1.what is Wessex? How Thomas Hardy used Wessex in his novels?

Wessex

A region and ancient Anglo-Saxon kingdom of southern England. Founded by the descendants
of Saxons who settled in Britain in the fifth century, Wessex became part of the unified kingdom of
England in the tenth century.

Thomas Hardy most famous English poet and novelist whose works are full of Wessex.
Most of his fictional works are set in the semi-fictional region of Wessex (based on the medieval
Anglo-Saxon kingdom) comprising the counties of Dorset, Wiltshire, Somerset, Devon, Hampshire and
much of Berkshire, in southwest and south central England. They explore tragic characters struggling
against their passions and social circumstances in a world suggested to be ruled by Fate or Chance,
characters who sometimes find temporary salvation in the age-old rhythms of rural life and who can
achieve dignity through endurance, and heroism through simple strength of character.

Wessex in his novels

Far from the Madding Crowd in this novel Hardy first used the term Wessex as the name for the
section of southern England in which he set his work. it corresponds mainly to his native Dorset. In
this novel he tells the story of the love of Gabriel Oak for Bathsheba Everdene, who eventually
marries him after a disastrous marriage to Troy.

The Return of the Native is a tragic love story, like almost all his fiction, and it is
extremely simple in plot.

The Mayor of Casterbridge In this novel Hardy reflect the new spirit of science and
industry. Casterbridge, however, is not like many manufacturing towns that were springing up. It
maintains an intimaterelationship with the surrounding countryside. It tells the story of Henchard, a
man who attempts to scape his past and whose past actions come back to destroy him. Hardy rejects
the convention that good qualities will lead to prosperity and bad ones to ruin. Character is fate, but
not in the Christian sense that people "get what they deserve".

Tess of the d´Urbervilles In the Preface he wrote: "a novel is an impression, not an
argument". An intense study of human nature, personal emotions, and the meaning of man´s
existence. It tells the story of a country girl whose parents discover that they are related to a noble
family. She is seduced by one of the members of this family, Alec d´Urbervilles, and has an illegitimate
child who dies. Tess eventually finds work as a dairymaid in a peaceful and rural setting but continous
to be haunted by her past. She falls in love with Angel Clare and marries him without confessing her
past. When he learns the truth he deserts her and she ends up living with Alec again. He told her that
Angel would never take her back again, but when Tess discovers that he lied to her, she kills him. She
is briefly reunited with Angel but justice must be done and she is hanged. In a way, the tragedy of
Tess, "a pure woman" (subtitled added by Hardy at the last moment), is also the story of "pure"
Wessex from which she comes. Both are corrupted and betrayed by the modern world.
 Jude the Obscure is Hardy´s last novel. It tells the story of a country boy who leaves his
village and goes to Christminster hoping to study at the University. He has married a coarse, sensual
girl who leaves him and goes to Australia. Jude falls in love with his intellectual cousin Sue Bridehead.
She brings up his son with Arabella and they have children themselves. Arabella´s son finally hangs his
stepbrother and stepsister, leaving a laconic note: "Done because we are too menny". In the end Jude
kills himself by walking in bad weather. Jude´s tragedy lies in that he is not an ordinary man. What
brings him down are his intellectual ambitions; he is trapped between the physical and the
intellectual, between social propriety and the unconventional, between one class and another,
between religious belief and freethinking, between the old world and the new.

Hardy´s Wessex

Higher Bockhamton lies three miles east of Dorchester, the country town of Dorset. At
the end of a narrow lane, known as Cherry Alley, stands Hardy´s Cottage. In the autumn of 1873,
Thomas Hardy was living here with his parents, helping with the cider-making and immersed in
writing Far From The Madding Crowd. In the novel, cottages such as this, ´long low cottage´, with a
´hipped roof of thatch´, tucked between ´a heath and a wood`, punctuate the ´Weatherbury`
landscape inspired by scenes familiar to him from chilhood. Hardy continually drew on the Dorset
countryside, his family and neighbours in writing the book. Almost every scene or setting was based
on personal experience -incidents of local life recollected and recounted to him by his mother,or on
his own close observation of nature and people during this period.This ´partly real, partly dream-
country` covered an area larger than that of the country of Dorset and as Hardy suggests, was closer
to ancient Wessex (the kingdom of the West Saxons) because it contained six counties: Berkshire
("North Wessex"), Hampshire ("Upper Wessex"), Wiltshire ("Mid-Wessex"), Dorset("South Wessex")
and Devon ("Lower Wessex"). Cornwall is adjacent and is referred to as "Off Wessex".Hardy was
unique in applying his own system of place names to a fictional area based in fact. He did so
comprehensively. To help readers identify the real place names he had disguised, Hardy produced a
map of Wessex complete with ´county` boundaries, natural features, coastal resorts, towns, villages
and hamlets. It´s evident that his Wessex took a shape and form that extended the boundaries of his
real world.Once created, the fictional name for a real place in one book was usually carried over to
another.The ´Weatherbury`in Far From The Madding Crowd appears throughout the Wessex novels as
the name of Puddletown, or Piddletown as it was called before the reign of Queen Victoria.
Dorchester, the heart of Wessex is refered to as ´Casterbridge`. Dorset´s scenic coastline features in
many of his novels. His fictional place names echo now-forgotten folklore elements.The ancient
monuments loom large in Hardy´s novels. The landscape bore all the signs of a history streching back
to pagan times. Stonehenge remains as a monument to it, and appears as a potent symbol in Tess of
the D´Urbervilles.

