The Pessimism of Thomas Hardy Towards Matrimony, Anglicanism, and Society

When Thomas Hardy's last and most daring work, Jude the Obscure, came out in 1895, it sparked a firestorm of criticism in Victorian England. In his depiction of marriage, Hardy takes a critical attitude that was not well received by many Victorian readers. The work was deemed very objectionable to Victorian morals and law by many reviewers. The novel's sexual frankness drew criticism from a number of commentators, including American writer and critic Harry Thurston Pick, who dubbed the book "Jude the Obscene" and lambasted it for "speculating in smut" and "purveying filth, nonsense, and damnation" (Norman v). Even more extreme was the action taken by the bishop of Wakefield, who tossed a copy of the book into the fireplace as a form of protest at the work's scathing critique of social and religious mores. It was "probably in his anguish at not being able to fire me," Hardy humorously lamented in a postscript he wrote in 1912. It is crucial to investigate the causes of the novel's critical reception back then. Hardy's social protests against class inequality, marriage and divorce, and women's subordination in society are all summed up in Jude the Obscure. As a serial narrative, it debuted in Harper's Magazine at the end of 1894 and ran in monthly installments for the next few years (Norman xxvii). The conservative audience of Harper was appalled by this work, which Hardy "abridged and amended" multiple times to fit their demands. Many others felt it was inappropriate for reading aloud in a domestic setting. The novel's heroines were criticized for their "sexual frankness," and Hardy was mocked and rejected not just by males but also by female authors after its release. This analysis of Jude the Obscure looks at the role of women in the holy institution of marriage in late nineteenth-century England. It is my contention that Jude the Obscure deals with feminist and women's concerns in contemporary society. The research will also examine the traditional religious and societal attitudes about women and sexuality. I'll explain why sexual and romantic relationships outside of marriage were taboo in Victorian culture and how it contributed to the perpetuation of unhappy to discussing Hardy's condemnation of marriage, I will analyze his central point in the book, which is that people "should be free" to marry and divorce if they so want. Conservative culture, which promotes the purity of marriage as a holy institution, reacted negatively to the idea that some marriages are undesirable. In an afterword he wrote in April of 1912, Hardy discusses the function of divorce as a solution for a troubled marriage. As he puts it:

Beyad, Maryam & Kaboli, Taraneh. (2019) Some of Hardy's characters had quite different ideas about marriage than the Victorian rural working class (Schoenfeld, "Dysfunctional Families in the Wessex Novels of Thomas Hardy," 25). Some individuals believed that being married was the right thing to do regardless of whether or not there was love, while others held that morality could only exist if there was love and equitable treatment of all people. And although some saw marriage as a sacrosanct institution from which neither partner could voluntarily resign, others saw divorce as a reasonable choice in the event that the marriage failed (Schoenfeld, "Dysfunctional Families in the Wessex Novels of Thomas Hardy"). Hardy uncovered the many circumstances that lead to couple selection. Despite marriage's significance in this culture, the reader learns that partners get into these relationships for a wide variety of reasons. One would wonder whether the goal of society was only compliance or actual progress. MahaQahatnSulaiman (2018) Studying Thomas Hardy's poetry in depth exposes the novel and uncommon Existentialist theories of the 19th century. Hardy's poetry, which combines Modern and Victorian themes, celebrates freedom from the constraints of material wealth and theological orthodoxy. According to Hardy, the battle for survival is the ultimate meaning of life, hence mutual aid among people is essential to their survival. Hardy's faith in God and the afterlife faded, but his belief in the moral teachings of the Christian church remained strong. In his poetry, this is communicated through a deep yearning to help man rise from obscurity to prominence, from mediocrity to greatness. This paper analyzes Hardy's poetry through Emphasis is placed on the women of Hardy's poetry because their enlightenment and sense of agency offer a moral framework that can promote human flourishing and global betterment.

