I read this book years ago, then decided to re-read it after seeing the 1990's movie with Catherine Zeta Jones as Eustacia Vye. I don't know why it didn't make a stronger impression on me the first time I read it.
There is something very modern about how Hardy uses the landscape of Egdon Heath. He creates visions of large, primitive hills, with silhouettes of figures emerging from and disappearing into them as if they were growths produced from of the heath itself and were fated to merge back into it (ashes to ashes, dust to dust). It made me think of a huge lava lamp (I know that's weird, but read the book and you'll see what I mean). The imagery reinforces the idea that human beings are futile, short-lived creatures. The events that seem all important to us make no lasting impression on the world. The vibrant character and beauty of Eustacia and her strong desire to escape from the heath make little impression in the long term and she never does escape. Clym, who already did escape to Paris in the past, feels himself pulled back and decides to move back to the heath for good. The heath seems to have an irresistible gravitational pull on all those who live there.
The reddleman Diggory Venn is the character most closely associated with the heath, and his redness and propensity to just appear and disappear at will into the landscape makes him an almost spectral figure, as if he were the spirit of the heath itself. He is the wisest and best informed of the characters, and is the only one who doesn't have anything tragic happen to him.
Throughout the novel appears the theme of ancient, rural traditions coming up against new, urban ideas that in the end make little progress against the old ways.
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