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jenn756 's review for:
Jude the Obscure
by Thomas Hardy
I knew before I started reading a Hardy novel it would be depressing, as they are all depressing. I prefer my novels to have trials and tribulation along the way, but everything nice and happy at the end. But oh no, Thomas Hardy didn’t think like that. He prefers to pile misery on misery in an unremitting orgy of unhappiness. No butterflies and fluffy kittens here obviously.
So you must gird your loins before you start and think things might not work out altogether well for poor Jude. He dreams of being a student in a far-away Christminster, but is thwarted by his social class and own impractical nature. He meets Sue Bridehead, his cousin and an airhead if there ever was one, and falls in love, but that doesn’t work out too happily either…
I suppose I love Hardy most for his descriptions of the South Downs, there is a strong element of geography to Hardy’s novels. So you can follow Jude’s progress from Christminster (Oxford) to Melchester (Salisbury) to Aldbrickham (Reading). It proves that if Hardy was correct, the Victorians were much more mobile than you imagine. Albrickham is extraordinary – I mean, I know Reading a little and it is nothing like Aldbrickham now! A lot of southern England has irrevocably changed, so Hardy’s novels allow you to imagine for a little while a lost landscape. An indulgent pleasure and worth putting up with the misery.
So you must gird your loins before you start and think things might not work out altogether well for poor Jude. He dreams of being a student in a far-away Christminster, but is thwarted by his social class and own impractical nature. He meets Sue Bridehead, his cousin and an airhead if there ever was one, and falls in love, but that doesn’t work out too happily either…
I suppose I love Hardy most for his descriptions of the South Downs, there is a strong element of geography to Hardy’s novels. So you can follow Jude’s progress from Christminster (Oxford) to Melchester (Salisbury) to Aldbrickham (Reading). It proves that if Hardy was correct, the Victorians were much more mobile than you imagine. Albrickham is extraordinary – I mean, I know Reading a little and it is nothing like Aldbrickham now! A lot of southern England has irrevocably changed, so Hardy’s novels allow you to imagine for a little while a lost landscape. An indulgent pleasure and worth putting up with the misery.