64 pages • 2 hours read
Far From The Madding Crowd
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Chapters 12-20Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 12 Summary: “Farmers—A Rule—An Exception”
Bathsheba appears in the corn market at Casterbridge, signaling her intent to be a hands-on farmer; she is the only woman present at the market, causing some surprise among the other shoppers. Out of earshot, they criticize her decision to do everything herself, but presume she will soon be married, anyway.
However, Bathsheba takes note of the one man in the market who does not take note of her. Bathsheba later asks Liddy who the man is; at first, she is confused, but then tells Bathsheba that she is referring to Farmer Boldwood, who had visited her house the other day. She tells her that people say he was jilted by a woman when he was younger and has remained standoffish ever since.
Chapter 13 Summary: “Sortes Sanctorum—The Valentine”
In February, the day before Valentine’s Day, Liddy and Bathsheba are sitting together when the topic of conversation turns to marriage. Liddy asks Bathsheba if she has ever tried to divine her future partner by a method using a Bible and a key; Bathsheba dismisses the idea, but then agrees to give it a shot. The Bible moves, indicating that she will marry the person she thought of; however, Bathsheba refuses to tell Liddy who that was.
The conversation turns back to Boldwood, whom Liddy noticed did not turn toward Bathsheba during church services at all. After a silence, Bathsheba recalls that she had bought a valentine yesterday; Liddy presumes it is for Boldwood, but Bathsheba indignantly replies that it is for little Teddy Coggan, just as a small surprise. Bathsheba writes out the valentine, but when Liddy suggests it would be fun to play a prank on Boldwood, Bathsheba considers his “troublesome image” (115), and she decides to send it to Boldwood, writing “Marry Me” on the seal.
Chapter 14 Summary: “Effect of the Letter—Sunrise”
When Boldwood sits down to supper on Valentine’s Day, he eyes the valentine on the mantle which he had been pondering all day. Boldwood, a very serious man, is unable to believe that the letter was not sent deliberately and seriously; he takes the letter to bed, continuing to think about it, even waking throughout the night to check and recheck the envelope for more of a clue as to who sent it.
In the morning, when the mailcart arrives with another letter, Boldwood seizes it and immediately opens it; however, he discovers that this letter, though anonymous as well, is not for him, but rather for Gabriel. He initially tells the mailman to take it to Bathsheba to be delivered to Gabriel, but when he spots Gabriel in the distance, heading to the malthouse, he decides to take the letter himself, which will give him a pretense on which he might ask about his valentine.
Chapter 15 Summary: “A Morning Meeting—The Letter Again”
It is breakfast at the malthouse, and the topic of conversation is Bathsheba; the consensus appears to be that she will eventually regret not hiring a new bailiff, though some speak highly of her.
Gabriel arrives with some newborn lambs; as there is no lambing hut in Weatherbury, he has been using the malthouse as a substitute. Gabriel and the maltster talk a bit about Norcombe, when the topic of conversation turns to Bathsheba and the critiques the men have of her. Gabriel sharply warns them that he will not hear any bad talk about Bathsheba, and the men assent. Nevertheless, they try to bait him a bit; Gabriel refuses to take it.
Boldwood enters with the letter for Gabriel, which turns out to be a letter from Fanny, returning the money Gabriel lent her and informing him of her impending marriage to Sergeant Troy. He gives the letter to Boldwood to read due to his interest in Fanny’s whereabouts. Boldwood does not have a high opinion of Troy; he says Troy is clever but wild.
Cainy Ball rushes in to inform Oak that two more ewes have twinned, necessitating Oak’s departure. Boldwood follows him out, and when they are alone, asks him about the valentine. Oak immediately recognizes the handwriting as Bathsheba’s but grows embarrassed with himself when he realizes he has just given her up as the writer of an anonymous letter. The two men part ways, and Boldwood continues to ponder the letter over breakfast.