Beyad, Maryam & Kaboli, Taraneh. (2016) Thomas Hardy's characters, like the general population of nineteenth-century England, have a wide range of theological perspectives because of the country's religious climate. Tensions arose as a result of the wide range of religious views, particularly between adherents to religious orthodoxy and others who sought to live their lives freely without being constrained by any one faith's norms. The theological conflict between belief and nonbelief and doubt about God's presence is explored in four of Thomas Hardy's books (Tess of the D'Urbervilles, Jude the Obscure, far from the Madding Crowd, and The Mayor of Casterbridge) chosen for this paper. Hardy emphasizes how the church and religious beliefs in general run counter to common sense and personal liberties. This study makes an effort to demonstrate how differences in religious belief have contributed to conflicts within religions and between religion and freedom of expression.

Thomas Hardy was born in Dorset, England, in 1840, making him the last author of the Victorian era. After his death in 1928, his second wife Florence

His father, Thomas, worked on construction sites, while his mother, Jemima, was a housekeeper. Hardy learned to read at the age of three because his mother took the time to teach him despite the fact that she and her family were destitute. A Biography Revisited, written by Michael Millgate in 2006, claims that Hardy's childhood had a significant effect on his later writing. The traditions of his family, the social and economic realities of his youth, his own experiences, and his studies all had an impact on him. Hanchard, his alcoholic grandpa, is a possible allegory in the novel The Mayor of Casterbridge. The strain of his parents' emotional conflict is also evident in Jude the Obscure, where he addresses the difficulty of maintaining a happy marriage. Therefore, it seems that both his own and his parents' failed marriages affected this work. Took his first elementary school steps in the little town of Back Hampton when he was eight years old. His mother Jemima pushed him to read throughout this time. Exactly one year later, he enrolled in a Protestant institution to further his education. He dropped out of school at the age of sixteen and went to work for the genial and intelligent architect John Hicks. But he also made an effort to study French and German and studied the great works of Greek and Latin while at work. His lack of formal education and propensity to focus only on rural life led his Victorian contemporaries to dismiss him as nothing more than a brilliant villager. At the age of twenty-one, he relocated to London to study architecture, where he finally found employment assisting Sir Arthur Bloomfield with the refurbishment of historic castles. When he was just 23, he won an award for his first published work, "How I Built Myself a House," which appeared in a scholarly publication. While working as an architect, he continued writing despite his lifelong sorrow at not having had a formal degree in literature. The Poor Man and the Lady was his first work, published in 1868. Author and literary legend George Meredith examined the manuscript before it was about to go to print and warned against its release due to the book's satirical portrayal of English aristocracy. This caused Hardy to give up on the notion of releasing his first work. However, he wrote Desperate Remedies in 1871; Under the Greenwood, a fiction, appeared the following year; and A Pair of Blue Eyes appeared the year after that. Hardy wed Emma Lavinia Gifford in 1874. Few details regarding his marriage to Emma are known, but it seems that she was a pompous lady who compelled Hardy to engage in social climbing. In addition, she forbade any contact between Hardy and his beloved sister Mary. He was also disappointed since he really wanted to have a family but was unable to. Hardy, on the other hand, consistently disagreed with the detractors who labeled him a pessimist: then I do not reject the designation. . . But my pessimism, if pessimism it be, does not involve the assumption that the world is going to the dogs, and that Ahriman is winning all along the line. On the contrary, my practical philosophy is distinctly meliorist. To understand what led to Hardy's pessimism, one must consider not only his character but also his upbringing, philosophical outlook, writing style, and analysis of setting, themes, plot, and characters. His culture sheds light on where cynicism has its roots in human nature. He lived during the time when the rural system was devastated by the Industrial Revolution, and the number of people living in rural areas fell as a result of the rise of the capitalist industrial civilization. And so it came to pass that Hardy experienced first bewilderment and then depression as a result of the shifts in social, political, and religious norms. Hardy supposedly read Schopenhauer between the years 1883 and 1912, Both Tess of the D'Urbervilles and The Dynasts were completed by Hardy in 1883, and both bear striking resemblance to Schopenhauer's blind, fatalistic, godless philosophy of the same name (called the "Immanent Will"). The following is how the poet The Dynast describes will; It works unconsciously, as heretofore,Eternal artistries in CircumstanceWhose patterns, wrought by rapt aesthetic rote,Seem in themselves Its single listless aim,And not their consequence.

