Review: The Woodlanders

The Woodlanders by Thomas Hardy
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The late 19th Century teemed with Hardy’s words. He wrote heaps and it is all good. This book, The Woodlanders, was his own personal favorite.

Set in an isolated, slightly backward village known as Little Hintock, it tells the story of a bright young woman and her always "too little, too late love life", which seemed destined for tragedy due to a serious problem with timing.

This quote really sums up the infernal, ever-present puzzle in this book: “Such miserable creatures of circumstance are we all.”

Grace Melbury is the objet de désir throughout. She was sent away to boarding school because her father wanted her to rise above her circumstances. He did not want her to be a commoner, he wanted her to advance beyond the culture of their little village. She returns bright, refined, and cultured. Now, she is caught between two worlds. She loves a commoner as well as a promising, well-educated doctor (or at least she thinks she does).

Grace is a principled young woman who has great difficulty resolving the unprincipled forces in her life, constrained as she is by the intractable subjugations of women at the time. In other words, she is not really free to fix this up to her own satisfaction. Add to this general problem of emotional bondage, the interference from the world outside of Little Hintock and interference from her meddlesome father (whom she is absolutely bound to obey) and you have a perfect storm for the tragedy of unintended consequences.

Some of the players: Giles (the commoner/a woodlander) was a breath of fresh air but extremely dense at times. Edred (an outsider/doctor) needs very much to get over himself. Marty (a poor woodlander girl) made me smile; she was pure strength.

I love Hardy but I was grateful that this story was not as solidly tragic as Tess of the d’Urbervilles. I did find the plain satisfaction I typically seek at the end of a major work, but not until the end.


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