Why this book

When Hardy published this in 1891, he dared to call his ruined heroine 'a pure woman.' Victorian readers were scandalized that a fallen girl could keep her innocence. The book became a thunderclap against a society that punished women for the cruelty of men.

The Story

It begins with a foolish gift of knowledge. A parson tells John Durbeyfield, a poor country peddler, that he descends from the noble d'Urbervilles, knights long forgotten. Drunk on the news, John dreams of grandeur, therefore he neglects the small trade that feeds his many children.

In that crowded cottage lives his eldest daughter, Tess: a beautiful dark-haired young Englishwoman, deep eyes, full mouth, plain country dress, quiet dignity. Beside her plays her gentle little sister, Liza-Lu, still a child. Tess shoulders the family's burdens, because her careless parents will not.

The family's only horse must carry their goods to market before dawn. Tess drives the cart, but exhaustion closes her eyes, and she sleeps. A speeding mail-coach strikes the horse dead in the dark road. Therefore Tess, drowning in guilt, believes she alone must repair the ruin.

Her mother has a scheme. She sends Tess to a rich family named d'Urberville nearby, hoping they are wealthy kin who will help. But the name was merely bought by a blind merchant's son. There Tess meets Alec d'Urberville, idle, handsome, and hungry-eyed.

Alec is a predator dressed as a gentleman. He gives Tess work tending the estate's fowls, feeds her strawberries from his own hand, and circles her with easy charm. Tess, dutiful and unworldly, cannot see the danger, because no one has taught her to fear a smiling man.

One night the farm women walk home through the dark, and a quarrel leaves Tess stranded. Alec offers his horse, but instead of carrying her home he rides into the deep fog of The Chase, an ancient forest. There, among the sleeping trees, he forces himself upon her.

Tess returns home no longer a girl. She refuses to blame her fate on anyone but herself, therefore she will take no penny of Alec's money. Silent and proud, she carries her shame back to the cottage where Liza-Lu and the little ones still play, innocent of grief.

Soon a child is born, sickly and small. The village would deny it a Christian burial, but Tess, fierce with love, baptizes the baby herself by candlelight and names him Sorrow. Within days the infant dies. Therefore Tess buries her son and her girlhood together.

Two years of silence pass, and slowly Tess's spirit lifts. She longs for a place where no one knows her story. Therefore she leaves home for a distant valley, to work as a milkmaid at Talbothays, a green and generous dairy far from every whisper of her past.

At Talbothays the world turns kind. Among the cows and the mist Tess meets Angel Clare: a thoughtful young man, a parson's son, learning to farm because he has rejected the pulpit for his own ideals. He is gentle, searching, and utterly unlike Alec.

Angel watches Tess across the dairy and sees in her something pure and elemental, a daughter of nature. Tess, in turn, loves him with her whole starved heart, but fear holds her back, because she believes her ruined past makes her unworthy of so good a man.

Angel asks Tess to marry him. She refuses again and again, though she loves him, therefore he presses harder, baffled by her tears. At last her longing overcomes her dread. She says yes, but vows privately that she must first confess the truth of Alec.

Tess writes her whole confession in a letter and slips it under Angel's door in the night. But by cruel chance the paper slides beneath the carpet, unseen. Therefore the wedding day arrives, and Angel marries her still believing her spotless.

On their wedding night, before the fire, Angel confesses his own past: a brief reckless affair in London. Tess, flooded with relief, forgives him instantly. Therefore, trusting his mercy, she tells him her matching story — how Alec d'Urberville took her innocence.

The room goes cold. Angel, who forgave himself the very same fault, cannot forgive Tess. His love was for an ideal, not a woman, and the ideal is shattered. He does not rage; he simply withdraws, and all his tenderness turns to stone.

Angel cannot bear to stay. He gives Tess some money, refuses to take her with him, and sails for Brazil to seek a farm and master his heart. Tess, too proud to beg, will not go to his wealthy family for help. Therefore she is left utterly alone.

To survive, Tess takes brutal winter work at a bleak upland farm called Flintcomb-Ash. She digs frozen turnips in freezing rain, saying nothing of her sorrow. Still she waits, faithful, certain her husband will one day soften and send for her across the sea.

One day a familiar voice stops Tess cold. It is Alec d'Urberville, now dressed as a ranting evangelist. He had been converted, remarkably, by the earnest sermons of Angel's own father, the Reverend Clare. His old wickedness now wears the borrowed mask of faith.

But the moment Alec sees Tess, his new religion burns away. His old desire roars back, therefore he casts off the preacher's cloak and begins to hunt her once more. He tells her Angel is gone forever, and that only he, Alec, will ever truly want her.

Alec pursues Tess without mercy, following her to the fields, pressing money and promises upon her. She resists, clinging to Angel, therefore Alec waits like a patient hawk for her strength to fail. And soon fate itself begins to break her down.

Then Tess's father suddenly dies. With him goes the family's right to their cottage, and they are turned out onto the road. Her mother and the children — Liza-Lu among them — face the winter homeless. Therefore Tess stands crushed between her love and her duty.

Alec seizes his moment. He offers to house and feed the whole family, to save Tess's mother and little Liza-Lu from ruin, if only Tess will come to him. Angel has sent no word in a year. Therefore, sick with despair, Tess surrenders and becomes Alec's mistress.

But Angel has changed. In Brazil, sickness and hardship taught him how cruelly he had judged his wife. His rigid ideal fell away, and only love remained. Therefore, thin and repentant, he sails home to find Tess and beg her forgiveness, carrying her name like a prayer.

Angel searches until he traces Tess to a seaside lodging house in a fashionable town. He finds her there dressed in fine clothes, kept by Alec. He is too late. Tess, seeing the husband she prayed for, is torn open by grief, for she believed he would never return.

Something in Tess breaks completely. Alec had sworn Angel would never come, and that lie had bought her surrender — now it stands exposed. Overwhelmed by rage and ruined love, she goes upstairs to where Alec lies, and in her anguish she drives a knife into his heart.

Tess runs into the street and catches Angel, confessing what she has done. He does not recoil; his love now forgives everything. Therefore the two flee together into the countryside, hiding in an empty mansion, stealing a few precious days of the happiness they were always denied.

In those quiet days Tess makes one last request of Angel. When she is gone, she says, he must marry her sister Liza-Lu — good and pure, and half of Tess herself. Angel, weeping, does not refuse. Therefore Tess entrusts her love to the sister she always shielded.

Fleeing still, they come by night to Stonehenge, the vast circle of ancient stones upon the open plain. Weary beyond fear, Tess lies down to sleep on a great altar-stone, at peace at last. But as dawn breaks, dark figures close silently around them.

The police have come. Tess wakes, and she does not run. She has known all along that her few days of love were only borrowed. Therefore she rises calmly, says she is ready, and lets them lead her away across the grey morning grass.

Tess is tried and condemned. On a summer morning Angel and young Liza-Lu climb a hill above the town and watch, hand in hand, as a black flag rises slowly over the distant prison. Its meaning is plain: Tess is dead. Justice, as men call it, is done.

What it means

Hardy asks a burning question: who was truly guilty? Tess sinned against nothing but the cruelty of others, yet a hypocritical world destroyed her while forgiving the men who ruined her. As Hardy wrote, 'the President of the Immortals had ended his sport with Tess' — an indifferent fate playing at cruelty.

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