Hardy was a young adult when he was introduced to views that made him doubt the legitimacy of some church rituals, most notably infant baptism. His cousin, Tryphena Sparks, whom he eventually began dating, was another person he met. A number of Hardy's female characters and themes were based on Tryphena. Gibson notes that early in his adult life, Hardy had frequent contact with his mentor, the architect John Hicks. Hardy's family's financial struggles prevented him from continuing his education above the eighth grade, thus he was forced to seek out an apprenticeship if he ever wanted to master a skill and support himself. Hardy credits John Hicks as a major turning point in his development as a writer. In spite of his profession as a builder, he was well-versed in the Holy Scriptures and the Classics of many languages. Hardy's first open discussions about his doubts about church rituals and rules were with Hicks. Hicks may not have known that the practice that Creighton claims Hardy not only questioned, but also could not provide an adequate explanation for (65). In his later work, Tess of the d‘Urbervilles, Hardy explored the topic of infant baptism. His protagonist, Tess, has an illegitimate child and seeks the Church's blessing and baptism for her child in this novel. The rector refuses to baptize the kid, so Tess tries to do it herself. There is a strong possibility that Hardy's portrayal of poor Tess and her desire to have her bastard child baptized and christened is a reflection of his and Hicks' philosophical discussions on the topic of infant baptism. Hardy may have intended for the scene of Tess baptizing her child to show the pathetic religious efforts of a young, uneducated mother. Bjork claims that around this period, Hardy studied Greek writers like Aeschylus and Sophocles, comparing and contrasting their teachings with his own observations of life and society. He also read the contemporary critical magazine The Saturday Review voraciously. It's possible that his excessive preoccupation with this magazine's hyper-critical posture led to his intense self-condemnation. Bjork explains that Hardy's "corrective skepticism" in his early works may be traced back to his "nearly weekly encounter over many years with the critique in The Saturday Review of Victorian social problems, hypocrisy, and sentimentality". Hardy's later writings are marked by a pessimistic and dismal outlook that began to emerge even in his early adulthood. He also encountered Tryphena Sparks, the inspiration for his female protagonists like Jude the Obscure's Sue Bridehead, in his early twenties. Hawkins theorizes that Hardy modeled Sue after his childhood sweetheart Tryphena Sparks Jude and Sue's romance was brief, but lovely, and this may have been a mirror of Hardy's connection with Tryphena, which was also fleeting. In the absence of any concrete evidence, their level of devotion may only be speculated upon. There is some speculation as to whether or not they were engaged based on entries Hardy made about her in his diaries, but no concrete proof. Hawkins theorizes that after the breakup with Tryphena, Hardy gave the ring he had given her to Emma, his first wife. Like Sue, who gave birth to Jude's children, Tryphena may have conceived Hardy's kid outside of wedlock. Whether or not these allegations are true, Hardy undoubtedly modeled at least some of Sue on his beloved cousin, with whom he had just a passing acquaintance. Miller claims that Hardy's marriage to his first wife, Tryphena, likewise broke down into estrangement due to the couple's inability to resolve their issues. Tryphena represented his idealistic, romantic side, while his first wife, Emma Lavinia Gifford, exemplified the harsh reality of marriage in the 19th century.