Chapter 16 Summary: “All Saints’ and All Souls’”
At All Saints’ Church, following a weekday service, Troy arrives for his wedding. Much of the congregation remains to watch; however, Fanny is missing. After some time, Troy gives up and leaves. As he crosses the town square, he encounters Fanny, who had instead gone to All Souls’ Church. Fanny apologizes and assumes they can simply marry the next day; Troy, however, is embarrassed and angry; he storms off without committing to another wedding date.
Chapter 17 Summary: “In the Market-Place”
One Saturday at the Casterbridge market, Boldwood observes Bathsheba enter, for the first time truly noticing her, albeit as an object of confusion rather than desire, “as something foreign to his element, and but dimly understood” (141). As Boldwood monitors her, Bathsheba takes notice, “having broken into that dignified stronghold at last” (143). However, she also notes that what was meant as a tease seems to have taken a much stronger hold in him, and she weighs the merits of apologizing for the jest with the fear that an apology may further misconstrue her intentions.
Chapter 18 Summary: “Boldwood in Meditation—Regret”
Boldwood’s character is illustrated as he walks the grounds of his farm, having returned from the market, and the narrator suggests that what appears to be a strong moral code to outsiders might “have been the perfect balance of enormous antagonistic forces—positives and negatives in fine adjustment” (146). Across the fields, Boldwood sees Bathsheba along with Gabriel and Cainy; seeing her figure “lighted him up as the moon lights up a great tower” (147).
Boldwood decides to walk over and talk to his neighbor. However, he recognizes in their actions and movements that they notice him, which causes him to change his mind and instead pretend he is along the road on some other business. Bathsheba, however, is not fooled by this, and resolves to avoid him entirely so as not to further confuse him.
Chapter 19 Summary: “The Sheep-Washing—The Offer”
Eventually, Boldwood calls on her at home, only to be told she is out at the sheep-washing; he is momentarily embarrassed, realizing he should have known that since she is, too, a farmer. He heads over to the sheep-washing pool to find her.
At the pool, he says good morning to her; she returns it, then withdraws to avoid him. However, he follows her until they are far enough away from the others to talk in private. Almost immediately upon gaining her attention, Boldwood asks her to marry him. Bathsheba tries to politely decline, but Boldwood continues insisting, referencing the valentine. This frustrates Bathsheba, who now regrets sending it, and she attempts to write it off as carelessness; Boldwood refuses to hear of it that way, though, and continues his entreaties. He finally convinces her to at least consider it; she says she will but asks him to give her time and to remain neutral, rather than hopeful, as he waits.
Chapter 20 Summary: “Perplexity—Grinding the Shears—A Quarrel”
Bathsheba realizes that many women in her position would be thrilled to be offered marriage by Boldwood, but she is underwhelmed; though she respects him, she knows she does not love him. Further, the typical practical reasons for her accepting the offer are not in place, as Bathsheba is already the head of her own farm, and therefore not in need of Boldwood’s stature and wealth.
Bathsheba seeks out Gabriel to discuss the matter with him. As they work together, she asks him if the farmhands have been talking about Bathsheba and Boldwood; Gabriel confirms that some have been talking of marriage between the two, which Bathsheba rejects as absurd and tells Gabriel to contradict it next it comes up.
However, Gabriel tells her that if Boldwood does speak of marriage, he will not lie about it. He further offers his opinion on her conduct, which she declines initially before changing her mind. Gabriel tells her that her actions regarding Boldwood have been unbecoming, which angers her. They argue, and Bathsheba brings up Gabriel’s own offer of marriage, to which Gabriel responds by telling her that he has long ago stopped thinking of or wishing for her hand in marriage. He further castigates her for “leading on” Boldwood (164).
Bathsheba considers his comments to be too bold and dismisses him from his duties at the farm. He takes his shears and leaves.
