Hardy vis-à-vis J.S. Mill in The Hand of Ethelberta

Abstract

The Hand of Ethelberta, dismissed usually as ‘the most brittle and superficial of his works’,¹ is very important as far as Hardy’s thought is concerned. Ethelberta, a poetess of rare charms and accomplishments, is, as the title itself suggests, the central character in this novel. The third of a butler’s ten children, she passes herself off as the daughter of the late Bishop of Silchester, and carefully conceals her identity, not because she is ashamed of owning her parents, but because she wants to rise higher in order to raise her family up from poverty. Self-abnegation is the chief characteristic of her soul. Iron will and an ability to manoeuvre situations into the desired direction by dint of patience and perseverance, are others. She knows no defeat or despair and pursues the larger happiness of all concerned in her actions as the summum bonum. In her situation she has to turn even marriage into a means of realizing the welfare of her family. That is why she renounces Christopher Julian whom she loves, and marries one Mr Petherwin. After the death of her husband she could have waited until her responsibilities were over, to marry Christopher at last. But she discovered that Picotee, her younger sister, had developed a hopeless one-sided passion for him.