Obscure, you can see his outright disgust for the institution. Hardy was completely enchanted by his first wife, Emma Lavinia Gifford, but that feeling quickly faded. Gibson claims that Hardy met his future wife, Emma Lavinia Gifford, when he was undertaking restoration work on a church where her brother-in-law served as the rector. Upon first meeting, he found her appealing but she assumed he was much older than he seemed. Curiously, she also recalled the fact that a blue scrap of paper protruded from his pocket. It included the rough draft of a poem he was working on at the time. According to Gibson, Hardy's diary entries on his future wife's hair describe it as "corn colored‖. Later, he would utilize blonde hair on his female figures to represent attractiveness. For instance, in Far from the Madding Crowd, Sergeant Troy comments on how much he prefers Fanny's lighter hair over Bathsheba's darker hair. Contrary to popular belief, Troy's illegitimate kid was not fathered by his wife, but rather by Fanny, his girlfriend and the mother of his child. Perhaps even at the time he penned Far from the Madding Crowd, Hardy was unhappy with his wife. And by the time Hardy and Emma tied the knot, Gibson notes, far from the Madding Crowd had already been published serially. Hardy and his new bride were on their honeymoon when the book's section in which Sergeant Troy asserts that "all romances end in marriage" came out, which is ironic. Many of Hardy's letters of love to his wife have been preserved, but if his books are any indication of his genuine ideas and opinions, he may have come to regret being married.

As a child of the early Victorian era, Thomas Hardy had a unique perspective on the era's culture. Christian ethics and norms of appropriate sexual behavior were prominent at this time. As a result of Christianity's pervasive impact on how people saw women, the "women's question" made little to no headway. Women in the Victorian Christian worldview were seen as "standard-bearers of morality" and were expected to prioritize their biological responsibilities as mothers and spouses. Disparities in treatment of men and women existed. According to the Victorian binary model of sexuality, there are two categories of women: the Madonna and the whore. Women were expected to maintain their virginity until marriage, since this was seen as essential to their social standing and was valued by their prospective husbands. The social standing one now occupied was linked to their sense of identity. To get married was just what young men and women did. Many brides engaged into marriage at tender ages in the hopes of moving up in the social strata or finding financial stability with a rich spouse. Marriage in Victorian times was seen

of subservience on the part of wives led to unequal treatment of husbands and wives in society and the home. The moment a woman tied the knot, she became subject to her husband's authority, since he was the only heir to the family's wealth. A major societal shift was really taking place at the time. In The Subjection of Women, Mill discussed the issue of women's subordination and proposed a solution based on gender parity. Some of Mill's feminist beliefs started to gain traction among writers. Hardy addressed Mill's concerns about marriage and individual freedom in Jude the Obscure. He came to appreciate the nuance of the female experience and offered his female characters greater room to reflect on their social context, particularly in the context of marriage. To Hardy, marriage was a tyrannical institution that should be abolished. Hardy "just rejected what was unnatural in the norms of forced partnerships and suppression of intrinsic desire," indicating that he did not condemn marriage as a concept. The legalized contract of marriage was harmful to both parties, but especially to women. Unhappiness between a couple would no longer be grounds for a divorce. They remained together after being compelled to endure the harsh conditions of their marriage. Contrary to popular belief, Jude the Obscure does not believe that marriage provides women with more safety and protection. Sue and Arabella both embody the newfound intellectual and sexual freedom that reformers like Mill used literature to promote. Their rejection of conventional marriage is reflected in their forward-thinking perspectives on love and the sarcastic remarks they make about the institution. Hardy was cognizant of the progress women had made in the workplace and in public life. In two distinct ways, he expressed a significant critique of marriage as it was practiced in the nineteenth century. The objectification of women inside marriage was the first thing he took exception to his saying. In response to Mill's master-slave model, Hardy argued that it degraded women to the position of an object. His stance on the sexual role of women in marriage was unequivocal: none. The marriages of Sue and Philipson and Jude and Arabella are examples of this. In contrast, by supporting Jude and Sue's free union, he cast doubt on the trustworthiness and legality of the marriage contract, which sustained unhappy couples for life rather than any expression of love outside of Victorian matrimony. All of the novel's protagonists have had unhappy marriages and are looking for methods to rediscover love and companionship outside of the traditional framework of marriage until they discover it may be found through cohabitation.

