The Return of the Native: the psychological problems of modern man and woman (I)

Abstract

All Hardy’s novels deal to some extent with the problems both of adjusting to changes in society and of coping with its failure to change in response to the individual’s needs. His treatment of character emphasises that individuals as well as society are in a process of change and that novelists’ methods of exploring character must change in order to reflect this and to take into account new insights. This is the area of Hardy’s most important innovations in the novel. Clym, Knight, Angel, Sue and Jude are all examples of the problems of “advanced” thinkers (or those trying to be advanced) in a world which, while accepting industrial change (sometimes reluctantly) resists adamantly any challenge to its attitudes and preconceptions. For the individual, it is not merely an external problem. The “advanced” thinkers are themselves hampered by these same preconceptions and prejudices which they share, often unconsciously, with the society they criticise. Up to this point, I have examined a number of characters which reveal the complexity and subtlety of Hardy’s psychological insight; I now come to some novels which demonstrate these qualities even more fully, because in these he is creating characters who are themselves interested in new ideas.