TESS OF THE D'UBERVILLES by Thomas Hardy

This was the featured selection for my Classic Book Club and the meeting was on Monday, 5/21/12

............. This is a rather depressing and bleak tale of a poor country girl who was beguiled by the notion that she might be of 'royal blood', and then she is raped, and her reputation and her life are irrevocably damaged. Tess never had a chance and never catches a break, and although she is beautiful, this also seems to work against her. I thought that the novel had a 'fevered melodramatic' quality, and really didn't translate well to modern readers. The story is set in Southwester England of the 1880's. I found the prose rather lackluster, and for all the 'over-the-top' situations, the novel just seemed to plod along. Overall, I think this novel is more trouble than it's worth.
............... Tess Durbeyfield- John and Joan are her parents. Alec d'Uberville- the rakish libertine who rapes Tess, and she later murders him Sorrow- the name of her child who she babtizes, and then dies. Angel Clare- 'Farmer In Training' who loves Tess until he learns that she is a 'fallen woman'. He has two brothers who are college educated, and have joined the church. His father is also a churchman, and will only sent Angel to college if he continues in the clergy. STONEHENGE- After the murder, Angel and Tess flee, and this is where she is captured. A black flag signals that Tess has been hanged, and Angel leaves with Liza-Lu who was Tess's younger sister.