Why Does Henchard Fail and Farfrae Succeed?.
This essay is based on "The Mayor of Casterbridge" by Thomas Hardy. I will be explaining how Michael Henchard fails and Donald Farfrae succeeds.
Donald Farfrae is a young Scotsman who is following the industrialisation of the world, however Michael Henchard is a man at the top, he is Mayor of Casterbridge and has a thriving business but he loses everything.
Henchard and Farfrae have a lot of opposite personal qualities which allows one of them to fail and the other to succeed in this rapidly industrialising world.
The first of Henchards" qualities I am discussing is his impulsiveness, by this I mean that he makes important decisions too quickly. An example of this is when Henchard sells his wife and child at the fairground auction near the beginning of the novel. Another example is when he hires Farfrae who at this time was a complete stranger to Henchard, because of this impulsive action in itself Farfrae decides to stay in Casterbridge. As Farfrae settles in from his new job he becomes more popular than Henchard, who slowly becomes second best, because of this Henchard is willing to do anything to destroy Farfrae showing more impulsive decisions.
Farfrae however is not as impulsive and spends more time over important decisions, such as when Henchard sells his crops thinking that they were becoming cheaper, Farfrae waits and makes a massive profit. Another one of Farfraes" qualities that helps lead to his success is that he is able to adapt, whereas Henchard can not adapt to new things and likes everything to be old fashioned. An example of this is when at the market, when a new piece of machinery is being shown Henchard says "tis impossible it should act" but Farfrae tells people it will work and "revolutionise sowing here about". Henchard is unwilling to modernise the town of Casterbridge whereas Farfrae wants to use his adventurous ideas to modernise Casterbridge and bring it into the Industrialised modern world.
