The Resistance And Surrender Of Bathsheba To Patriarchy In Far From The Madding Crowd

Thomas Hardy is one of the greatest realistic novelists in Britain. Most of his works portray women. He has a deep understanding of women's life style and psychology, and shows great sympathy for the women in male-dominated society. His first famous novel Far from the Madding Crowd presents the living conditions of Victorian women fully and centrally.This thesis focuses on the female character in this novel and presents Hardy's depiction of a Victorian woman-Bathsheba who surpasses the tradition under Patriarchy. She has extraordinary personality and abundant emotions, and shows the distinctive female-consciousness in pursuing independence and freedom. She resists the Patriarchy by her independence in character, economy, love and marriage. But at last, she is tamed by Oak, the representative of the Patriarchy and acts as his obedient wife willingly. Thus, the purpose of this thesis is to show the course that Bathsheba's resistance to Patriarchy ends up with her surrender to it, to point out that this is a female tragedy and to analyze its sources: Hardy's tragedy consciousness, fatalism and the limit of his ideas.