This speech brings us to a number of conclusions about this relationship. We realise that Tony has a lot of power over Unity, as most men did in those days, and he manipulates her into doing what he want’s her to do. Having the exclamation mark next to do and then a dash shows us how frantic he is, and it is logical to assume that he only talks about ‘the loving question’, marriage, to get her to do what he wants.
The relationship between Tony and Milly is very similar to the one with Tony and Unity. They are fiancés, and as such she expects him to be there for her. In response to an invitation for a lift she says ‘well, of course! What can I do else? Surely you don’t want me to walk, now I’ve come all this way?’ she is a little angry with him because she believes he should have picked her up earlier; Tony in response makes up an excuse that doesn’t really make much sense.
At the end of the story when Tony has been rejected by both Hannah and Unity in front of Milly, he tells her: ‘it do seem as of fate had ordained that it should be I and you’ in response she asks ‘you didn’t really mean what you said to them?’ he replies saying no, which quite obviously is not true. He is still manipulating her, but she wants to be manipulated, she speaks like a little naïve girl.
The last relationship in the story is between Tony and Hannah. In the story the narrator states Hannah as being Tony’s first love instantly setting up an obvious predicament and an odd situation, because people who were in love always have some feeling left for the other. As the scene progresses we are made more aware of his newly rekindled love: ‘the more he looked at her the more he liked her’ and ‘they sat a little closer and closer, their feet upon the footboard and their shoulders touching’ this is the narrative and as such is our little insight into the mind of Tony without his mouth opening. Of course as soon as it does open we are re-introduced to the arch-deceiver. Another key thing to note about this scene is the fact that what Tony does by sitting very near to Hannah would have been totally unacceptable for an engaged man, but he doesn’t seem to care much.
As the conversation between the two progresses they start to talk of marriage. It seems Tony likes talking about this subject a lot, but when she speaks she is in fact trying to manipulate him: ‘you’ve settled it with Milly by this time, I suppose’ she wants to see his reaction, the language used is provocative, with a subtext of her wanting to marry him and wanting to know what he thinks without being too forward because that was not lady like. Although Unity was much more forward in the question of marriage, we get the feeling that Hannah is much more lady-like and as such would be more desirable.
At the end of the story Hannah rejects Tony’s proposal of marriage, mainly because of her father and because of his deceitfulness towards her; we can see this when the narrator says; ‘…she would have not have refused if asked quietly and her father had not been there.’ This ending shows that the arch-deceiver, manages to deceive all the women to the point where they would certainly have married him, sadly he couldn’t keep the wagon going for longer.
The next relationship I will explore is the one between Farmer Lodge and Rhoda from the story ‘The withered arm’. The relationship is a horrid mix of emotions between the two characters. We know that Rhoda and Lodge had a relationship before the story starts, but it ended badly due to the birth of a child out of wed-lock. “He thought of Rhoda Brook and her son; and feared this might be a judgement from heaven above”. This shows that Lodge actually believes it was a mistake to have left Rhoda with their illegitimate child. Of course in those days illegitimate children were despised and considered sinful. At the end of the story however, it seems as though Lodge does care for the child and Rhoda, because he comes to bury his hanged son. We also know he paid Rhoda money to bring up her child, “He had bequeathed…a small ammunity to Rhoda”, which shows again that he does care for her and his son. Rhoda is very bitter at him, and life in general; this is the reason for her jealousy of Gertrude, because having an illegitimate child would mean the end of any hope of a successful life for her.
The next relationship I will explore is the relationship between Farmer Lodge and Gertrude. Gertrude is much younger than Farmer Lodge, and as such he is infatuated with her beauty, “soft and evanescent, like the light under a heap of rose petals”; this simile shows us how much he is attracted to her beauty. It seems also that the whole town is also infatuated with this woman’s beauty, “…all other eyes were fixed upon her”, and she seems to use this to her advantage throughout the story. All seeming nice, but as soon as the curse is placed upon Gertrude’s arm, the relationship begins to fall apart, “half a dozen years passed away and Mr and Mrs Lodge’s married experience sank into prosiness and worse”, the relationship was really based on her looks She seems to agree with this, “If I could only be again as he first saw me”, which shows us once again, as shown in the relationships in ‘Tony Kytes the arch deceiver’, that men have lots of power over women.
In fact this relationship is very similar to the ones in ‘Tony Kytes the arch deceiver’ because it is all about a man’s desire for a beautiful wife at whatever cost to the feelings of other, less beautiful women. Of course Tony is trying for three women and gets rejected by two, meanwhile Mr Lodge has already made his choice, but his woman is getting less pretty. Rhoda is also very scared of Mr Lodge,
“She dared not tell him for she had found by delicate experiment that these
Smouldering village beliefs made…”
It is not particularly made clear why, we just assume it’s simply because of his authority of being ‘the man’. The relationships with Rhoda and Gertrude are not very similar at all; it would appear that Gertrude is prettier than Rhoda, it also seems as though Lodge was not infatuated by Rhoda, the story suggests that he may have actually loved Rhoda and that is why he still cares about her.
