[Hardy-l] Re: Thoughts on 'Tess'

[Niemeyer, Paul J.]

Rosemarie, I'm not sure why you're quoting Hardy's description of the mail cart--I know it's a mail cart in the novel, but I'm not sure it's one in the TV serial.  (Did you think I was referring to the original magazine serial of TESS?)
 
Anyway, I'm afraid the treatment of Prince's death is turning into the King Charles' head of this discussion, but I guess there's a little more to be said.  An obvious rejoinder to the comment "this is not Hardy" comes to mind: no, it isn't.  Nothing in the TV serial is.  Even dialogue that comes straight from the novel and images that strike us as being 100% true to what Hardy wrote come to us in an entirely different medium and have been modified to suit the needs of that medium.  Only the novel TESS is Hardy.
 
There are a lot of good reasons why the director may have chosen to alter Prince's death.  One thing that comes to mind is the matter of detail.  When Hardy's original readers read about a mail cart on the road, they had a contemporary image in mind, much as we do when we hear about a mail truck.  For today's readers, that image has changed: I suppose we all know what a horse-driven cart looks like, but how many of us have a clear picture of what an 1890s mail cart looked like?  Or an 1890s mail carrier?  (I can envision Van Gogh's painting of a postman, but he was French--not much help.)  Ultimately, though, most readers probably don't worry too much about what the mail cart looked like, and they substitute something that is clear in their own minds.  As an example, I'm currently re-reading WUTHERING HEIGHTS in preparation for teaching it.  When I read about "the kitchen" I know it's something different from what I've known all my life as a kitchen, but, dammit, I still picture Nelly Dean with a Frigidaire and a microwave in the background!  That fact doesn't keep me from understanding the novel, though.
 
In a film or TV adaptation, however, you have to worry about things such as the proper signage on the cart, what the mail bags looked like, what the mail carrier was wearing, and in the end it all may be a distraction.  Instead of the viewer's attention being on the action, the viewer may be left saying, "So that's what an 1890s mail cart looks like!  What's that written on the side?  Hey, what's a mail cart doing here, anyway?"  In contrast, the serial established the sight of people in 1890s working garb from the opening shot, so a viewer would not be distracted by workers in a cart on the road.
 
As to why the manner of Prince's death was changed, well, who knows?  This is made for TV, so spurting arterial blood might have been considered too disgusting (but I have my doubts, having seen a lot of CSI); or it could have been that the filmmakers originally shot a more "faithful"--ooh that word--version of the death and realized it just didn't work on a visual level.  Viewers might have been reminded more of the fountains of blood that gushed forth every time Uma Thurman lopped off a head or an arm in the KILL BILL movies than they were made to contemplate the Durbeyfields' economic tragedy.
 
Ultimately, the crucial element from Hardy's novel--the death of the horse--is there and it serves the same purpose as it does in the novel: it gets Tess to Trantridge.  What has been changed is what Brian MacFarlane calls the "catalyzer," the surface details surrounding the plot function.  We like our catalyzers: when they're changed we feel like we've been cheated of an accurate depiction of the novel, even though catalyzers are subjective and hard to film.  Anyway, I guess I've had my say on this. . .before I start arguing about angels dancing on the head of a pin, I'll just resolve to agree to disagree.
 
Best,
 
Paul   

________________________________

From: Rosemarie Morgan [mailto:Rosemarie.morgan at yale.edu]

Hardy says (Ist edition) "The morning mail-cart , with its two noiseless
wheels, speeding along these lanes like an arrow, as it always did, had
driven into her slow and unlighted equipage" (Maiden, IV).

Rosemarie

>Not to be pedantic, but I'm not entirely sure that the cart Tess runs into
>in the serial IS a mail cart.
>Eyes open,
>
>Paul Niemeyer

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