Skip to main content

The Return of The Native

The Return of The Native
by Thomas Hardy
The Return of The Native is one of the greatest novels of Thomas Hardy. Clym is the hero of the novel. Eustacia is the heroine of the novel. Mrs. Yeobright is the mother of Clym. She is also the aunt of Thomsin. Wildeve is the husband of Thomasin. Egdon Heath is the native of Clym. Clym returned to his native Egdon Heath from Paris. He is the product of Egdon Heath. He belongs to the Heath physically, instinctively and emotionally. He came back with high aims and ambitions to serve the natives by educating them. But fate did not support and all his plans ended in frustration. After returning Egdon Heath, he tries to start a school in the village. Eustacia is a foreigner to Egdon Heath. Eustacia hates the Egdon Heath. She desires for a fashionable luxurious life in Paris. In order to drive away her loneliness in Egdon Heath she makes relation with Wildeve but her desire make Wildeve unhappy and Wildeve goes back to Thomasin. Thomasin is a homely girl and loves Heath. She loves Wildeve but Eustacia takes Wildeve as her lover simply to relax her loneliness in the Heath. When Wildeve and Thomasin are about to be married, Eustacia calls him back again. Wildeve's attitude to Thomasin as a lover and as a husband is certainly not believable. He shifts from Thomasin as a lover and as a husband is certainly not believable. He shifts from Thomasin to Eustacia, and again to Thomasin. His attraction to Eustacia is sensuous. He marries Thomasin when he is rejected by Eustacia. 

After marriage with Thomasin, he neglects his wife and moves about the cottage of Eustacia. At this time Eustacia comes to know Clym and becomes interested in him. She has the impression that Clyn will go back to Paris. At the meeting between Eustacia and Clyn, Clyn is charmed by the beauty of Eustacia. 
He wants to marry her in spite of his mother's (Mrs. Yeobright) objection. Mrs. Yeobright opposes the marriage between Eustacia and Clym. Actually she is a practical woman. She also opposes Thomasin's decision to marry Wildeve. She wants Clym to marry Thomasin, but Clym has not shown any interest in the girl. Eustacia and Clym get married and Clym is separated from his mother. But the marriage fails because of the utter unsuitability of temper. Clym is satisfied with rural environment and simple way of life. He hates the vanity of city life. He does not want to go back to his trade of diamonds in Paris. His plan is to educate the people of the Health. He is a man of ideas. But his plan of education is opposed by his mother and by his wife. Eustacia desires for the fashions and pleasure of city life. Clym becomes semi-blind because of hard study and he has to give up his educational project. The irony of the situation is that Clym is creating his own misery by believing that he can educate and enlighten the people of the Health. He takes to furze-cutting. 

Eustacia doesn't accept it. She is a woman of superior beauty. She wants to be happy with Clym but her fate has not allowed her to be happy.

The loss of Clym's eye-sight shattered her all the romantic hopes of life. Eustacia believes that her fate is responsible for her miseries of life. One day Mrs. Yeobright goes to her son;s house and knocks at the door which was closed from inside. Nobody comes to open the door. She goes back and dies on the way. Egdon Heath is inimical to Mrs. Yeobright. she meets her tragic death in course of her journey across the Egdon Heath. She dies at a snake bite. Actually Wildeve and Eustacia are inside the house and they hit upon a plan how to flee from Heath. When Clym comes to know the death of his mother, he becomes furious and holds Eustacia responsible for the tragedy of his mother. Bitter quarrel arises between her and Clym. She thinks of committing suicide but later on she decides to run away to Paris with the help of her former lover Wildeve. Eustacia is a rebel against Egdon Heath. When she tries to fly away with Wildeve, there are storms and rains to interrupt. The rains and storms on the Egdon Heath create a death for Eustacia and she drowns herself into a deep pond of water and with her Wildeve jumps into the water to save Eustacia. His death is heroic. Now we see the catastrophe in the death of Eustacia and Wildeve. At the end of the novel when the main characters are either dead or gone, we find Clym preaching from the Rainbarrow in the Heath which he dearly loves.



Please make comment if you like it.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Clear Light of Day by Anita Desai

Clear Light of Day (Novel) Clear Light of Day is one of Anita Desai’s most outstanding novels and may be regarded as one of the masterpiece in the field of Indo-Anglican fiction. The novel indicates the realistic pictures of family life. Ani ta Desai was born in 1937 of a German mother and a Bengali father. Clear Light of Day tells the story of a Hindu family living in a rented house in old Delhi. The house belongs to a rich Muslim landlord, whose name is Hyder Ali , Mr. and Mrs. Das live in this house with their four children --- Raja, Bim, Tara and Baba. Raja, Bim, Tara and Baba in this novel are the victims of an unpleasant, meaningless, hopeless, melancholy atmosphere of childhood. They spend their childhood in a home, which smells of disease and decay. The parents are busy with their own affairs, and do not make an effort themselves about the needs of their children. The kind of unhappy situation creates fear, insecurity, distrust and anxiety as the children grow up. Mr...
Post a Comment
Read more

Mother by Maxim Gorky

                                                                   Mother                                                                              By Maxim Gorky Maxim Gorky's Mother is the landmark in the history of English literature. Although this book was written ten years before the establishment of Soviet power in Russia, we count it the first stone laid in the foundations of Soviet Literature. Mother was first published in Russia in 1907. When Gorky wrote it, he was a mature craftsman, fully aware of his historical mission. During the Russian revolution of 1905 that is, two years before, Mother came out in Russi...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Tell-Tale Heart

The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Alan Poe Edgar Alan Poe (1809-1849) was one of the finest short writers in the history of English literature. Poe’s fame we see as the master of horror, the father of the detective story. Poe, in fact, wrote nearly short works of fiction. The Tell-Tale Heart is the most famous short stories of Poe. The story is a psychological portrait of a mad narrator who kills a man. It is a horror story. This poem exemplifies Poe’s ability to expose the dark side of humankind. The storyteller says how afraid he was of the old man’s Evil terribly that he gradually determined to kill the old man and get rid of it. It appeared very evil to him and such an evil eye should not last long. He had tried to establish that he was not mad. It was not his madness that drove him to determine to murder the old man. The man was not bad but all the trouble was created by the evil eye. It is the story of domestic violence. This violence was the result of an irrational fear. The...
1 comment
Read more