Despite being an imagined world, the Wessex novels contain descriptions of life in the region which
are completely authentic. During Hardy´s childhood Dorset in particular had remained relatively
remote and old-fashioned. The railway only reached Dorchester in 1847, when Hardy was seven. His
earliest memories were of ´men in the stocks, corn-law agitations, mail coaches road-waggons, tinder-
boxes and candle-snuffing`. Condemned, for the most part, to a life of poverty and squalor, the farm
labourers of Dorset -among whom Hardy could count close cousins and uncles- were the worst paid
and worst housed in the country. To maintained a reasonable family income, the women and children
also sought work on the land. So, though picturesque, his settings were not sentimentalized, real
hardship and poverty were to evident during the agricultural depression.

2. Social and political issues reflected in Thomas Hardy´s novels

Hardy's novels address a number of social issues of the time. Class is most
prevalent, with characters regularly suffering due to the financial and social restrictions of their
specific class. This is most apparent in the "fallen woman" archetypes that are regularly featured.

The "wheel of fortune" is another recurring tragic feature. Characters will often transition
from a low social position to a higher one, or vice versa. This is often catalysed by the introduction of
an "outsider", who will appear towards the beginning of the story and upset the established social
order. This social and technological transition reflects the great changes brought about by the
Industrial revolution. Also, there are the themes of religion. Though a practising Anglican, Hardy
would often question his faith and the church through his novels and poetry. He would often portray
representatives of religious institutions negatively, portrayed as dogmatic, callous, and at odds with
the kinder, meek faith of the protagonists. This caused some degree of controversy for the time, with
religious figures condemning their negative portrayal, as well as Hardy's attempts to portray "fallen
women" in a sympathetic light. Finally, Hardy was an animal lover, and many of his poems focussed
on his beloved cats

As in many of his other works, Thomas Hardy used Tess of the d'Urbervilles as a vessel for
his criticisms of English Victorian society of the late 19th century. The novel's largest critique is aimed
at the sexual double standard, with all the extremities and misfortunes of Tess's life highlighting the
unfairness of her treatment. Society condemns her as an unclean woman because she was raped,
while Angel's premarital affair is barely mentioned. Angel himself rejects Tess largely based on what
his community and family would think if they discovered her past. Hardy saw many of the conventions
of the Victorian age as oppressive to the individual, and to women in particular, and in Tess's case the
arbitrary rules of society.There is also a satirical thread running through the novel's social
commentary. The emphasis on ancient names is played to absurdity with John Durbeyfield's sudden
pretensions upon learning of his ancestry, and the newly rich Stoke family adding “d'Urberville” to
their name just to seem more magnificent.

Contemporary social reality's reflection in The Mayor of Casterbridge is one of the

most important aspects. The social condition of 1970's together with the male dominated society is
one of the most striking aspects of the novel.It was thought that it is the husband's duty to feed their
family. Why Susan Henchard couldn't protest against Michel Henchard's decision of selling like as an
animal is very symbolic aspect to draw the picture of the actual social condition of contemporary
social reality. The whole events of the novel are in the position of contemporary social realism. By
social realism we mean social nature of reality. In other words, social realism means the position,
nature and structure of society. Hardy represents the social reality of a country named Wessex during
the 19th century.One of the most striking aspects of social realism in The Mayor of Casterbridge is the
condition of women in contemporary societyAnother important social reality pictured in the novel is
the depiction of the agro based economy of contemporary society. The means of earning money have
been pictured by the agriculture. The economic downfall of Henchard is depended up on the progress
of agriculture throughout the novel. In the same way the influence of modernization in contemporary
society is another important aspect of the depiction of social realism in the society.

Considered a Victorian realist, Hardy examines the social constraints on the lives of those
living in Victorian England, and criticises those beliefs, especially those relating to marriage, education
and religion, that limited people's lives and caused unhappiness.

In Two on a Tower, for example, Hardy takes a stand against these rules of society with a story
of love that crosses the boundaries of class. The reader is forced to reconsider the conventions set up
by society for the relationships between women and men. Nineteenth-century society had
conventions, which were enforced. In this novel Swithin St Cleeve's idealism pits him against such
contemporary social constraints.

Name: Mohsin iqbal

Roll no: 10225

submitted to: mam uzma naqvi

subject: Victorian novel