The Return of the Native
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| Author | Thomas Hardy |
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| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Romance Tragedy |
| Publisher | Belgravia, the Magazine of Fashion and Amusement |
| Released | 1878 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| ISBN | NA |
| Preceded by | The Hand of Ethelberta |
| Followed by | The Trumpet-Major |
The Return of the Native is Thomas Hardy's sixth published novel. It first appeared in the serial Belgravia, a none-too-prestigious publication known for its sensationalism, and was presented in twelve monthly instalments from January to December of 1878. Due to the novel's controversial themes, Hardy had some difficulty finding a publisher; reviews, however, though somewhat mixed, were generally positive. In the twentieth century, Return of the Native became one of Hardy's most popular novels.[1]
Contents |
[edit] Summary
The novel takes place entirely in the environs of Egdon Heath, and, with the exception of the epilogue, Aftercourses, covers exactly a year and a day. The narrative begins on the evening of Guy Fawkes Night as Diggory Venn drives slowly across the heath, carrying a hidden passenger in the back of his van. When darkness falls, the country folk light bonfires on the surrounding hills, emphasizing - not for the last time - the pagan spirit of the heath and its denizens.
Venn is a reddleman; he travels the country marking flocks of sheep with a red mineral called 'reddle'. Although his trade has stained him red from head to foot, underneath his devilish colouring he is a handsome, shrewd, well-meaning young man. His passenger is a young woman named Thomasin Yeobright, whom Venn is taking home. Earlier that day, Thomasin had planned to marry Damon Wildeve, a local innkeeper known for his fickleness; however, a minor technical difficulty delayed the marriage and Thomasin, in distress, ran after the reddleman's van and asked him to take her home. Venn himself is in love with Thomasin, and unsuccessfully wooed her a year or two before. Now, although he knows Wildeve is unworthy of her love, he is so devoted to her that he is willing to help her secure the man of her choice.
At length, Venn reaches Bloom's End, the home of Thomasin's aunt, Mrs. Yeobright. She is a good woman, if somewhat proud and inflexible, and she wants the best for Thomasin. In former months she opposed her niece's choice of husband, and publicly forbade the banns; now, since Thomasin has compromised herself by leaving town with Wildeve and returning unmarried, the best outcome Mrs. Yeobright can envision is for the postponed marriage to be duly solemnized as soon as possible. She and Venn both begin working on Wildeve to make sure he keeps his promise to Thomasin.
Wildeve, however, is still preoccupied with Eustacia Vye, an exotically beautiful young woman living with her grandfather in a lonely house on Egdon Heath. Eustacia is a black-haired, queenly woman who holds herself aloof from most of the heathfolk; they, in turn, consider her an oddity, and one or two even think she's a witch. She is nothing like Thomasin, who is sweet-natured and fair. She loathes the heath, yet seems completely in harmony with her surroundings. The previous year, she and Wildeve were lovers; however, even during the height of her passion for him, she knew she only loved him because there was no better object available. When Wildeve broke off the relationship to court Thomasin, Eustacia's interest in him briefly returned. The two meet on Guy Fawkes night, and Wildeve asks her to run off to America with him. She demurs.
Eustacia drops Wildeve when Mrs. Yeobright's son Clym, a successful diamond merchant, returns from Paris to his native Egdon Heath. Although he has no plans to return to Paris or the diamond trade and is, in fact, openly planning become a schoolmaster for the rural poor, Eustacia sees him as a way to escape the hated heath and begin a grander, richer existence in a glamourous new location. With some difficulty, she arranges to meet Clym, and the two soon fall in love. When Mrs. Yeobright objects, Clym quarrels with her; later, she quarrels with Eustacia as well.
When he sees that Eustacia is lost to him, Wildeve marries Thomasin, who gives birth to a daughter the next summer. Clym and Eustacia also marry and move to a small cottage five miles away, where they enjoy a brief period of happiness. The seeds of rancour soon begin to germinate, however: Clym studies night and day to prepare for his new career as a schoolmaster while Eustacia clings to the hope that he'll give up the idea and take her abroad. Instead, he nearly blinds himself with too much reading, then further mortifies his wife by deciding to eke out a living, at least temporarily, as a furze-cutter. Eustacia, her dreams blasted, finds herself living in a hut on the heath, chained by marriage to a lowly labouring man.
