The Complete Hardy 4: A Pair of Blue Eyes

I diagnose the reason why I don't appreciate Jane Austen as being that I can't tell which aspects of the characters' behaviour are intended as comedy and which are social conventions of Jane's time that she regards as entirely to be expected. A similar problem comes about in A Pair of Blue Eyes in which 32 year old Henry Knight can't accept that his first girlfriend, the 19 year old Elfride, has been kissed before. It's worse than that, though, the widow, Mrs Jethway, blames Elfride for the death of her young son who was also smitten but who received less encouragement previously. And the suitor in between, Stephen Smith, was quite naturally an old friend of Knight. One would never wish a Hardy story to be short of complications and they are only the most of them.

In a way, not being able to be sure quite unworldly Hardy thought his characters to be is in keeping with the ambivalence of how relatively tragic and comic the novel is. The two rivals, both dispossessed of the beloved but equally interested in returning home to Cornwall to relaim her ahead of the other, are surely a hapless double act- and somehow we by then realize they must be- before entirely forseeably neither is the winner.

It is no more absurd or demanding of our suspension of disbelief than any of the later catalogues of twists of fate that make up the framework of Hardy's art and he sets up some memorable set piece situations on it. Perhaps my favourite is Knight and Elfride watching the return of Stephen on the ship, the landbound and seagoing parties watching each other through telescopes but there's a huge amount to enjoy, as ever, in the fabric of the writing and the dynamics of the social relationships involved. 

A note on Hardy's names is also due. Like Shakespeare who never missed an opportunity with even minor characters like Moth, Osric, Bushy, Bagot and Green, in this book - just for one example- Hardy delineates class status with names like Luxellian, Swancourt, Knight, Smith and Worm to leave little doubt about birthrights. 

It's a brilliant book.

-

What remains of the Hardy project are novels I've read before but so long ago that a reminder is overdue but still anticipated with great enthusiasm. The Hand of Ethelberta, Two on a Tower and Under the Greenwood Tree will follow.