Genealogy and Fiction in Hardy: Family Lineage and Narrative Lines

206 Pages·1997·12.589 MB·English

by  Tess O'Toole

GENEALOGY AND FICTION IN HARDY

Genealogy and Fiction
in Hardy
Family Lineage and Narrative Lines
Tess OToole
Assistant Professor of English
McGill University
flfl
First published in Great Britain 1997 by
* MACMILLAN PRESS LTD
Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and London
Companies and representatives throughout the world
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 0-333-68163-0
First published in the United States of America 1997 by
tt ST. MARTIN'S PRESS, INC.,
Scholarly and Reference Division,
175 Fifth Avenue, New York. N.Y. 10010
ISBN 0-312-17462-4
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
OToole, Tess, 1962-
Genealogy and fiction in Hardy : family lineage and narrative
lines / by Tess OToole.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p.) and index.
ISBN 0-312-17462-4 (cloth)
1. Hardy, Thomas, 1840-1928—Knowledge—Genealogy. 2. Domestic
fiction, English—History and criticism. 3. Genealogy in
literature. 4. Family in literature. 5. Narration (Rhetoric)
6. Fiction—Technique. I. Title.
PR4757.G42087 1997
823'.8-^dc21 97-1763
CIP
© Teresa M. OToole 1997
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made
without written permission.
No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with
written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by
the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1P 9HE.
Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to
criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
The author has asserted her right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and
sustained forest sources.
10 9 8 7 6 54 3 21
06 05 04 03 02 01 00 99 98 97
Printed in Great Britain by
The Ipswich Book Company Ltd
Ipswich, Suffolk
To my mother, Patricia Murphy OToole,
and in memory of my father, Thomas Joseph OToole,
who together taught me to value family and to love literature

Contents
Note on Editions and Abbreviations viii
Acknozvledgnients ix
Introduction 1
1 Fictitious Families 17
'Buried genealogical facts': The Mayor of Casterbridge 19
The genealogical trace . 24
Illegitimacy and fiction 32
Family frauds 40
2 Narrative Coercion 45
The machine in the narrative: The Well-Beloved 48
Naming and narrative 55
The impossibility of priority: A Pair of Blue Eyes 58
The exhaustion of narrative options: Jude the Obscure 65
Tess of the d'Urbervilles: The discomfort of existing
in narrative 73
3 Gender and Genre: Women and the Family Script 93
Plotting gender 93
Models of triangulation 96
Sisters and mothers 107
Reinventions: The Hand of Ethelberta 115
4 Narrative Jamming in the Family Saga 125
Engendering narratives 125
Narrative jamming 130
Ghostly genealogies 134
The 'genealogical passion' 139
Narrative subversions 144
The problem of the ending 149
Epilogue 155
Notes 175
References 189
Index 193
vn
Note on Editions and
Abbreviations
I have used the Penguin paperback edition of the novels when
available. Citations to The Hand of Ethelberta and The Well-Beloved
refer to the paperback Macmillan editions (1975 and 1986, respect
ively). I have used the Oxford paperback edition of A Laodicean
(1991). Desperate Remedies is cited from the 1984 AMS reprint of
the 1912 Macmillan edition.
The following editions of short story anthologies are cited.
Abbreviations used in my text are indicated parenthetically:
Life's Little Ironies. Oxford, 1996. (LLI)
Life's Little Ironies and A Changed Man. St. Martin's, 1977. (CM)
Wessex Tales and A Group of Noble Dames. Macmillan, 1977. (WT,
GND)
The abbreviation CL refers to The Collected Letters of Thomas Hardy,
edited by Richard Little Purdy and Michael Millgate (Clarendon,
1978).
The number given in parentheses after the title of a poem indi
cates its place in The Complete Poems of Thomas Hardy, edited by
James Gibson (Macmillan, 1976).
Vlll
Acknowledgments
My greatest debt is to Elaine Scarry, who advised the disserta
tion that preceded this book and who has continued to offer
unstinting support. Her patience and generosity are as remark
able as her insight. I am also deeply grateful to Barbara Johnson
and Philip Fisher for their incisive comments and advice.
Special thanks are due to Deirdre d'Albertis for patiently review
ing many parts of the manuscript, for offering astute commen
tary and suggestions, and for providing fellowship from the earliest
to the latest stages of this project.
My colleagues at McGill have provided a supportive community
within which I am privileged to work. I particularly wish to thank
Kerry McSweeney for his good counsel, and Maggie Kilgour and
Brian Trehearne for good meals and good movies. Thanks also
to the graduate students in my 1996 seminar whose energy and
insights helped reinvigorate my own reflections on Hardy.
Finally, I thank my husband, Martin Stevenson, for his support
and his patience, for allowing me to turn his sunroom into my
writing room, and for choosing Hardy country in which to propose.
A shorter version of Chapter 4 first appeared in Narrative 1
(1993).
IX