess should live today, could she get rid of the misfortune? The answer is still no. This world is still dominated by men. There are many “Alec”s in the world. If Tess should stick to her purity and very kindness, never make any compromise and never yield to the custom, she would still walk on the dark way---bright way in my eyes. “It was not unsuitable that such a lifeful face appeared here.”⑥ The world is like the inn, where most people drank, and the people who didn’t have the same behavior would be looked at with different eyes. It is not the false of Tess’s, it is

the world’s.

① From 《Tess of the D’Urbervilles》 Page69，China Book Press. ② From 《Tess of the D’Urbervilles》 Page303，China Book Press. ④ From 《Tess of the D’Urbervilles》 Page245，China Book Press. ⑤ From 《Tess of the D’Urbervilles》 Page63，China Book Press. ⑥ From 《Tess of the D’Urbervilles》 Page20，China Book Press.