Of Furtive Hedgehogs and Steam Machines: An Ecofeminist Reading of Thomas Hardy

Abstract

In “Afterwards”, Thomas Hardy includes the furtive hedgehog among the things and creatures that he draws attention to. Such a detail is symptomatic of Hardy’s ecopoetic approach to the nonhuman. While poems devoted to birds highlight man’s insensitivity, “The Mother Mourns” lays down Hardy’s own Gaia hypothesis, so to speak, as if he foresaw the extinction of species. This environmental ethics helps to cast light on Tess of the d’Urbervilles, where prevailing patriarchal models of capitalist development threaten the eponymous protagonist, but also animals and the land. An ecofeminist reading of the novel may trace the disquieting undertones of the apparently idyllic dairy of Talbothays, as well as the viral progression of machinery in Wessex. The novel dismisses the ideological dichotomy virgin/sinner and calls for an ecologically sound, non-exploitative version of agriculture as well as for women’s ability to use their bodies freely.