Chapters 12-20 Analysis
Bathsheba’s actions in this section are the true inciting incident of the novel. Without her Valentine’s Day jest, much of the rest of the novel would not happen: Boldwood remains oblivious to her, so regardless of what happens with Troy, Boldwood does not kill him to protect his beloved. It would be foolish to blame Bathsheba for those actions, as the seriousness with which Boldwood takes the valentine is laughably extreme, and Bathsheba could not have expected him to react that way. However, it would likewise be reductive to claim that Bathsheba’s actions were those of arrogance, vanity, or whimsy. First, Boldwood is Bathsheba’s only real equal in town, and Bathsheba, as a woman, must already fight for people to give her the respect that comes so easily to Boldwood; in that light, the fact that Boldwood doesn’t take notice of her can and should be seen as insulting. The narrator presents it as a matter of him not noticing the pretty woman, but it is just as likely that Bathsheba feels snubbed as a fellow landowner and farmer, more so because she takes an active interest in the farm. The novel never clarifies if Boldwood treated her uncle the same way, but we can presume that he did not; yet, once Bathsheba takes over, Upper Weatherbury Farm—and its owner—become invisible to him.
In this section, the novel begins to track time through the actions and necessities of farming life. When the novel opened, we were nearing the end of the season, and the novel focused on two individuals rather than more. Chapter 19, however, marks a specific moment in the alternative calendar of Weatherbury in sheep-washing season. This begins a series of moments that mark the passage of time through alternative means—those that are necessary for the purposes of the land and farming life; seasons in this light become descriptive shorthand rather than the larger organizing principle as we understand them to be today. Time’s passing becomes central to the novel—much of the novel passes slowly, then we pass over great expanses of time in just a few pages; the ticking of watches and clocks represents a modern conception of time imposing order upon a people largely incongruous with it, and the old traditions of village life frequently butt heads with modern versions of life. Even the narrator often feels the need to explain country life to a reader who is presumed urban and therefore ignorant of country customs. Partially this is due to Hardy’s own experiences and positionality, as he left London life understanding his modest background to be an impediment to class mobility, but this is also likely to suggest a fundamental difference in thought processes, even if the narrator sometimes still seems to get it wrong.
We get a stronger introduction to Troy, and one that is necessary before he is reintroduced later. We have already seen the great risks Fanny takes to go to Troy, and though it is not made explicit that she is pregnant at that point, it is hinted in the quickening of her pulse that Gabriel feels. We know that she is frightened and that she is taking extraordinary measures to escape; we are not led to believe that Bathsheba has shown herself to be a cruel mistress, and indeed despite some later, smaller problems, Bathsheba proves herself to be quite the opposite. The strongest conclusion is that she escapes knowing that she needs to marry quickly because of her pregnancy. It’s unlikely Troy doesn’t realize this, as he—at the very least—realizes that they have had sexual relations; although the novel takes pains to demonstrate that all is not as it seems in Victorian England, it also takes pains to demonstrate that the people of Victorian England are willing to convince themselves that it is (hence, much of Hardy’s critique). Yet, Troy’s vanity prevents him from continuing with the marriage over what appears to be an easily made mistake. Without his refusal to forgive Fanny for misconstruing the church names, the reader might be more inclined to trust Troy when he meets Bathsheba down the road; however, we have already seen that he is opportunistic, self-centered, and temperamental, so we are keen to recognize the dramatic irony later when Bathsheba is unable, or unwilling, to see it.
Likewise, without the larger (limited) omniscience of the narrator, it is difficult to understand Bathsheba’s actions, and easy to assume Gabriel, as the more stoic character in the exchange, is in the right. It is important to note just how many balls Bathsheba is juggling at the moment, though. Bathsheba trusts and respects Gabriel, which is what ultimately pushes her to ask his opinion; however, Gabriel’s familiarity is difficult for her to reconcile because he is, after all, her employee, and she needs to maintain respect and distance, all the more so because her gender pushes the townspeople automatically to second-guess her. Further, while one might argue that she should not have asked for his opinion, she only did so after he told her that he had some sort of judgment he was holding back. Again, the narrator presents Bathsheba as the temperamental one, but her temperamentality is in truth a product of her precarious position—she must be everything at once, and do all of that perfectly, lest she lose the respect of anyone; Gabriel responds by disrespecting her.
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By Thomas Hardy
