Phase the Fifth "the woman pays"

Question 1

the woman pays

Answer 1

• the woman pays, the man doesnt - because of societal contructs that have marginalised women so much and created such high double standards that women are actually criticised and outcast due to the disgusting actions of a man who can take advantage of her due to a womans sheer vulnerability and biological lack of power.

Question 2

“and yet nothing had changed in the moments where he had been kissing her, or rather nothing in the substance of things. But the essence of things had changed”

Answer 2

Omniscient narrator showing that Angel loved the idea of tess - he is a victorian gentleman and no matter how much he thinks he differs from the expectations and ideologies that come with that, it is simply embedded in him. Hardy pushes the idea of tess’ innocence to question this and show the narror mindedness of victorian society.

Question 3

“O, tess, forgiveness does not apply to this case. You were one person: now you are another”
“the woman i have been loving is not you”
Angel

Answer 3

• shaming her- as if her virginity is the only thing he loved about her/is what made her as a person
• Angel is at fault completely here because HE is the one who placed tess on a pedistool and idealised tess so much that he did not allow her to say that she wasnt even when tess tried.
• Also shows that he is infact not the forward thinking individual that he liked to paint himself out to be

Question 4

“you were more sinned against that sinning, I admit that”

Answer 4

• shows that Angel does not think tess to be duplicious, yet he cannot get over the fact that she in not a virgin anymore, shows that this is all an outburst of his ego and expectations he had of the woman he made his wife
• tess loves Angel for who he is, Angel loves tess for who he thought she was.

Question 5

A guilty woman in the guise of an innocent one”

Answer 5

This is what Angel sees now when he looks at Tess. It is very much in contrast to the ‘daughter of the soil’ and ‘pure’ woman he saw before. It suggests that Angel thinks Tess seduced Alec and lied to him, making Tess the ‘guilty’ one in the situation. This can be used in the argument that Tess is not a ‘pure woman’, as Angel sees her as a ‘guilty woman’ and a liar.

Question 6

She looked absolutely pure. Nature, in her fantastic trickery, had set such a seal of maidenhood upon Tess… omniscient narrator

Answer 6

Hardy is making it clear here that Angel, when looking at Tess, thinks that external presentation can represent someone’s internal being, highlighting his ignorance and the way he has idealised Tess. The way ‘Nature’ has made her look ‘pure’ and have a ‘seal of maidenhood’ is a suggestion by Hardy that in the natural world, Tess maybe is a ‘pure woman’, but it is just by the standards of Angel and society that she is not.

Question 7

He turned to go on his own way, and did not know that he loved her still.

Answer 7

This is the last line of Chapter 37 - Tess and Angel part and go their separate ways. Hardy is once again playing with the idea, as he did earlier in the chapter, that Angel deeply loves Tess but suppresses his feelings and is totally unaware of them. This creates a tragic irony as they are parting. Hardy makes it apparent that the parting is not final, as Angel said he will write to her to come to him when he is ready, but the chapter ends with a sense of finality nevertheless, creating a sad sense of loss of love. It is clear that Angel has let his anger and social convention override his true, natural emotions for Tess.