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A University of Sussex DPhil thesis Available online via Sussex Research Online: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/ This thesis is protected by copyright which belongs to the author. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Please visit Sussex Research Online for more information and further details LITERATURE, INTUITION AND FAITH DPHIL THESIS FIONA TURNER UNIVERSITY OF SUSSEX 2013 Fiona Turner/DPhil/University of Sussex/Abstract ABSTRACT This thesis is entitled ‘Literature, Intuition and Faith’ and it aims to create a new critical perspective of Thomas Hardy’s novels by examining four of his best-known works. I will suggest that the novels of Thomas Hardy reveal a particular narrative concerning the idea of spiritual intuition and the Hardyean protagonist. The discussion will use as its methodology a close analysis of the sub-textual impulses of the novels rather than the considerable biographical information that is already available on Thomas Hardy. The contention of the thesis is that in contrast to Hardy’s expressed allegiance to agnosticism, an unspoken and so far unrecognised narrative of intuitive spiritual faith inhabits the text. ………………………………………………………………………………………… Fiona Turner/DPhil/University of Sussex/Acknowledgements ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My first and most grateful thanks are to the thesis supervisor, Norman Vance, Professor of English and Intellectual History at the University of Sussex. His encyclopaedic knowledge of both subjects is matched by an acute ability to inspire students to challenge the limits of their own thinking. His distinguished academic achievements are combined with humour, patience and kindness towards students. These qualities create the best learning experience, one I shall not forget. I am grateful to Dr. Sophie Thomas who supervised the early stages of the thesis before an academic appointment took her overseas. Her wise counsel and kindness was very much appreciated. My thanks to all staff in the department of English at the University of Sussex where an atmosphere of high academic expectations combined with unfailing support for students exists. I was privileged to have as my tutors over the years Professor Peter Abbs, Professor Lindsay Smith and Professor Jenny Taylor as well as Professor Vance. The skill and patience of library staff at the University of Sussex must be acknowledged. I would also like to acknowledge the University of Chichester’s department of English, and thank Professor William ‘Bill’ Gray, whose undergraduate seminars on literature, philosophy and theology first lit my interest in these subjects some years ago. My gratitude also to Dr. Fiona Price, undergraduate supervisor, who suggested I take this interest further. My husband Ian has been the main source of support. I dedicate this thesis to him, and our children. …………………………………………………………………………………… Fiona Turner/DPhil/University of Susssex/Contents Page LITERATURE, INTUITION AND FAITH CONTENTS INTRODUCTION CHAPTER ONE – ISOLATION The Woodlanders CHAPTER TWO – INTELLECT Jude the Obscure CHAPTER THREE – ILLUMINATION Far from the Madding Crowd CHAPTER FOUR – IMMANENCE Tess of the d’Urbervilles CONCLUSION BIBLIOGRAPH Y i INTRODUCTION The aim of this thesis is to examine novels by the nineteenth century writer Thomas Hardy in the context of the interactions of literary narrative, intuition and faith. The investigation proceeds from the (sub)-textual evidence of Hardy’s novels alone (as the ground from which the investigation develops), rather than entering into dialogue in detail with the now substantial body of Hardy criticism and scholarship. However, insofar as the concerns of this project can be located in one compatible narrative in existing work on Hardy, it may be found in a few brief comments made in Michael Millgate’s revised biography of Hardy. I quote from the chapter titled ‘Pessimistic Meliorist’: Where Hardy differed from so many of his contemporaries was in the absoluteness, the literalness, with which he believed that not to be born was best, that consciousness was a curse, and that while death might distress the bereaved the dead themselves were not to be pitied. 1 Whilst Millgate considers the interesting notion of Hardy’s apparent pessimism, this thesis leans towards notions concerning Millgate’s assertion that Hardy thought ‘consciousness was a curse’. Notwithstanding the value Hardy placed on consciousness, this thesis discusses, through the prism of Hardy’s novels, what may lie underneath depictions of overt consciousness. We may understand ‘consciousness’ to mean not only the use of mental faculties but additionally, the potential to analyse our use of that cognition. This understanding of what consciousness means is amenable to aesthetic analysis. If we understand art and literature to be conscious manifestations of the artist’s intent or state of mind, then we too may join a narrative that sites consciousness (as opposed to dreams, wishes etc) within the dubious paradigm of ‘truth’, or at least the truth of intent. 