"Tess of the D"Ubervilles" is a classic tragedy by Thomas Hardy. This novel is about Tess Durbeyfield, a simple country girl who is used by Alec D"Uberville, a wealthy gentleman as a victim of lamentable purpose, and later finds love with Angel Clare who marries her but abandons her on their wedding night when he finds out about her previous history. Tess is left to survive by herself only to run into Alec D"Uberville again, who quickly becomes obsessed with trying to win her back. Tess refuses all of Alec's advances until he convinces her that Angel will never come back. Angel returns to find her with D"Uberville and is deeply hurt. Tess ends up killing D"Uberville in a fit of despair and she escapes with Angel only to be caught and executed a few days later. .
The characters in "Tess of the D"Ubervilles", especially Tess, are well-rounded three-dimensional characters (although towards the end of this novel Hardy appears to have grown sick of all the other characters but Tess). Tess is a powerful and beautiful heroine who through out the novel exhibits generosity, resourcefulness, endurance and vulnerability in everything that she does. An example of Tess" generosity is how she always puts others first. Even though Tess despised Alec she went back to him so that her brothers and sisters would be properly taken care of and provided for. Through out the novel Tess" vulnerability and innocence is an attribute to her womanliness. It was these characteristics that first attracted the attentions of both Alec and Angel. Angel described Tess as "a rosy warming apparition, an exceedingly novel, fresh and interesting specimen of women kind" (Pg. 186). Both Alec and Angel realize that Tess is unique straight away but even through all the distress she experiences it still doesn't destroy the tenderness that she has for others. For instance when Angel leaves her, she still thinks of him as her husband and she refuses to say a bad word against him or let others bring his character into disrepute despite all the hardship that he puts her through.