had their roots in his unhappy upbringing. Both of these ideas can be found in Tess of the d'Urbervilles, the novel in which his gloomy outlook first becomes clear. In several of his works, Hardy's faith in an "Imminent Will" becomes concrete. According to Bates, he came to believe that human life was directed by some external Force, but that this Force was cruel and unjust. Additionally, Bates explains how Hardy came to see Nature as a motivating force driven by an uncaring God, and how this, in turn, led to his conclusion that human misery is the result of an innately unjust and hostile environment. His works are evidence of this conviction, but more crucially, they developed as a result of his profound personal tragedy. The use of despair in Hardy's literature is not restricted to suicidal or dismal themes. His pessimism was meant to be a quest for knowledge and an investigation into the nature of things. Brown claims that while Hardy believed the universe to be hostile, he was also curious as to why this was so and how the natural world was structured. Despite his negative outlook, his interest in nature and transcendence is extraordinary. Hardy makes it plain, however, that Tess is not a bold woman; she is innocent and unblemished, illustrating the novel's obvious, but occasionally misinterpreted theme: the nature of purity. Hardy wrote the following on May 17, 1892, in a letter sent to Roden Noel, As if it mattered a straw whether I have, or have not, put too liberal a construction on the word ―pure.‖ Reading over the story after is was finished, the conviction was thrust upon me, without any straining or wish for it on my own part – rather, indeed, with some surprise – that the heroine was essentially pure – purer than many a so-called unsullied virgin: therefore I called her so. Hardy's goal in creating this work was to dispel the common belief that virginity and moral rectitude are always and everywhere identical. Gibson claims that the novel's subtitle, A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented by Thomas Hardy, is evidence of his advocacy of this new notion of purity. Hardy reportedly intended Tess of the d'Urbervilles to "demolish the doll of English literature," as described by Tomalin. To do this, Hardy aimed to portray Tess in a sympathetic light, demonstrating that she was a woman whose spirit was destroyed not by her own deeds but by the way in which society saw her. Though the moment in which Tess is raped isn't very explicit, it can't be mistaken for an act of her own sexual will. Hardy maintains that Tess is not automatically unclean after losing her virginity. Purity, he argues, is not limited by space and time

In his later years, Hardy's pessimism was solidified by the divorce from his wife and the terrible reception of his final two books, Tess of the d‘Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure, due to their major anti-religious and anti-marriage themes. Gibson claims that Hardy's marriage to Emma had already begun to deteriorate and become sour by the time Tess of the d'Urbervilles was published, circulated, and began to acquire recognition. According to Gibson, Emma's beauty faded as she got older, and by the time she was in her forties, she was considered ugly. Also, they were childless. After several years of marriage with no progeny, it was clear that the Hardys would not be having children, however it is unknown if this was due to infertility on either of their parts or whether one or both of them had purposefully avoided sex. In addition, as Emma aged, her faith deepened, maybe as a coping technique, whereas Hardy's agnosticism grew. A prescription for marital strife, according to Gibson, who claims that disagreements over religious doctrine led to a separation between the couple. While Emma often voiced her dissatisfaction with her husband in public, Hardy remained devoted to his wife in word, never criticizing her in front of others. Instead, he portrayed her in his writings or looked elsewhere for love. According to Gibson, when Hardy was writing Tess of the d'Urbervilles, he met and started writing to a Mrs. Arthur Henniker. She was stunning, especially in contrast to his overweight, elderly wife. The fact that she was a writer just added to her attractiveness in Hardy's eyes. Naturally, a letter exchange ensued, and for the next six months, they discussed book and poetry techniques and shared advice. After the six months, Hardy scheduled a meeting with her in person to strengthen the relationship that had developed between them. He had gone into the meeting with all the optimism and anticipation of a guy who aspires to romance, but was left devastated by her cold rejection of him as a lover, as was the case with everything in Hardy's life. She never wished for any romantic tension or attraction to develop between them, seeing simply the friendship in their connection. They were both married at the time, but Hardy's heartbreak only made him a better writer. According to Gibson, Sue Bridehead was heavily influenced by Mrs. Florence Henniker. Some aspects of Florence, Tryphena Sparks, and even Hardy's sister, who taught school for a while, may be seen in her. Using his own marital missteps as inspiration, Hardy creates a symbol for the fleeting nature and eventual impossibility of real companionate connection.

