Critics

Question 1

Dana Elisabeth Allington: women

Answer 1

‘The Mayor of Casterbridge brings to light the harsh reality of Victorian society’s treatment of women’

Question 2

Professor Carrolls: Susan, gender

Answer 2

‘Susan Henchard is the embodiment of a typical submissive Victorian age woman’

Question 3

Joseph Warren Beach: nature

Answer 3

‘Thomas Hardy sounds the death-knell of the old nature poetry’

Question 4

Greg LaLuna: nature

Answer 4

‘Preoccupied with understanding how nature operates’

Question 5

Jerome Bump: MH and SH, secrets

Answer 5

‘Both [MH and SH] are obsessed with secrecy’

Question 6

Phillip Henneman: Susan, women

Answer 6

‘she has a steely, meticulous determination’

Question 7

Bert Hornback: Lucetta, the past

Answer 7

Lucetta ‘tries to break from the bonds of her past, and this destroys her’

Question 8

Roger Ebbatson: the persistence of the past

Answer 8

‘as in greek tragedy, the past returns to haunt the protagonist’

Question 9

Emma Hardy: gender

Answer 9

‘He understands only the women he invents’

Question 10

All critical comments about gender (4)

Answer 10

Dana Allington: ‘MOC brings to light the harsh reality of Victorian society’s treatment of women’

Professor Carrolls: ‘embodiment of a typical submissive Victorian age woman’ (SH)

Phillip Henneman: ‘[SH] has a steely, meticulous determination’

Emma Hardy: ‘he understands only the women he invents’

Question 11

All critical comments about the past (3)

Answer 11

Bert Hornback: ‘Lucetta tries to break free from the bonds of her past, and this destroys her’

Roger Ebbatson: ‘As in greek tragedy, the past returns to haunt the protagonist’

Patterson: ‘rooted in the demoralisation of the present by the corruption of the past’

Question 12

All critical comments about love (3)

Answer 12

Elaine Showalter: ‘paternity is a central subject of the book’

J Hillis Miller: ‘passionate desire for full possession of another person’ (MH)

H.M Daleski: ‘ambivalent portrayal of marriage’

Question 13

All critical comments about character and fate (4)

Answer 13

Gilani: ‘indifferent […] to human happiness’ (Hardy’s fate)

Angus: ‘misery is the result of character’

Ray Evans: MHs fate is ‘seemingly inevitable’

Pratap: ‘Henchard’s fate seems to arise from his inflexibility’

Question 14

All critical comments about nature (2)

Answer 14

Joseph Warren Beach: ‘Hardy sounds the death-knell of the old nature poetry’

Greg LaLuna: ‘preoccupied with understanding how nature operates’

Question 15

Casterbridge

Answer 15

‘primitive’, ‘hierarchy’ - John Patterson

Question 16

Tragedy, past

Answer 16

‘as in Greek tragedy, the past returns to haunt the present’ - Roger Ebbatson

Question 17

Greek tragedy

Answer 17

‘like Oedipus’, ‘punish himself’ - E Ingersoll

Question 18

Lucetta, past, downfall

Answer 18

‘Lucetta tries to break free from the bonds of her past, and this destroys her’ - Bert G Hornback

Question 19

Gender, suffering (paraphrased)

Answer 19

Hardy confuses the feminine capacity for suffering with suffering as a feminine role - Patricia Spacks