Tess As A Pure Woman

Tess who is a copulated girl, bearer of an illegitimate child, religious skeptic and murderer for the society, is given the title of pure woman by Hardy because she never loses her purity because her natural very own being and intentions with she carries out her actions never change in her life despite all the sufferings she experiences.

First event which defiles her purity in the eye of the society is her sexual intercourse which Hardy explains as “Why it was that upon this feminine tissue, sensitive as gossamer, and practically blank as snow as yet, there should have been traced such a coarse pattern as it was doomed to receive; why so often the coarse appropriates the finer thus, the wrong man the woman, the wrong woman the man, many thousand years of analytical philosophy have failed to explain to our sense of order.

One may, indeed, admit the possibility of a retribution lurking in the present catastrophe. Doubtless some of Tess d’Urberville’s mailed ancestors rollicking home from a fray had dealt the same measure even more ruthlessly towards peasant girls of their time.

But though to visit the sins of the fathers upon the children may be a morality good enough for divinities, it is scorned by average human nature; and it therefore does not mend the matter.” (Hardy, 65)

Pure Woman

As Hardy’s catastrophic narration shows Tess despite all of her efforts to prevent from malicious intentions of Alec, experiences the punishment of fate as her people explain “It was to be” (65).

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After the incident, she is an outcast for the society because of an incident that she did not have the control over. Despite all the pressure from the environment, she never accedes to change her pure nature. Her mother says “Any woman but you would have got him to marry thee”(67). Even she has the chance to reach the fortune of Alec and get loose from the pressure of the society, she does not accede to change. Instead she selects to endure the hard conditions and live in her natural way by refusing the society’s solemn pressures, she baptizes his own child for saving him, works as a dairywoman for helping her family and refuses to abandon her hope and nature’s way.

The second time which she is marked as impure by society comes with the marriage when Angel finds out Tess’ unfortunate past. Tess who tries for longtime to stay away from Angel, who finds her a pure natural beauty and perfect creature because of Tess’ pure intentions and spirit, accepts to marry him but she still thinks of him too. Tess risks her own happiness again to tell him the story but despite her pure intentions, the fate again drives her into a painful path. The letter she writes never reaches Angel. When Angel acts in a hypocrite way by judging her because of the deeds instead of intentions, she again does not think selfishly. Hardy comments as “if Tess had been artful, had she made a scene, fainted, wept hysterically…he would probably not have withstood her” (199) to show her artless and sacrificing nature. She sacrifices her happiness for the truth and later honor of Angel. Later in their separation period, Tess selects to endure hardships and she never demands money from him. Not until she is pushed to the limits of danger that Alec creates, she wants help from Angel.

The third time “The President of Immortals” draws a malicious plan for her to suffer as much as she is pure. She again is encountered by the seduction of Alec when she only gives up her resistance for the sake of her mother and her siblings. When she kills Alec for running away with Angel, she shows her reaction to the amount she suffered because of her purity. Later she sacrifices herself at an altar where ancient people sacrificed the other pure creatures for their “President of Immortals”. Her resistance to the pressure of malignant faith ends once more with her pure intentions of making her sister and husband happy after her death.

Tess was a sinner for the society and she is killed as a murderer but her fight against the fate with her pure intentions makes her the pure woman. She does not give up on doing the righteous things in her nature but the consequences of the deeds always turn out painful for her.