The Deconstructed Angels in <i>Tess of the D’Urbervilles</i>

Tianyu Xu

doi:doi:10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11

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The Deconstructed Angels in Tess of the D’Urbervilles

Tianyu Xu

Published in English Language, Literature & Culture (Volume 5, Issue 3)

Received: 13 July 2020 Accepted: 30 July 2020 Published: 10 August 2020

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Abstract

The nineteenth-century is an age when traditional social expectations for a truly pure and angelic woman pervade the Western world. In Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles (1891), two main characters apparently bear unignorable relevance to the term “angel” or its connotation: Angel Clare, whose Christian name alone suggests the subtle artistic design of the author, and Tess, who is overtly defined by the author in the subtitle of the novel as “a pure woman”. The controversial verdict on Tess lead readers to reflect upon the life experiences of the “angelically pure” Tess again in terms of what she does instead of what she is already assumed to be, thus revealing her loyalty, forbearance and nobility of her struggle against fate. Appearing both as an intruder into the Wessex country life and reforming destructionist of the dogma of the church, the other “angel”, Angel Clare deconstructs what his father Reverend Mr. Clare of Emminster holds as absolute truth. His self-deconstruction along the way blurs the simple dichotomy of what is pure and moral, and furthermore, help him finally recognize the disadvantaged female. Prominently, these two “angels” are deconstructed against the incorrigible connotation and the Zeitgeist of their time, showing Thomas Hardy’s possible awareness of the necessity of breaking the stereotypic angelical image as well as wielding the inestimable power of literature to propel changes.

Published in	English Language, Literature & Culture (Volume 5, Issue 3)
DOI	10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11
Page(s)	79-83
Creative Commons	This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright	Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Angel, Tess of the D’Urbervilles, Deconstruction

References

[1]	Hoad. T. F. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996: 16.
[2]	Fredericksen, Linwood. “Angel and demon.” May 29, 2019. Encyclopædia Britannica. July 27, 2020 .
[3]	Patmore, Coventry. “The Angel in the House.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Vol. 2, 8^th ed. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2006: 1582-1583.
[4]	Woolf, Virginia. “Professions for Women.” January 21, 1931 .
[5]	Gilbert, Sandra and Gubar, Susan. The Mad Woman in the Attic, 2^nd edition. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2000: 76.
[6]	Kramer, Dale. The Cambridge Companion to Thomas Hardy. London: Cambridge University Press, 1999.
[7]	Cox. R. G. Thomas Hardy: The Critical Heritage. London and New York: Routledge, 2003.
[8]	Hardy, Thomas. The Collected Letters of Thomas Hardy, Vol. 1. Eds. Richard Little Purdy and Michael Millgate. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978-88: 250.
[9]	Hardy, Thomas. Tess of the D’Urbervilles. New York: Oxford University Press, 1983: 4-5.
[10]	Guerin, W. L., Labor, E. et al. A Handbook of Critical Approaches to Literature, 4^th ed. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Researching Press, 2004: 340-341.
[11]	Smith. Merril D, ed. Encyclopedia of Rape. Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 2004: 218-219.
[12]	Gurman, Elissa. “Sex, Consent, and the Unconscious Female Body: Reading Tess of the D’Urbervilles Alongside the Trial of Brock Allen Turner.” Law & Literature 30. 1 (2020): 155-170.
[13]	“Evangelist.” .
[14]	Bloesch, Donald G. Essentials of Evangelical Theology, Volume 1: God, Authority and Salvation. San Francisco: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1978: 7.
[15]	Eagleton, Terry. Literary Theory: An Introduction. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, 2004: 115-116.

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Tianyu Xu. (2020). The Deconstructed Angels in Tess of the D’Urbervilles. English Language, Literature & Culture, 5(3), 79-83. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11

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Tianyu Xu. The Deconstructed Angels in Tess of the D’Urbervilles. Engl. Lang. Lit. Cult. 2020, 5(3), 79-83. doi: 10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11

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Tianyu Xu. The Deconstructed Angels in Tess of the D’Urbervilles. Engl Lang Lit Cult. 2020;5(3):79-83. doi: 10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11

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@article{10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11,
  author = {Tianyu Xu},
  title = {The Deconstructed Angels in Tess of the D’Urbervilles},
  journal = {English Language, Literature & Culture},
  volume = {5},
  number = {3},
  pages = {79-83},
  doi = {10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11},
  eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ellc.20200503.11},
  abstract = {The nineteenth-century is an age when traditional social expectations for a truly pure and angelic woman pervade the Western world. In Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles (1891), two main characters apparently bear unignorable relevance to the term “angel” or its connotation: Angel Clare, whose Christian name alone suggests the subtle artistic design of the author, and Tess, who is overtly defined by the author in the subtitle of the novel as “a pure woman”. The controversial verdict on Tess lead readers to reflect upon the life experiences of the “angelically pure” Tess again in terms of what she does instead of what she is already assumed to be, thus revealing her loyalty, forbearance and nobility of her struggle against fate. Appearing both as an intruder into the Wessex country life and reforming destructionist of the dogma of the church, the other “angel”, Angel Clare deconstructs what his father Reverend Mr. Clare of Emminster holds as absolute truth. His self-deconstruction along the way blurs the simple dichotomy of what is pure and moral, and furthermore, help him finally recognize the disadvantaged female. Prominently, these two “angels” are deconstructed against the incorrigible connotation and the Zeitgeist of their time, showing Thomas Hardy’s possible awareness of the necessity of breaking the stereotypic angelical image as well as wielding the inestimable power of literature to propel changes.},
 year = {2020}
}

