Tess of the D'Urbervilles Quotes - Phase the Second (Maiden No More) Flashcards
A quote as Tess walks back home at the start of the phase, encountering the religious sign painter. The quote demonstrates Hardy’s criticism of the ecclesiastical Church for its blind accusations toward the society’s most vulnerable
“But the words entered Tess with accusatory horror. It was as if this man had known her recent history; yet he was a total stranger”
A quote describing the reaping machine using hellish imagery of the “cross” and of “liquid fire”. The quotation demonstrates Hardy’s criticism of industrialisation, the force being one of hellish destruction
“They formed the revolving Maltese cross of the reaping-machine… The paint with which they were smeared, intensified in hue by the sunlight, imparted to them a look of having been dipped in liquid fire”
A quote again suggesting the reaping machine to be a figure of evil akin to the devil. Animalistic imagery is used to describe the machine putting the natural world to death through a process of extreme violence. In the same way, Tess, a figure of the natural world, is put to death by the profiters of the industrial revolution, Alec D’Urberville
“Rabbits, hares, snakes, rats, mice, retreated inwards […] unaware of the ephemeral nature of the refuge and of the doom that awaited them later in the day when [… they would be] under the teeth of the unerring reaper, and they were every one put to death”
A quote from Tess’ depression after having given birth to Sorrow, suggesting nature to be indifferent toward her struggle. Also perhaps suggests that, while Tess has broken social laws, all natural laws remain intact
“Meanwhile the trees were just as green as before; the birds sang and the sun shone as clearly now as ever. The familiar surroundings had not darkened because of her grief, nor sickened because of her pain”
A quote from the baptism of Sorrow describing Tess’ thoughts of her unbaptised child in hell through horrific imagery of torture at the hands of the devil, demonstrating Hardy’s criticism of the ecclesiastical Church, thus creating pathos for Tess
“She thought of the child consigned to the nethermost corner of hell, as its double doom for lack of baptism and lack of legitimacy; saw the arch-fiend tossing it with his three-pronged fork”
Quotes from the baptism of Sorrow presenting Tess in a state of megalopsychia, above the judgement of the Church. She is greater morally than the God of the Christian Church who is ambivalent toward her distress. She takes on a regal stance as a great, divine being in her good nature
“Uttering it boldly and triumphantly in the stopt-diapason note which her voice acquires when her heart was in her speech”
“The ecstasy of faith almost apotheosized her; it set upon her face a glowing irradiation… while the miniature candle-flame inverted in her eye-pupils shone like a diamond”
A quote suggesting the Church to be a figure of unfair judgement and immorality, as Tess is forced to bury her “conjecturally damned” baby in an overgrown corner of “God’s allotment “ (irony) along with others of supposedly ill nature
“buried by lantern-light, at the cost of a shilling and a pint of beer to the sexton, in that shabby corner of God’s allotment where He lets the nettles grow, and where all unbaptised infants, notorious drunkards, suides, and others of the conjecturally damned are laid”
