In the end, Troy does agree to marry her but chaos surrounds the marriage. The wedding day arrives; Troy waits for Fanny at the church of All Souls for over an hour on their wedding day. As he is about leave the church Fanny arrives apologizing, “O, Frank I made a mistake! – I thought that the church with the spire was All Saints”. She had been waiting in another church. Troy doesn’t love her enough and did not want to marry her now because his pride had been dented. Fanny pleads with Troy to set another date for the wedding, but he turns her away because of the mistake and because of Troy’s heartlessness as expressed in Hardy’s use of language, “You fool, for fooling me! But say no more”. This moment leads to Fanny’s downfall. It shows that females depended on trustworthy men for their survival, and the same will be for Bathsheba Everdene when she marries.
Fanny’s next appearance in the novel is when she is in great poverty, “Bathsheba could discern the extreme poverty of the woman’s garb and the sadness of her face”. She is walking up Yalbury Hill, She asks the way to Casterbury workhouse, Fanny recognises Troy and faints, Bathsheba attempts to help her but Troy orders her to lead the horse on up the hill, “stay where you are, and attend to the horse!’ said Troy peremptorily, throwing her the reins and the whip. ‘Walk the horse to the top: I’ll see to the woman”. While being alone with Fanny, Troy gives her all his money, as she is in great poverty he arranges to meet her on Grey’s Bridge two days later, “ Monday is the first free day I have: and on Monday morning, at 10 exactly, meet me on Grey’s Bridge”. Eventually we will know that Fanny was pregnant and was failing to cope on her own; her only hope of survival is the workhouse or Troy’s help.
Fanny carries on walking only stopping for a few hours sleep. She uses two sticks as crutches to help her walk, but near Casterbridge she can only continue walking by leaning on a large dog,“ she looked up to him just as in earlier times she had, when standing, looked up to a man. The animal was as homeless as she”. At last the minute she collapses on the workhouse steps and is carried inside. Fanny is presented as a small weak figure in a dark hostile landscape. Fanny’s fate is death is in destitution.
The next morning Troy departs for Casterbridge, and Bathsheba learns of Fanny’s death. Bathsheba has ordered Joseph Poorgrass to fetch the coffin for burial at Weatherbury. Joseph fetches the coffin but stops of at the Buck’s Head
Inn where he met Coggan and Clark. He gets too drunk to carry out the duty, so even in death Fanny is ignored. Gabriel arrives and drives the coffin back to Weatherbury; Bathsheba then insists the coffin is brought to her house that night as the funeral is postponed to the next day. When the coffin is brought into the house, Gabriel sees the words, “ and child” written on the coffin and rubs them of. He rubs these words “to save Bathsheba from, at any rate, immediate anguish”. Liddy informs Bathsheba about Fanny’s baby. In some editions of the text, Liddy whispers the news to Bathsheba, Hardy was forced to censor this part of the chapter due to the sensibilities of his readers, showing that in the 19th century society condemned a woman for having an illegitimate child. Bathsheba sees both herself and Fanny as ‘victims’. Fanny is buried in an obscure part of the graveyard,
“ In the reprobates’ quarter of the graveyard, called in the parish behind church”, because of her “crime” of having an illegitimate baby. Thus she is seen by society as sinning, rather than sinned against.
Working class unmarried mothers in the 19th century were sent to the workhouse; pregnancy outside marriage was a great scandal. Workhouses existed because of society’s attitude to women like Fanny. From Fanny’s experiences the reader sees that having an illegitimate child, denies the mother even a dignified burial and destroyed women, yet from Troy we see 19th century men escape the consequences of an illegitimate child.
In contrast to Fanny is the character, Bathsheba Everdene. Bathsheba is very much independent, and does everything for herself. She will not marry if she does not love, because she does not like to be seen “as men’s property”, but when she does marry unwisely she is under the same confines as any other woman who becomes the property of her husband.