At this point, Wildeve reappears; he has unexpectedly inherited a large sum of money, and is now in a better position to fulfill Eustacia's hopes. He comes calling on the Yeobrights in the middle of one hot August day and, although Clym is at home, he is fast asleep on the hearth after a grueling session of furze-cutting. While Eustacia and Wildeve are talking, Mrs. Yeobright knocks on the door; she has decided to pay a courtesy call in the hopes of healing the estrangement between herself and her son. Eustacia looks out at her and then, in some alarm, ushers her visitor out the back door. She hears Clym calling to his mother and, thinking his mother's knocking has awakened him, remains in the garden for a few moments. When Eustacia goes back inside, she finds Clym still asleep and his mother gone. Clym, she now realises, merely cried out his mother's name in his sleep.
Mrs Yeobright, it turns out, saw Eustacia looking out the window at her; she also saw Clym's gear by the door, and so knew they were both at home. Now, thinking she has been deliberately barred from her son's home, she miserably begins the long, hot walk home. Later that evening, Clym, unaware of her attempted visit, heads for Bloom's End and on the way finds her crumpled beside the path, dying from an adder's bite. When she expires that night from the combined effects of snake venom and heat exhaustion, Clym's grief and remorse make him physically ill for several weeks. Eustacia, wracked with guilt, dare not tell him of her role in the tragedy; when he eventually finds out from a neighbour's child about his mother's visit - and Wildeve's - he rushes home to accuse his wife of murder and adultery. Eustacia refuses to explain her actions; instead, she tells him You are no blessing, my husband and reproaches him for his cruelty. She then moves back to her grandfather's house, where she struggles with her despair while she awaits some word from Clym.
Wildeve visits her again on Guy Fawkes night, and offers to help her get to Paris. Eustacia realises that if she lets Wildeve help her, she'll be obliged to become his mistress. She tells him she will send him a signal by night if she decides to accept. Clym's anger, meanwhile, has cooled and he sends Eustacia a letter the next day offering reconciliation. The letter arrives a few minutes too late; by the time her grandfather tries to give it to her, she has already signalled to Wildeve and set off through wind and rain to meet him. She walks along weeping, however, knowing she is about to break her marriage vows for a man who is unworthy of her.
Wildeve, packed and ready to leave his wife and child, waits for Eustacia in the dark. Thomasin, guessing his plans, sends Clym to intercept him; she also, by chance, encounters Diggory Venn as she dashes across the heath herself in pursuit of her husband. Eustacia does not appear; instead, she falls or throws herself into nearby Shadwater Weir. Clym and Wildeve hear the splash and plunge into the water after her. Venn arrives in time to save Clym, but is too late for the others. When Clym revives, he accuses himself of murdering his wife and mother.
In the epilogue, Venn gives up being a reddleman to become a dairy farmer. Two years later, Thomasin marries him and they settle down happily together. Clym, now a sad, solitary figure, eventually takes up preaching.
[edit] Discussion
With its deeply flawed heroine and its (for the time) open acknowledgement of illicit sexual relationships, The Return of the Native raised some eyebrows when it first appeared as a serial in Victorian Britain. Although he intended to structure the novel into five books, thus mirrororing the classical tragic format, Hardy submitted to the tastes of the serial-reading public sufficiently to tack on a happy ending for Diggory Venn and Thomasin in a sixth book, Aftercourses. In Hardy's original conception, Venn retains his weird reddleman's character, while Thomasin lives out her days as a widow.[2]
Hardy's choice of themes - sexual politics, thwarted desire, and the conflicting demands of nature and society - makes this a truly modern novel. Underlying these modern themes, however, is a classical sense of tragedy: Hardy unifies time and place and suggests that the struggles of those trying to escape their destinies will only hasten their destruction. To emphasize this point, he uses as setting an ancient heath steeped in pre-Christian history and even supplies a Chorus consisting of Grandfer Cantle, Timothy Fairway, and the rest of the heathfolk. Eustacia, who manipulates fate in hopes of leaving Egdon Heath for a larger existence in Paris, instead becomes an eternal resident when she drowns in Shadwater Weir; Wildeve shares not only Eustacia's dream of escape, but also her fate; and Clym, the would-be educational reformer, survives the Weir but lives on as a lonely, remorseful man.