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TY  - JOUR
T1  - The Deconstructed Angels in Tess of the D’Urbervilles
AU  - Tianyu Xu
Y1  - 2020/08/10
PY  - 2020
N1  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11
DO  - 10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11
T2  - English Language, Literature & Culture
JF  - English Language, Literature & Culture
JO  - English Language, Literature & Culture
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EP  - 83
PB  - Science Publishing Group
SN  - 2575-2413
UR  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11
AB  - The nineteenth-century is an age when traditional social expectations for a truly pure and angelic woman pervade the Western world. In Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles (1891), two main characters apparently bear unignorable relevance to the term “angel” or its connotation: Angel Clare, whose Christian name alone suggests the subtle artistic design of the author, and Tess, who is overtly defined by the author in the subtitle of the novel as “a pure woman”. The controversial verdict on Tess lead readers to reflect upon the life experiences of the “angelically pure” Tess again in terms of what she does instead of what she is already assumed to be, thus revealing her loyalty, forbearance and nobility of her struggle against fate. Appearing both as an intruder into the Wessex country life and reforming destructionist of the dogma of the church, the other “angel”, Angel Clare deconstructs what his father Reverend Mr. Clare of Emminster holds as absolute truth. His self-deconstruction along the way blurs the simple dichotomy of what is pure and moral, and furthermore, help him finally recognize the disadvantaged female. Prominently, these two “angels” are deconstructed against the incorrigible connotation and the Zeitgeist of their time, showing Thomas Hardy’s possible awareness of the necessity of breaking the stereotypic angelical image as well as wielding the inestimable power of literature to propel changes.
VL  - 5
IS  - 3
ER  -

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Author Information

Tianyu Xu

Department of Foreign Languages, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

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Plain Text BibTeX RIS

APA Style

Tianyu Xu. (2020). The Deconstructed Angels in Tess of the D’Urbervilles. English Language, Literature & Culture, 5(3), 79-83. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11

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ACS Style

Tianyu Xu. The Deconstructed Angels in Tess of the D’Urbervilles. Engl. Lang. Lit. Cult. 2020, 5(3), 79-83. doi: 10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11

Copy | Download

AMA Style

Tianyu Xu. The Deconstructed Angels in Tess of the D’Urbervilles. Engl Lang Lit Cult. 2020;5(3):79-83. doi: 10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11

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@article{10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11,
  author = {Tianyu Xu},
  title = {The Deconstructed Angels in Tess of the D’Urbervilles},
  journal = {English Language, Literature & Culture},
  volume = {5},
  number = {3},
  pages = {79-83},
  doi = {10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11},
  eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ellc.20200503.11},
  abstract = {The nineteenth-century is an age when traditional social expectations for a truly pure and angelic woman pervade the Western world. In Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles (1891), two main characters apparently bear unignorable relevance to the term “angel” or its connotation: Angel Clare, whose Christian name alone suggests the subtle artistic design of the author, and Tess, who is overtly defined by the author in the subtitle of the novel as “a pure woman”. The controversial verdict on Tess lead readers to reflect upon the life experiences of the “angelically pure” Tess again in terms of what she does instead of what she is already assumed to be, thus revealing her loyalty, forbearance and nobility of her struggle against fate. Appearing both as an intruder into the Wessex country life and reforming destructionist of the dogma of the church, the other “angel”, Angel Clare deconstructs what his father Reverend Mr. Clare of Emminster holds as absolute truth. His self-deconstruction along the way blurs the simple dichotomy of what is pure and moral, and furthermore, help him finally recognize the disadvantaged female. Prominently, these two “angels” are deconstructed against the incorrigible connotation and the Zeitgeist of their time, showing Thomas Hardy’s possible awareness of the necessity of breaking the stereotypic angelical image as well as wielding the inestimable power of literature to propel changes.},
 year = {2020}
}

Copy | Download

TY  - JOUR
T1  - The Deconstructed Angels in Tess of the D’Urbervilles
AU  - Tianyu Xu
Y1  - 2020/08/10
PY  - 2020
N1  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11
DO  - 10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11
T2  - English Language, Literature & Culture
JF  - English Language, Literature & Culture
JO  - English Language, Literature & Culture
SP  - 79
EP  - 83
PB  - Science Publishing Group
SN  - 2575-2413
UR  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ellc.20200503.11
AB  - The nineteenth-century is an age when traditional social expectations for a truly pure and angelic woman pervade the Western world. In Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles (1891), two main characters apparently bear unignorable relevance to the term “angel” or its connotation: Angel Clare, whose Christian name alone suggests the subtle artistic design of the author, and Tess, who is overtly defined by the author in the subtitle of the novel as “a pure woman”. The controversial verdict on Tess lead readers to reflect upon the life experiences of the “angelically pure” Tess again in terms of what she does instead of what she is already assumed to be, thus revealing her loyalty, forbearance and nobility of her struggle against fate. Appearing both as an intruder into the Wessex country life and reforming destructionist of the dogma of the church, the other “angel”, Angel Clare deconstructs what his father Reverend Mr. Clare of Emminster holds as absolute truth. His self-deconstruction along the way blurs the simple dichotomy of what is pure and moral, and furthermore, help him finally recognize the disadvantaged female. Prominently, these two “angels” are deconstructed against the incorrigible connotation and the Zeitgeist of their time, showing Thomas Hardy’s possible awareness of the necessity of breaking the stereotypic angelical image as well as wielding the inestimable power of literature to propel changes.
VL  - 5
IS  - 3
ER  -

Copy | Download