Posted by joffre on 10/2/2009, 13:20:38, in reply to "Re: jude the obscure"
68.19.137.158
Thanks Lale. I respond here because I particularly enjoyed your comments.
What can I say about Jude. There is much in it that is interesting, engaging. Some of his most polemical passages also seemed the most entertaining. I am thinking particularly of Phillotson's discussions with Gillingham. Though there are a lot of ideas, I don't really think it's the weight of them that causes the novel to fall apart. I do think it falls apart at the end. I had to drag myself through the last fifty or more pages. Part of the problem is, of course, the preposterousness Guillermo mentioned. And I think some of it is the character of Sue. I can't imagine anyone not becoming sick of her. I read somewhere that D.H. Lawrence was perplexed by Sue and did a study of the novel.
I think it was time for Hardy to return to poetry. Tess and The Mayor of Casterbrige are, I think, well done, but Hardy lets himself go in Jude.
Today, the most controversial idea in this book is surely the one that a child's soul comes to it at some point after and not immediately after birth. Does anyone know if this was a common idea then? Or if that idea has some name?
The new system already causes me some guilt. I hate to bring a two year old discussion to the top of the page. I don't suppose it will happen often, and this will probably close soon.
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