The Art of Analogy in The Woodlanders and Other Novels: Hardy’s Eco-Writing

Abstract

Hardy’s lifetime spanned a time of intense technological, societal and sociological change. Pushed away from pollution-saturated urban centres, the wealthiest classes sought to create an idealistic version of the countryside. A novelist like Thomas Hardy contributed, albeit unwittingly, to this myth-making; he also, in what one might call a counter-text, fiercely criticised the system producing a commodification of the countryside. It is the counter-text of one of his novels that I propose to examine in this paper; more specifically, I will focus on a rhetorical device recurring in Hardy’s prose works which is instrumental in the elaboration of this counter-text: the analogy between the human and the non-human. The likening of the former to the latter is what contributes to the creation of a timeless rural countryside and also what underlies the capitalistic, hierarchical relationships within the human community and also of men with Nature. This naturalisation of the human is completed by its opposite, namely the anthropomorphic treatment of Nature: it undoes the commodification of Nature and the human as enforced in Wessex but also in the real rural areas of England. Complementary to this process, the interrelatedness of the living world as a whole is also evidenced by the ethical dimension developed by the counter-text which posits that man’s stewardship of Nature is not only morally justified but also strongly recommended if human survival is to be secured. Eventually, Hardy’s text emerges as eco-conscious and resonates with our contemporary preoccupations and the solutions that are put forward.