The next relationship is the one between Old Mrs Chundle and the Curate in the story ‘Old Mrs Chundle’. This relationship is based on the old belief system, that priests are ‘above’ everyone. Mrs Chundle believes this especially, as she says, “I don’t want to eat with my betters-not I”, which would appear to mean she has great respect for the priesthood, but later on she actually lies to the priest saying she goes to the church every other Sunday. When he sees her again he asks her why she lied “I thought it very unkind of you to lie to me” she then quickly tells him she is very deaf and would not be able to hear him, he is very insistent in finding a way for her to hear his sermon “do you think you could hear the service if you were to sit closer?”. Being a very nice man, he decides to buy her a trumpet to assist her in her troubles “I could get you an ear trumpet”. The ear trumpet however does not work, she just gives up, but the priest decides to install a special tubing apparatus into the church”.
Ironically, as soon as it is installed and she is using it, he realises something throughout his sermon, he can smell her through the tubing, and she does not smell nice, “…no longer able to endure the odour…” he eventually puts a handkerchief into the tube, stopping the smell from affecting his sermon. After the sermon he speaks to his parish priest, who says he should never have gotten himself into this mess, he shouldn’t have befriended her in the first place, the curate decides to avoid her “I shall tell her not to come”, and so he does even though she calls for him twice. Eventually he does come to her house, to find her dead. Not only did she die with her last wishes to see the curate, she died because she ran after realising she would be late for his sermon. He feels very guilty, “the curate went out, like peter at the cock-crow”. This relationship has no particular resemblance to any relationships already covered, because it does not involve a romantic relationship, and is more about friendship.
The next relationship I will cover is the relationship between Timothy and Anneta in the story ‘Squire Petrick’s Lady”. At the beginning of the story it is revealed to us that the marriage between the two was not considered a good marriage, “he had not married well” this is because she was not rich, and did not come from a particularly good family, “…his wife having been the daughter of a family of no better beginnings than his own” it is also made known that she was very pretty, and that he fell in love with her for that reason,
“She was a very pretty woman, by all accounts, and her husband had seen, courted, married her in a high tide of infatuation”.
Right at the beginning of the story Anneta dies, telling Timothy, with her final breaths, that his son is not actually his. This crushes Timothy and makes him very angry at her “dire domestic treachery”. This clever alliteration alludes to his hating of his wife who has done such a terrible thing behind his back. He also decides all woman are bad,
“The imbittered state of Timothy Petrick’s mind bred in him by degrees such a hatred and mistrust of womankind that though several specimens of high attractiveness came under his eyes, he could not bring himself to the point of proposing marriage”, this shows us how much her ‘domestic treachery’ hurt him, this quote also shows us a strange use of language as refers to the use of the word ‘specimens’ I feel this is once again Thomas Hardy showing us how much more powerful men were than women.
This relationship relates to the others. It is similar to that between Gertrude and Farmer Lodge, because Farmer Lodge was infatuated by Gertrude’s beauty, but she never betrayed him, in fact she strove to make him love her again. You could also compare the relationship, to the ones in ‘ Tony Kytes the arch deceiver’, because they also had to do with infatuations, but then again they dealt with the issue of powerful men over weak women, with a different outcome to Farmer Lodge and Gertrude’s relationship, because two of the women reject Tony.
The final relationship I will cover is the one between Mr and Mrs Hardcome from the story, ‘The superstitious man’s story’. The relationship is that of a man and wife. It is a normal sort of relationship for that time, with the woman staying home, doing the washing up and the ironing and things; and the man going out and doing the work. The thing that must be most noted about this relationship is the fact that it is a very usual relationship for that time, for instance when Mrs Hardcome is very alarmed to see Mr Hardcome asleep in his bed, she does not wake him up as she wishes to, for fear of his authority because he is the man and she is the woman. This is a very familiar theme when looking at Thomas Hardy stories, and out of all these short stories is what I would call the denominator.
In conclusion, the relationships described in Thomas Hardy’s short stories are all very similar, all fulfilling a sort of pattern. Men in all the stories become infatuated with the beauty of a woman and the relationships fail because the woman cannot compete, or the beauty of the woman is taken away. Women are not equal to men, in the stories men are portrayed as the much more powerful sex, with the most authority. The females in the stories try all they can to seduce and manipulate men, but this is always to no avail. Even in ‘Old Mrs Chundle’ the friendship between the old woman and the curator ends up as a desperate battle between the two characters, with the man as the figure of authority; but when she dies we realise he is not really the strong character. In fact all the men are not very strong, they have no depth and in finality are in fact extremely shallow.