Jude the Obscure 513The catastrophic death of their children marks
the end of their union. It throws Sue’s mental bal-
ance, causing her—once a New Woman with a
free and bright intellect—to turn religious, thereby
finally adopting the rules of late Victorian society
she used to oppose so vehemently. She believes now
that Jude and she living together in sin has caused
the misery to the family and, repenting, returns to
the detested Phillotson, having convinced herself
that she is attached to him indissolubly by religious
law. Arabella, by now widowed, also manages to
trick Jude back to her. He subsequently falls ill with
desperation and dies. Sue conforms and Jude gives
in. It may be the bitterest irony of the novel that
both protagonists conclude their lives by remarrying
their unloved partners. There has been no hope for
the love of Sue and Jude, the disappointments and
delusions the situation has caused are too numerous.
Jude sums up: “Perhaps the world is not illuminated
enough for such experiments as ours.”
Thomas Schares
Sex/SenSuality/eroticiSm in Jude the
Obscure
When the novel appeared in 1895 it caused a scan-
dal among its cleric critics, one of whom renamed it
Jude the Obscene. These agitations are hardly com-
prehensible nowadays, as the reader will not find any
openly described sexuality in the book. Contempo-
rary critical rejection of the novel is understandable
because marriage as well as religion are attacked
heavily. The only (sexually) gross event depicted
involves a butchered pig’s “pizzle” (penis), which
Arabella, Jude’s first wife-to-be, throws playfully
at Jude on the occasion of their first acquaintance.
While sexual performance is banished behind the
scenery (we know it is happening frequently because
of the children emerging), the characters do not
refrain from discussing their sexuality; this also was
probably unsettling for the Victorian reader.
Mainly through her conversations with Jude it
becomes apparent that Sue, Jude’s great love, is not
a sensual creature: Rejection of sexual intercourse
(with men) is a stable disposition of her character.
She tells Jude of a former relationship, a “friendly
intimacy with an undergraduate at Christminster”
. . . “he wanted me as a mistress, in fact, but I wasn’t
in love with him.” Sue admits: “I have mixed with
[men]—one or two of them particularly—almost
as one of their own sex.” Her attitude toward men
is unconventional, as is her sexual nature. She has
a hysterical breakdown when she assumes that her
then-husband Phillotson is trying to persuade her
into her matrimonial duties. In fact, as Sue believes
toward the end, from the moment she gave in to
Jude, their lives began to worsen and, in this later
interpretation of events, to lead to catastrophe. But
the constant rejective posture of Sue is a symptom
of her whole disposition: She feels “that before a
thing was done it might be right to do, but that
being done it became wrong; or, in other words,
that things which are right in theory became wrong
in practice.” Consequently, Sue prefers the mere
possibility of a (sexual) relationship with Jude to its
fulfillment. Her attitude toward sexuality reveals a
very complex and much-debated character, which
cannot be unfolded extensively here (gender per-
spective is be left out of this brief account). Many
times, a kiss is the most intense token of love Jude
can obtain from Sue, and it takes them a while
of living together before their sexual relationship
commences—in a moment of crisis when Sue feels
threatened by Arabella’s return. The fairy-like,
asexual constitution of Sue marks a sharp contrast
to Jude’s less refined inclinations to “savage” sexual-
ity (as with Arabella) and drinking. Jude’s (occa-
sionally fulfilled) desire to fully love Sue is an urge
to possess the unpossessable (she being his cousin).
The contrast is evident when Jude compares her
to Arabella: In observing Sue’s bosom, “the small,
tight, apple-like convexities of her bodice, so differ-
ent from Arabella’s amplitudes.” To Jude Sue is “the
most ethereal, least sensual woman I ever knew to
exist without inhuman sexlessness.”
Jude’s attachment to his first wife, Arabella, is
of a completely different nature. They attract each
other mutually, but this attraction is purely sexual. In
all other aspects of matrimonial life and in terms of
affection for each other, they fail; after a short while,
Arabella flees from Jude to immigrate to Australia.
To Jude, this marriage was “buying a month’s plea-
sure with a life’s discomfort.” After her second hus-
band has died, Arabella turns to Jude again, taking
advantage of his miserable state. Two times Arabella