Hardy uses men throughout the book as a big role in both Bathsheba’s and Fanny’s lives. One man is Gabriel Oak. As soon as Oak sets eyes on Bathsheba, he is deeply in love with her so decides to propose to her in Chapter Four, ‘“...Will you marry me? Do Bathsheba. I love you far more than common!”’ Due to Bathsheba’s vanity, she declines but after saying that she would like all of the things that Oak has been telling her. Her vanity is her main sin throughout the book. Vanity is seen as a bad thing even nowadays it is and it made her seem like a mean person however; Oak still had feelings for her.
Mr Boldwood is another man in Bathsheba’s life who has feelings for her. He didn’t notice Bathsheba at first and she didn’t like that, so as a joke, decides to send him a Valentine’s card with the words ‘marry me’ on it. Another reason why she sent him the card is that she was bored so she and Liddy decided to make a bet. It was a Sunday and no one was allowed to do anything in Victorian times, especially betting. The fact that she was betting on a Sunday was bad as this was seen as sinning. So they decided to throw their hymn book thinking that it wouldn’t be seen as sinning. Unfortunately, once Boldwood received the card, he suddenly became obsessed with her, ‘“...My life is not my own since i have beheld you clearly...I come to make you an offer of marriage.”’
In ‘Far From the Madding Crowd’, there is one man that is a main part in both Bathsheba’s and Fanny’s life – Sergeant Troy. We first met Troy in chapter eleven when Fanny goes to see him outside of the barracks. A person in the Victorian Times would see Fanny Robin as a bad person if they read this chapter. This is because Hardy uses different ways to hint to the reader that she has seen Troy ‘lots of times’ before and she might have had sex with him. One example of this is ‘“Your wife Fanny”’. People would see this as sinning as they thought that it was wrong for people to have sex before marriage. However, Hardy still makes the reader see that Fanny is actually a good person, even though she had sex before marriage.
Sergeant Troy may also be seen as a sinner due to him marrying Bathsheba just for her money. He bribed Bathsheba into marry him, saying that he had seen a prettier woman earlier that day (playing with Bathsheba’s vanity). As their relationship grows, the reader gets the feeling that Troy only married Bathsheba to get to her money and spend it on betting, ‘“...you have lost more than a hundred pounds in a month by this dreadful horseracing...”’
Hardy uses a few sexual references throughout the book generally around Sergeant Troy. An example of this is when he accidently cuts off part of Bathsheba’s hair even though he told her that his sword was blunt, ‘“Is the sword very sharp?” “O no ...” ... The lock dropped to the ground.’ At the end of this chapter, Bathsheba and Troy kiss. Because of this, the reader would have seen Bathsheba as a sinner as she had basically had a sexual relationship before marriage just like Fanny.
In chapter thirty-eight, Fanny is walking on Casterbridge highway to get to the Unionhouse where she dies on the journey, ‘...the bark of a fox, its three hollow notes rendered at intervals of a minute with the precision of a funeral bell.’ This chapter is very moving and it draws out the reader’s sympathy for her. This is a good technique that may make the reader not see her as just a sinner. Fanny departure has a biblical reference behind it that may also make the reader see her as a saint. The journey is like when Jesus was carrying his cross to his death.
Throughout the book, Bathsheba has many men after her and most of them she ends up having a relationship with. This is probably one of Bathsheba’s major sins as she seems to go from one to the other. Due to discrimination and the patriarchal society she may have been seen as a ‘slut’. This links to Fanny as she may have been seen as a prostitute due to her saying that she had seen Troy many times before. They would both be seen as sinning.
Hardy generally makes Bathsheba and Fanny seem like sinners but he also makes them look like saints at times as well. Fanny would be seen as a saint as the reader would start to feel sympathetic towards her by the end of the book. Bathsheba and Oak can be seen as ‘saints’ when there is the big storm in chapter thirty-six. Oak is seen as a saint as he starts covering the crops even though he is not the owner of the farm. Bathsheba is seen as a saint as she helps Oak to do this, ‘“...Can I do anything to help? ...Surely I can do something?”’ (Bathsheba). The storm is not only used to show that Bathsheba and Oak are saints; it is also a symbol. It symbolises that everything is going to go wrong with Troy and Bathsheba’s marriage (pathetic fallacy).
Hardy uses many different techniques throughout the whole book to make the reader have a more vivid image of the characters (mainly Fanny Robin). One of his techniques is imagery. He uses time imagery basically all the time around Fanny to give the impression that her life is running out of time.
Hardy uses the symbol of a holly bush to describe Bathsheba in chapter four, ‘...stunted holly bush, now laden with red berries.’ This imagery gives different views of how Bathsheba is seen. It shows that she is sweet like the berries but can also hurt someone like the holly bush. It also gives the impression that she is a woman who is seen as a ‘saint’ as well as a ‘sinner’.
In ‘Far From the Madding Crowd’, Hardy tries to make both Bathsheba and Fanny be seen as ‘saints’ although the reader may see them more as ‘sinners’. He also makes the men in the book be seen as ‘saints’ and ‘sinners’. If Hardy had made them ‘saints’ all of the time then it would have been like a dream world and not reality.