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Literary Devices
Definition of Allusion
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to other literary works, famous individuals, historical events, or philosophical ideas... read full definition
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to other literary works, famous individuals... read full definition
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to... read full definition
Chapter 3
Explanation and Analysis—William Wordsworth:
In Chapter 3, Hardy references a line from William Wordsworth's poem, "Lines Written in Early Spring":
Some people would like to know whence the poet whose philosophy is in these days deemed as profound and trustworthy as his verse is pure and breezy, gets his authority for speaking of "Nature's holy plan."
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Chapter 5
Explanation and Analysis—Malthus and Population:
At the beginning of Chapter 5, the narrator reflects on the sheer number of children in the Durbeyfield family. Tess resents her mother for having so many children given their family's meager income, prompting the narrator to make an allusion to Thomas Malthus:
Unlock with LitCharts A+As Tess grew older, and began to see how matters stood, she felt Malthusian vexation with her mother for thoughtlessly giving her so many little sisters and brothers, when it was such a trouble to nurse those that had already come.
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Chapter 9
Explanation and Analysis—Alec Whistling:
In Chapter 9, Alec D'Urberville encounters Tess practicing her whistle. Ever predatory in his manner, Alec decides he will teach her to whistle. In doing so, he makes an allusion through his choice of tune:
Unlock with LitCharts A+He suited the action to the word, and whistled a line of "Take, O take those lips away." But the allusion was lost upon Tess.
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Chapter 11
Explanation and Analysis—Tess's Guardian Angel:
At the end of Chapter 11, Alec physically assaults Tess, taking her to an isolated glade in the forest and drugging her. In an interesting example of narrative voice, the narrator takes this moment to make an abstract observation about God and the nature of fate, making an allusion to the Bible in the process:
Unlock with LitCharts A+But where was Tess's guardian angel? where was Providence? Perhaps, like that other god of whom the ironical Tishbite spoke, he was talking, or he was pursuing, or he was in a journey, or peradventure he was sleeping and not to be awakened.
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Chapter 15
Explanation and Analysis—The Fall of Babylon:
At the end of Chapter 15, the narrator makes an allusion to the downfall of Babylon—documented in the Bible—and compares it to the fall of the House of D'Urberville:
Unlock with LitCharts A+[Tess] would be able to look at [the former D'Urberville estates], and think not only that D'Urberville, like Babylon, had fallen, but that the individual innocence of a humble descendant could lapse as silently.
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Chapter 16
Explanation and Analysis—Tess as Eve:
As Tess heads to her new job as a milkmaid in Chapter 16, she remembers a song she used to sing as a child, before she had her tragic encounter with Alec D'Urberville. Using a biblical allusion, the narrator likens this pre-Alec time to the time before Eve ate the apple in the Garden of Eden:
Unlock with LitCharts A+She tried several ballads, but found them inadequate; till, recollecting the psalter that her eyes had so often wandered over of a Sunday morning before she had eaten of the tree of knowledge, she chanted: "O ye Sun and Moon … O ye Stars … ye Green Things upon the Earth … ye Fowls of the Air … Beasts and Cattle … Children of Men … bless ye the Lord, praise Him and magnify Him for ever!"
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Explanation and Analysis—Tess's New Beginning:
In Chapter 16, the narrator describes the Vale of Little Dairies as full of wide open spaces. This spatial imagery mirrors Tess's current journey—both physical and emotional—which, in her mind, will provide her with new opportunities and freedom:
Unlock with LitCharts A+[The Vale of Little Dairies] lacked the intensely blue atmosphere of the rival Vale, and its heavy soils and scents; the new air was clear, bracing, ethereal. The river itself, which nourished the grass and cows of these renowned dairies, flowed not like streams in Blackmoor. Those were slow, silent, often turbid; flowing over beds of mud into which the incautious wader might sink and vanish unawares. The Var waters were clear as the pure River of Life shown to the Evangelist.
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Chapter 18
Explanation and Analysis—Milton and Cromwell:
Hardy references John Milton and Oliver Cromwell by name in the following passage from Chapter 18, alluding to their respective writings and political theories:
Unlock with LitCharts A+The typical and unvarying Hodge ceased to exist. He had been disintegrated into a number of varied fellow-creatures—beings of many minds, beings infinite in difference; some happy, many serene, a few depressed, one here and there bright even to genius, some stupid, others wanton, others austere; some mutely Miltonic, some potentially Cromwellian.
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Chapter 20
Explanation and Analysis—Mary Magdelene:
In Chapter 20, when Tess and Angel are first dancing around each other, Angel likens Tess to Mary Magdalene (an allusion to biblical scripture):
Unlock with LitCharts A+"The mixed, singular, luminous gloom in which they walked along together to the spot where the cows lay, often made [Angel] think of the Resurrection hour. He little thought that the Magdalen might be at his side."
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Chapter 23
Explanation and Analysis—Tess's Thorny Crown:
At the end of Chapter 23, the narrator elaborates on Tess's complicated romantic situation by alluding to the crucifixion of Jesus in the Bible:
Unlock with LitCharts A+The thorny crown of this sad conception was that she whom he really did prefer in a cursory way to the rest, she who knew herself to be more impassioned in nature, cleverer, more beautiful than they, was in the eyes of propriety far less worthy of him than the homelier ones whom he ignored.
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Explanation and Analysis—Leah and Rachel:
In Chapter 23, as Angel carries Tess across the water, he makes an important biblical allusion:
Unlock with LitCharts A+"Three Leahs to get one Rachel," [Angel] whispered.
"They are better women than I," [Tess] replied, magnanimously sticking to her resolve.
"Not to me," said Angel."
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Chapter 27
Explanation and Analysis—Tess and the Snake:
In the following passage from Chapter 27, Angel catches Tess off-guard. The narrator uses a simile to liken Tess to a snake:
Unlock with LitCharts A+[Tess] had not heard [Angel] enter, and hardly realized his presence there. She was yawning, and he saw the red interior of her mouth as if it had been a snake’s. She had stretched one arm so high above her coiled-up cable of hair that he could see its satin delicacy above the sunburn.
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Chapter 32
Explanation and Analysis—Queen Guinevere:
Upon first seeing herself dressed in wedding clothes at the end of Chapter 32, Tess's guilt weighs upon her. The narrative alludes in this moment to the infidelity of Queen Guinevere, the wife of King Arthur:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Alone, [Tess] stood for a moment before the glass looking at the effect of her silk attire . . . . Suppose this robe should betray her by changing colour, as her robe had betrayed Queen Guénever.
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