As well as having a relationship to darkness, Hardy also relates Eustacia to another symbol of nature which is fire. At several instances he surrounds her by fire in the phrase “throwing back the shawl to that the fire-light shone full upon her face and throat”. She is also described as having a “flame-like soul” and is further linked to fire as she is often seen hanging around the bonfires in the heath in the phrase “she ascended to her old position at the top where the red coals of the perishing fire greeted her like living eyes in the corpse of day’. Hardy uses fire in order to symbolize Eustacia’s excitement and power. Because fire can create lightness in the dark it has an immense force of power yet it has its disadvantage of being extremely dangerous as well. Moreover, linking Eustacia to fire is another hint of Eustacia’s fate of devastation.
The role of power is extremely important in this novel because Hardy associates Eustacia with power frequently. He uses classical references to describe Eustacia. Additionally, the classic relations are characters of power but have flaws to their power. Her image is describes as containing features of ‘Marie Antoinette and Mrs. Siddons’ both women being powerful yet outcasts. Marie Antoinette was the wife of Louse the 16th, a beautiful demanding woman who ended up being beheaded. Mrs. Siddons on the other hand, was a beautiful actress who was seen as an outsider by society due to the reason that as a woman in the 19th century you would be associated with a prostitute if you participated on stage. She is further related to the historical three goddesses who decided the fate of human in the phrase ‘had she handled the distaff, the spindle, and the shears at her own free will, few in the world would have noticed the change of government’. Moreover, this concept further establishes Eustacia as a woman of great power but also destruction. Hardy further relates Eustacia to “Heloises and Cleopatras” who were to intriguing women, again highlighting Eustacia’s status of power.
In addition to the theme of power, Hardy makes the character Eustacia carry two objects which are an hourglass and a telescope. These objects indicate that transience is being controlled by a higher power. The hourglass represents time and therefore establishes the fact that Eustacia is dependant on time stating a power above her. The telescope reflects her as being a person that wants to know what is going on beneath the surface.
In order to accentuate Eustacia’s characteristics, Hardy contrasts her character to that of Thomasin. After Hardy links Eustacia with fire he immediately uses the dialect of Wildeve ‘Thomasin is a pleasing and innocent woman’ to contrast the two women. This results in the effect of highlighting Eustacia’s power and the fact that she is majestic and not innocent. Hardy links Eustacia in with fire and darkness reflecting power and destruction whilst, on the other hand, he associates Thomasin with light therefore suggesting that Thomasin is a pure and innocent character.
Although Eustacia is having an affair with Wildeve, the reader is given the impression that she considers him as being an object to fulfill her void of loneliness until she finds the real romance she desires. The phrase ‘filling up the spare hours of her existence by idealizing Wildeve for want of a better object’ confirms this theory. Her persona reflects that of a person with an abstract ideal. The infatuation of wanting ‘to be loved to madness – such was her great desire’ is her fundamental flaw as such an ideal blatantly does not exist. Moreover, madness and desire are both extremes of emotion and madness is also linked to insanity and destruction. This accentuates the fact that Eustacia is linked to destruction.
In conclusion, Hardy moulded the character of Eustacia as a means to express his views of inequality between the sexes. Hardy has often been described as having universal pessimism, which is blatantly portrayed in the novel. Eustacia is described as a woman that ‘had been existing in a suppressed state and not in one of languor or stagnation’. Moreover, this phrase implies the fact that women in the 19th century did not have many options in life. A women’s role was to marry a man of the same class status in order to continue the cycle of mankind, which is the reason that Eustacia has an affair with Wildeve as he is the only suitable man in Egdon Heath for marriage. However, my impression is that Hardy sets Eustacia to be a powerful woman that will strive to reach her abstract goal, which will also lead to her destruction as during the 19th century that was the fate of intriguing women.