1 Millgate, M., Thomas Hardy, A Biography Revisited (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004) p380 ii But this thesis does not focus on consciousness – it focuses on the subconscious, although it is important to emphasise at the outset that this is not the model we associate with Freud. Specifically, in relation to ideas of literature and faith, it focuses on the idea of a subconscious spiritual intuition. The OED describes intuition as ‘the ability to understand something immediately without the need for conscious reasoning’ and intuitionism as a ‘philosophy – the theory that primary truths and principles are known by intuition’. Moreover, the latter, that is intuitionism gained precedence in the nineteenth century as an area of interest. Jenny B. Taylor and Sarah Shuttleworth’s anthology Embodied Selves brings together a diverse collection of works on mental science. It supports the idea of an intellectual culture in the nineteenth century that was energetically attending to complex pre-Freudian narratives: ..it is still often assumed, for instance, that the Victorians firmly believed in a unified, stable ego, that the English concept of the unconscious was of a crude physical reflex, or that medical and psychiatric discourses represented a monolithic, almost conspiratorial desire to construct and police dominant notions of gender. 2 Taylor and Shuttleworth make us aware that nineteenth-century psychological culture was more complex than a superficial notion of ‘typical Victorians’ may suggest. Taylor and Shuttleworth (and certainly many who have closely looked at Thomas Hardy’s works) contribute much to the debate on identity, but this thesis will regard identity in the context not of a social self, but through the prism of the Hardyean protagonist as the possessor of a unique, spiritualised intuition. However, this thesis does not assume that a spiritualised intuition is the means by which a social identity is created. Instead it is the mode through which the protagonist demonstrates a deeper 2 Taylor J. B., & Shuttleworth S., (eds.) Embodied Selves (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1998) xiv iii apprehension of material life and the idea of a spiritual universe. Moreover, intuitive energy operating through Hardyean protagonists is invariably oriented towards a meeting of the individual with an omnipotent metaphysical unity. We may describe that phenomenon as the One, the Good, or God. Whatever name we give it, the contention of this thesis is that throughout Hardy’s novels there is a subconscious narrative which speaks of a desire, even if it is eventually unfulfilled, to meet that unity and to reach it through the intuition. The intolerable nature of consciousness for Hardy (implied by Millgate) seems to be allied to some proof of Hardy’s so-called pessimism. However, I argue that Hardy’s ambivalence towards the idea of consciousness may have been less a pessimistic belief that it is better not to have any cognitive faculties (as a dead person has not) but more, on closer inspection, a silent valorisation of intuition. The trope of intuition is fraught with subtleties and complexities. A detailed study of the power of intuition and its philosophical overtones may be found in the work of the philosopher Hénri Bergson. 3 However, Bergson’s approach on the subject of intuition tended to emphasise the notion of the élan vital , the life spirit or force which powers human existence. We cannot disagree that a substantial sense of a life force exists in the work of Thomas Hardy. However, this thesis attempts to site intuition in a direct relationship with the metaphysical One, and it hopes to show how a nineteenth century writer of fiction such as Hardy achieved this through complex and subtle development of characterisation. A thesis on the subject of intuition and its conjunction with what Hardy called the novel of character and environment involves a methodological approach that any fair critique may assert is a creative one. It is impossible to prove the intuition of a 3 Bergson has written widely on intuition and his concept of the élan vital. iv writer or that of any character the writer creates, therefore it must be stated at the outset that this thesis makes no claim of absolute truth, instead it creates a discussion of the potentialities that lie in a faintly concealed narrative in a particular writer’s literary production. The contention of this thesis is that ultimately Thomas Hardy does allow us to see the intuitive impulses of his novels quite clearly if we look a little closer. Specifically, I hope to illuminate how a spiritual intuition is demonstrated through the carefully developed sensibilities of key protagonists in Thomas Hardy’s fiction. Hardy develops his protagonists as a means through which a particular awareness is activated.

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