In the first appearance that Bathsheba makes, she is seen as unconventional and vain, “Looking over a hedge his eye caught by an attractive dark haired girl sitting in a wagon, admiring her reflection in a looking glass.” There is too much vanity and pride in her that will lead her towards tragedy. Bathsheba’s behaviour in the novel provides useful insights into the way women were expected to behave in the 19th century.
In chapter 1, Bathsheba is not being depicted as a stereotypical Victorian female despite humble beginnings. On her first appearance Bathsheba is travelling to her aunts to help her with her land, which is typical of what a young woman without money would have to do, but what is not typical is her appearance and her independence. She was wearing a crimson jacket, which is not typical clothing and a sign of her independence and confidence. In chapter 3, Gabriel had observed Bathsheba riding her horse. She was riding without a side – saddle, which was uncomely for women and was a sign of not being considered a virgin, “she had no side saddle, and it was very apparent that a firm seat upon the smooth leather beneath her was unattainable sideways”. She was also lying back on her back enjoying the movement of the horse. She was also unconcerned about having to ride without a hat, which would not have been regarded as appropriate for women. In this sequin of events Bathsheba’s spirit of freedom and independence is very clear and also depicted as very unconventional.
Bathsheba flirts with Gabriel, having saved him from suffocation. When flirting with him she does not see it as it being a sign of being open to a marriage proposal. The suggestion of flirtation by a woman was a message to the man that the woman was open to marriage proposal, otherwise no flirtation should occur and Bathsheba would in the future pay a penalty of this type of behaviour.
When she shows her flirtatious behaviour towards Boldwood, Gabriel regards her behaviour as being, “unworthy of any thoughtful and meek and comely woman. Leading on a man you don’t care for is not praised worthy action.” When Bathsheba asks for Gabriel’s opinion, he gives an honest one and gets sacked for giving it, but later she calls him back, because she cannot survive without his skills.
In chapter 4, Gabriel visits Bathsheba’s house, her aunts home, and Gabriel bluntely states his intentions to her aunt. Her aunt describes her character as “too wild”; she also deters Gabriel by telling him of Bathsheba’s superior education and many sweethearts. Gabriel departs hearing this. Bathsheba runs after him, assuring him there are no rivals. Gabriel proposes directly behaving her keenness to run after him is a sign of her readiness to marry, he promises her various things that may have been considered as tempting. But Bathsheba does not love him. He would be seen as a good catch though, because he ran his own land. In chapter 9, Liddy’s thoughts on Bathsheba turning down a marriage proposal shows how women may typically respond to a marriage proposal offering such security, “How sweet to be able to feel disdain when most of us are glad to say ’Thank you!”
In chapter 6, we learn that Bathsheba has inherited her uncle’s farm, which was very unusual, “Tisn’t a master, ‘tis a mistress, shepherd’. Lately’ came here from a distance. Took on her uncle’s farm, who suddenly died”. Men would normally benefit rather than a women, and landowners and workers did not view her as the best prospect for the farm to begin with, one of the reasons given in chapter 45 was, “she is too young and beautiful”. Even Gabriel felt she was unable to manage without him, “How would the farm go on with nobody to mind it but a woman”.
In chapter 10, she “forms a resolution” to run the farm without a bailiff, the workers were very ‘amazed’, She would hopefully be better than a man in the role, she promised, in order that they will have confidence in her abilities despite her being a female.
In chapter 12, Bathsheba attends the ‘corn market’. Although she is “dainlty dressed” she is determined to brave the stares and drive hard bargains. “Nearly every face turned towards her,” except for which she noticed was Boldwood who didn’t seem to recognize her. Now she saw him as a challenge. Going into chapter 19, Boldwood’s proposal and the promises he offers would have been seen as very advantageous to her, from the view point of the society, but she turns him down, saying she wants to marry for love. However, sending the Valentine card to him has restricted her, she has had to pay the consequences and could not have turned down the proposal fully as she did with Gabriel, “She had a strong feeling that having been the one who began the game, she ought in honesty to accept the consequences”.
