Comments on: Book Review: Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy

By: CarrieK

CarrieK — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 20:52:52 +0000

Deanna – I know the feeling of a huge, ever-growing TBR list!

By: Deanna

Deanna — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 17:59:22 +0000

I do have this book on my TBR list. I am not sure when I will get to it so I skimmed through your spoiler part of the review…when I read {{ but I can’t say I’ll be picking it up again any time soon – if ever.}} I thought…hmmm…maybe I will wait a bit more before I read this book. Maybe when my TBR list is a lot smaller. **shrug** **smile**

By: CarrieK

CarrieK — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 15:24:53 +0000

Val – I missed out on a lot of classics during college, because I majored in theater arts. I read a ton of plays – and most of Shakespeare, but not a lot of classic novels. I’m kind of glad, because sometimes the feeling of being “assigned” reading can take the joy out of it.

Kathy – there were a few parts I definitely skimmed – sometimes his descriptions just went on and on…

Bonnie – exactly! There were times when I wanted to say, “enough about the road or sunshine or whatever – just get on iwth the story!”

LF – This book was so full of double-standards – between men and women and the rich and poor. I would not have wanted to live at that time.

By: Literary Feline

Literary Feline — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 14:55:52 +0000

Even though I haven’t read the book, I did go ahead and read your full review. I doubt I will read it anytime soon (not so much from lack of interest, but because it is not high up on my priority list). Isn’t it interesting the double standard some people have? It’s okay for them to trangress but not for others to. You’ve definitely got me more curious about this one, I have to say! Thanks for the great review.

By: Bonnie

Bonnie — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 13:06:51 +0000

I read (and reviewed) this one a while back, and I pretty much agree with your take on it. I thought it was a good book, but I also thought that Hardy was trying a little too hard in places to make a certain point and actually track of the fact that he was telling a story.

By: Kathy

Kathy — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 12:18:12 +0000

I haven’t read this book, but after your review, I’m not sure it’s for me – I don’t find flowery prose very appealing.

By: Val

Val — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 06:17:46 +0000

I’m pretty sure I read this in college…it all sounds vaguely familiar and I know I have the paperback on a bookshelf downstairs…but I don’t remember it all that much. This is no doubt a combo of the overwhelming number of books I had to read in college in too short a time, along with its incredibly sad plot. After reading so many ‘tearyourheartout” classics, I think they all just blended together into a blur of sadness that I just pushed right out of my mind…heh.

By: CarrieK

CarrieK — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 03:40:50 +0000

Lezlie – you’ll have to let me know what you think of Tess after you read it.

Stacy – I have a hard time listening to classics on audio – they seem to take more of my concentration and since I usually listen to audiobooks while I’m doing housework, it makes it hard.

Kool-Aid Mom – I haven’t read any George Eliot, yet, but I’m determined to read Middlemarch at some point. My best friend adored it, and our tastes are pretty similar.

By: The Kool-Aid Mom

The Kool-Aid Mom — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 02:34:42 +0000

I think one of the biggest differences between the first time I read Tess at 15 or 16 and when I re-read it last year at 34 is that, as a teen, I had this romantic notion that the man who would love me would accept everything about me, including my most darkest and awful secrets… as an adult, however, I know that’s bull, and that if nothing can be done about it, it’s not always best to tell. I can see Tess’s point in needing to tell Angel since they live in a small area and eventually it’d come out. But Angel was very much a hypocrite about it.

Tess of the d’Urbervilles is one of my favorite books, but I agree with you about Hardy being overly descriptive. 3 pages to describe the one bedroom was a bit much. I found George Eliot to have dipped from the same inkwell in that vein, only she didn’t do it quite as well.

Great review, I enjoyed being taken back to Tess

By: stacybuckeye

stacybuckeye — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 02:27:25 +0000

Great review! Your sentiments matched my own when I listened to it a few months ago. Since I listened to it I may have not been as struck by the flowery language. Sometimes a gifter reader can make it all better