[edit] Character List
- Clym (Clement) Yeobright—A young man of about thirty who gives up a business career in Paris to return to his native Egdon Heath to become a “schoolmaster to the poor and ignorant.” "The beauty here visible would in no time be ruthlessly overrun by its parasite, thought."
- Eustacia Vye—A raven-haired young beauty who chafes against her life on the heath and longs to escape it in order to lead the more adventure-filled life of the world. Some of the heathfolk think she is a witch. Hardy describes her as "the raw material of a divinity" whose "celestial imperiousness, love, wrath, and fervour had proved to be somewhat thrown away on netherward Egdon."
- Mrs. Yeobright—Clym’s mother, a widow of inflexible standards. Thomasin has lived with her for many years, but Clym is her only child.
- Thomasin (Tamsin) Yeobright—Clym’s cousin and Mrs. Yeobright’s niece, a young girl of gentle ways and conventional expectations. "Mrs Yeobright saw a little figure...undefended except by the power of her own hope."
- Damon Wildeve—Eustacia's former lover and Thomasin's first husband. He is an ex-engineer who has failed in his profession and who now keeps an Inn, "The Quiet Woman". He has a wandering eye and an appetite for women. "A lady killing career."
- Diggory Venn—A resourceful man of twenty-four and a reddleman (a traveling seller of reddle, red chalk used for marking sheep). He selflessly protects Thomasin throughout the novel; at the end, he renounces his trade to become a dairy farmer like his father, and in doing so loses the red skin. He is then seen as a suitable husband for Thomasin. He is said to be the 'Returning Native' by some critics.
- Captain Vye—Eustacia’s grandfather and a former naval officer.
- Timothy Fairway—A sententious man of middle age who is greatly respected by the other heathfolk.
- Grandfer Cantle—A somewhat senile and always lively ex-soldier of about sixty-nine.
- Christian Cantle—Grandfer Cantle’s fearful and timid thirty-one-year-old son.
- Humphrey—A furze cutter (furze is a low, prickly shrub more commonly called gorse).
- Susan Nunsuch—Eustacia's nearest neighbor and bitterest enemy who convinces herself that Eustacia's witchery has caused her son's sickliness. In a memorable scene, she tries to protect him by making a wax effigy of Eustacia, sticking it full of pins, and melting it in her fireplace while uttering the Lord's Prayer backward. Eustacia drowns later that night.
- Johnny Nunsuch—Susan’s son, a young boy. He encounters Mrs. Yeobright during her fatal walk home and, in obedience to her wishes, reports her last words to Clym: I am a broken-hearted woman cast off by my son.
- Charley—A sixteen-year-old boy who works for Captain Vye and who admires Eustacia, largely from afar.
[edit] Adaptations
The first and, thus far, only film version of The Return of the Native was a television movie released in 1994. It is set on Exmoor and stars Catherine Zeta Jones as Eustacia Vye, Clive Owen as Damon Wildeve, Ray Stevenson as Clym Yeobright, and Joan Plowright as Mrs. Yeobright. Jack Gold directed.
The novel has also been adapted for the stage several times.
[edit] Trivia
- Monty Python's 1973 record, Matching Tie and Handkerchief includes a sketch called "Novel Writing." In the sketch, a crowd gathers to watch Thomas Hardy begin his latest novel while an enthusiastic sports announcer provides a running commentary. The novel is The Return of the Native.
- This novel is mentioned by Holden Caulfield in J. D. Salinger's classic novel The Catcher in the Rye.
[edit] Notes
1. Oxford Reader's Companion to Hardy (Norman Page, editor). Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2001, pp. 375-7.
2. Oxford Reader's Companion to Hardy, ibid., p. 380
[edit] External links
- The Return of the Native, available at Project Gutenberg.
- The Thomas Hardy section of Victorianweb includes essays and background information on The Return of the Native. Free access.
- The TV movie version on The Internet Movie Database.
- A review of the film from Variety.