There had been a second proposal from Boldwood in chapter 23, and still Bathsheba was unable to deny the proposal, Hardy even suggests she felt a, “fearful joy” about the situation she was in. From then on she is trapped by her behaviour, even when she marries Troy, and when he goes missing Boldwood negotiates a further marriage promise.
In chapter 26, Troy is flattering Bathsheba so much that, she becomes ‘feverish’. At first she tries to behave towards Troy with a sense of independence in her, but to the end of chapter 27 she is agreeing to meet him without a chaperone, “Well, I won’t bring Liddy - and I’ll come. But only for a short time,’ a very short time”. Bathsheba is reacting very differently to the passion offered by Troy. Bathsheba changes - she becomes “powerless to withstand or deny him”. She loses her sense of control and becomes the opposite of herself. In chapter 34, Boldwood pleads with Troy to save Bathsheba’s reputation by marrying her, which indicates how much regard the Victorian society put on a woman’s reputation as a virgin,
“ Oh, How can she be saved now, unless I marry her?” says as he teases Boldwood. Later, we learn that Bathsheba has married Troy. In this marriage she has lost her role as a mistress of the farm. After the marriage Troy has already started ordering Bathsheba by telling her and the rest of the women to go home so the men can carry on drinking, “we’ll send the women – folk home! ‘Tis time they were in bed. Then we cockbirds will have a jolly carouse to ourselves!”. This direction undermines Bathsheba in front of her workers, but it also puts the farm in jeopardy because the workers are too drunk to save the hay from the storm. In chapter 37 we find that Gabriel is working with Bathsheba and he saves the day. Bathsheba tells Gabriel of her trip to Bath, she shows her understanding that maybe she has out the farm in jeopardy by marrying Troy but she felt her reputation was at stake because she had not adhered to the ‘general rule of society’ but had driven to see Troy unaccompanied late at night: “I saw that a scandal might seize hold of me for meeting him alone in that way”. Now, Bathsheba is getting unhappier by the day. She turns into an emotional woman and she is no longer in control of herself. Having married Troy, Troy is becoming reckless with money and Bathsheba can do nothing to stop him becoming like this. This happens because in marriage in the 19th century the husband becomes in control of his wife and his wife’s possession. In chapter 51 Bathsheba is not wanting to attract anyone’s attention with her beauty. In chapter 56, Hardy suggests that Bathsheba has had this downfall because she had so much pride and vanity in herself. Chapter 56 also starts with Bathsheba expressing the reliance she has had on Gabriel, and so she is upset when she hears of Gabriel’s resignation letter, “ It is that I may soon have to give up the management of your farm, Mrs. Troy. The fact is, I am thinking of leaving England – not ee, you know – next spring”. Realising that she is now reliant on Gabriel she would not refuse his marriage proposal if he were to ask again. Hardy shows that just like Fanny, Bathsheba is also reliant on the security a man can offer her and she comes to realize that this security only comes with marriage.
Bathsheba has taken on the role of the typical Victorian female, dependant on marriage for security, although the relationship is based on substantial affection.
In “Far from the Madding Crowd” Hardy illustrates the position of 19th century women as being disadvantaged. Fanny and Bathsheba both provide contrasting examples of Victorian women who were victims of the treatment of their men. In their lives they are seen in the role of second-class citizens in need of a trustworthy man for survival, unless they can survive themselves. Women’s social behaviour was expected to be restricted whereas men could have very little restrictions on how they behaved. They were even admired for some of their roguish tendencies. Hardy’s language as he describes Fanny’s plight expresses his sympathy for her, but Bathsheba’s suffering is not dealt with in the same sympathetic response. Her character, which was independent, has changed at the end of the novel. She appeared a more reserved character accepting the role of Gabriel’s wife. I think that Bathsheba had wrong treatment from men as a result the way she acted, having so much pride in herself and being vain. It was good for her to have that independence in her but maybe she felt too much of her independence, which got her in a muddle. The classic example is when in the beginning of the novel Gabriel proposed to her and she did not accept, because she did not want to be thought of as men’s property, yet in marrying Troy she destined herself to this very fate.
Henal R Patel 11s
