“Two themes dominated the whole of Hardy’s writing life – the position of women in love and marriage and class distinction”. What evidence do you find for this judgement in your reading of (at least three) of Hardy’s stories in this collection?
As James Gibson writes in his introduction to this collection of Hardy’s short stories, “…….We are aware of Hardy’s powerful creative imagination and his sympathy for others, in particular nineteenth-century women whose disadvantages are so clearly demonstrated.” A prime example of Hardy’s near obsession with writing of women in love and marriage and of class distinction is the short story, “The Withered Arm” This is about a lady who gets her arm damaged by the incubus of her jealous (so called friend) husband’s ex-mistress, Rhoda. The woman, Gertrude, knows nothing about Rhoda and her husband Farmer Lodge until right at the end of the story. Rhoda (acts as a friend and tries her best, but) envies Gertrude as she is the favoured more beautiful woman and Rhoda is now seen in Lodges eyes as “a fading woman of thirty” In Rhoda’s dream she imagines her attacking Gertrude and almost destroying her arm! The next time she sees her she sees Gertrude's arm and realises what has happened and the power she possesses. From then on Rhoda feels guilt and tries to act as a friend. Gertrude only finds out that it was Rhoda who did the damage when she goes to visit conjuror Trendle who was recommended to her by Rhoda. This is quite ironic. He tells Gertrude that in order to heal her arm she will need to put it up against the neck of a man who has been hanged to ‘turn the blood.’ Ironically, (again showing Hardy’s use of chance) the man whose neck she used was the son of Rhoda and Lodge who were there to bury their son after his execution. This proved all too much for Gertrude and the blood ‘turned too far’! In this story Rhoda and Gertrude emerged with a lot of credit (the two women) but Farmer Lodge came out of this with little if any credit as most men in Hardy’s writing. Lodge came across as the selfish farm owner who was only interested in the women’s beauty and social standing. The reasons for which he rejected Rhoda were: her age “a fading woman of 30” therefore she was past her height of beauty, her social status; she was a milkmaid, far insignificant to him, and her son was not fit to be an heir because he was son of Rhoda and therefore not ranked high enough to take over the farm. However this is ironic as when he found he and Gertrude had no children he tried to get his and Rhoda’s son back because he needed someone to take over the farm. This of course was too late as he had already left. Lodge rejected Gertrude much the same as she did to Rhoda but this time it was because of her arm “it makes my husband – dislike me – no, love me less. Men think so much of personal appearance.” Replies Rhoda who knew this only too bitterly