What made Thomas Hardy becoming a writer was his life experiences. His conception was the consequence University and instead became an apprentice to an architect. The intellectual discourse concerning religion, the contemporary Church, and Darwin that took place during Hardy's apprenticeship planted the seeds of doubt in God and discontent with established religion. Hardy's dislike for the Church and, in particular, the institution of marriage was solidified by his poor encounters with women. Despite the fact that both sexes suffer from marriage's harmful effects, women suffer more since they were not afforded the same legal protections that men were.Hardy's female characters are the most effective voices for his opposition to the legal terms of this institution. although SueDespite the fact that and Arabella have quite different personalities, conventional marriage depends on them both.Thomas Hardy's growing distaste for marriage stemmed from his experiences with his cousin Tryphena Sparks, Mrs. Arthur Henniker, and his first wife, Emma Lavinia Gifford. Hardy used his writing as an outlet for his cynicism and despair about life. While Far from the Madding Crowd is the most upbeat of his three published works, it nonetheless shows signs of the author's ambivalence over marriage. Compared to the somewhat optimistic tone of Far from the Madding Crowd, Hardy's later works, Tess of the d'Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure, take a much darker turn. Hardy's writings, on the other hand, feature a dark and utterly negative view toward the Church and the union of marriage, reflecting the difficulties and grief he experienced. Hardy had a lot of hardships before he could call himself a pessimist. His daily life was filled of great sadness and misery, and this is reflected in his writing style and the issues he chose to write about.

1. Beyad, Maryam &Kaboli, Taraneh. (2019). Multiplicity of Ideas Concerning the Concept of Marriage in Thomas Hardy ‗s Jude the Obscure. International Academic Journal of Humanities. 06. 148-175. 10.9756/IAJH/V6I1/1910016. 2. MahaQahatnSulaiman (2018),‖ Woman‘s Self-Realisation in the Poetry of Thomas Hardy,‖ English Language and Literature Studies; Vol. 8, No. 4; 2018 ISSN 1925-4768 E-ISSN 1925-4776 Published by Canadian Center of Science and Education 3. N.S., Saleh & Abbasi, Pyeaam. (2016). The Ideological Questions of Marriage in Thomas Hardy‘s Jude the Obscure. k ta. 17. 10.9744/kata.17.2.49-57. 4. Beyad, Maryam &Kaboli, Taraneh. (2016). Shifting Nineteenth Century Views on

5. Franey, Laura E. ――Chartered Robbery‖: Mobility, Somatic terror, and the Critique of Marriage in Select Hardy Novels.‖ Victorians Institute Journal 41 (2013): 155-184. Libris. Web. 9 Oct. 2018. 6. rost, Ginger S. Living in Sin: Cohabiting as Husband and Wife in the Nineteenth-century England. Manchester UP, 2013. ProQuest Ebook Central. Web. 17 Oct. 2018. 7. Ghasemi, Parvin, and Keshavarz Masood. ―Consolidation of the Victorian Marriage Tradition in Hardy‘s Jude the Obscure.‖ Epiphany 5.1. (2012): 109-119. Libris. Web. 3 Sep. 2018. 8. Liqing, Fang, and Weiqing, Jiang. ―Thomas Hardy‘s Feminist Consciousness in Jude The Obscure.‖ 10.4 (2015): 89-93. CsCanada. Web. 15 Oct. 2018. 9. Mays, Christine. ―The doomed Union: Thomas Hardy‘s Pessimism Toward Marriage, Anglicanism, and Society.‖ MS Thesis. Liberty U, 2012. 10. Salman Saleh, N, Abbasi P. ―Ideological Questions of Marriage in Thomas Hardy‘s Jude the Obscure.‖ 17.2. (2015): 49-57. K@ta. Web. 5 Sep. 2018.

Department of English, Bhagwant University Siker Road, Ajmer, Rajasthan E-mail: adikmanisha@gmail.com