卡斯特桥市长

The novel approaches the complex psychological state of a man who had auctioned his wife and daughter under the effect of intoxication, penury, and anger, and repented afterwards by making an oath of abstention that had lasted for more than twenty years. By focusing on the progress of Michael Henchard, Hardy had thus sought to unearth some of the darkest facts in English history. The auction itself may seem grotesque to the reader today, but was, by no means, an unusual proceeding in rural England at the time.Like Henry James, Hardy did not write to please his society but had rather targeted the mature readers. Including the auction of a woman by her own husband in a literary work was considered a taboo, for although the affair itself was common enough in real life, to have written about it was regarded as a trespass against decency. But Hardy was not a man to be silenced by the absurd guidelines of conventions. He had written about divorce, unfaithfulness, adultery, and now he wrote about moral degeneracy of a kind that had to do with women's conditions and the manner in which they were degraded and treated as a purchasable item.The novel also addresses the rapid changes that were effected by the rise of industrialization, and the issue of destitution that was brought about by modernity. Towns were gradually taking over the countryside causing people to be flung out of their homes with neither money nor employment. As far as structure and literary devices are concerned, the book features a binary opposition between Henchard and Farefrae, for whenever one loses the other makes profits and vice-versa. This serves many ends at the same time. On the one hand, it reflects the uselessness of the struggle against the monsters of industrialization. With neither education nor business training, Henchard stood no chance in the fight against modernity in spite of his vigor and strength. On the other hand, it allows the novel to dwell upon the limited capacity of human beings from the view point of Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard and his principles of the finite and infinite. Henchard was unable to succeed because he had to live with skills that were neither wanted nor needed in his time. In this respect, he is similar to the Greek tragic hero who loses everything in the course of his struggles.