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AIBU?

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Original poster

To wish Tess had just gone with Angel

229 replies

WallaceinAnderland · 21/05/2025 23:50

This is probably a popular and well discussed opinion but it just makes me so sad every time. She didn't have to kill Alec, she was legally married to Angel. She could have just walked away.

OP posts:
Amelie2025 · 22/05/2025 19:13

ThatCyanCat · 22/05/2025 10:25

More digging than Gabriel Oak.

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🙄🙄🙄🙄

Original poster
WallaceinAnderland · 22/05/2025 17:24

To clarify, I can confirm that I did not start this thread off the back of any screen adaptation. I'm not aware of any new screen adaptation either. I did not even start it after reading the book, I read that years ago. It just popped into my head whilst I was out walking and I started wishing that Tess had just walked out of there with Angel. Because she did love Angel.

But obviously that has led to discussion about what she would have been thinking and feeling and how different it was for women back then. I still wish she had lived but I understand how Hardy didn't want that ending for his book. He's no happily ever after Austen after all.

OP posts:
ThatCyanCat · 22/05/2025 17:23

Amelie2025 · 22/05/2025 16:56

It's not embarrassing you nit. I read it 40 years ago, probably before you were even born. It is most commonly discussed on MN after one of the screen adaptations has been aired.

It is a classic, but they're not real people. IMO it does not belong in AIBU, especially written as it is.

MN is a largely U.K. based forum, but there are plenty of people from other countries/cultures who will not have a clue they are characters in a book/screen adaptation & not everyone in the U.K. will have read it or seen it. It is rude to just post it like this, as another poster rightly said 'this is not 'vaguebook'

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IMO it does not belong in AIBU,

Your opinion has been noted with all the respect it is due. Can you move on now?

PlutoCat · 22/05/2025 17:10

Amelie2025 · 22/05/2025 16:56

It's not embarrassing you nit. I read it 40 years ago, probably before you were even born. It is most commonly discussed on MN after one of the screen adaptations has been aired.

It is a classic, but they're not real people. IMO it does not belong in AIBU, especially written as it is.

MN is a largely U.K. based forum, but there are plenty of people from other countries/cultures who will not have a clue they are characters in a book/screen adaptation & not everyone in the U.K. will have read it or seen it. It is rude to just post it like this, as another poster rightly said 'this is not 'vaguebook'

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Mr Crick says he can lend you a spade off the farm, should you need it.

Amelie2025 · 22/05/2025 16:56

TwilightZoneRose · 22/05/2025 09:25

Now you're trying to pretend you knew it was a classic novel after posting "This nonsense should be posted in the TV section." Embarrassing

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It's not embarrassing you nit. I read it 40 years ago, probably before you were even born. It is most commonly discussed on MN after one of the screen adaptations has been aired.

It is a classic, but they're not real people. IMO it does not belong in AIBU, especially written as it is.

MN is a largely U.K. based forum, but there are plenty of people from other countries/cultures who will not have a clue they are characters in a book/screen adaptation & not everyone in the U.K. will have read it or seen it. It is rude to just post it like this, as another poster rightly said 'this is not 'vaguebook'

CatHairEveryWhereNow · 22/05/2025 16:27

Wiseplumant · 22/05/2025 16:09

I think she killed Alex because he consistently told her that Angel would never come back and that was part of the reason she started living with him again ( that, and to help her feckless mother and her young siblings) She should have murdered Angel too!

I thought it was this fury realised Alex had lied to her and finally snapping at his cruelty to her - she lost control.

She may also had less educated ideas around common law marriage and may have thought Alex has some marital claim - but that's less clear.

I found Jude much bleaker - but saw that as film rather than read it as I did with Tess of the d'Urbervilles so that could be why I suppose as I had no idea of the plot.

PlutoCat · 22/05/2025 16:13

Itiswhysofew · 22/05/2025 16:11

I hate that book.

I love that book. We can't all like the same things!

Redpeach · 22/05/2025 16:12

myplace · 22/05/2025 15:51

Fascinating thread. Equal mixture of interesting discussion about a classic novel, and free for all bunfight over very little.

Mumsnet all over

Itiswhysofew · 22/05/2025 16:11

I hate that book.

PlutoCat · 22/05/2025 16:10

TipsyRaven247 · 22/05/2025 16:02

What are you talking about?

Tess of the D'Ubervilles. A novel by Thomas Hardy.

Wiseplumant · 22/05/2025 16:09

I think she killed Alex because he consistently told her that Angel would never come back and that was part of the reason she started living with him again ( that, and to help her feckless mother and her young siblings) She should have murdered Angel too!

TipsyRaven247 · 22/05/2025 16:02

What are you talking about?

myplace · 22/05/2025 15:51

Fascinating thread. Equal mixture of interesting discussion about a classic novel, and free for all bunfight over very little.

TheBroonOneAndTheWhiteOne · 22/05/2025 15:24

I must admit, it didn't really occur to me that people who didn't get the reference to a classic book would be bothered about reading the thread or posting on it

Quite.

ThatCyanCat · 22/05/2025 15:20

SerafinasGoose · 22/05/2025 14:59

I'm not easily shocked but I was, genuinely, when I read the infanticide aspect of Jude - not that this isn't an integral part of human history, sadly.

I assumed that Victorian readers had responded similarly, hence the controversy surrounding the book. It came as quite a surprise that nobody seemed to turn a hair at that, and were instead offended over childbirth out of wedlock.

Could be a question of changing values for changing times, but I always found that odd.

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It came as quite a surprise that nobody seemed to turn a hair at that, and were instead offended over childbirth out of wedlock.

And ironically, of course, that level of moral outrage over children out of wedlock - that it was more shocking than murder and suicide - goes some way towards explaining why Little Father Time did what he did.

SerafinasGoose · 22/05/2025 14:59

HaroldMeaker · 22/05/2025 14:48

Mousetrap spoilers 🤣

Poor Hardy received such a terrible backlash from an appalled public after he published Jude, he refused to publish his novels ever again. He just stuck with his nice poems instead.

I'm not easily shocked but I was, genuinely, when I read the infanticide aspect of Jude - not that this isn't an integral part of human history, sadly.

I assumed that Victorian readers had responded similarly, hence the controversy surrounding the book. It came as quite a surprise that nobody seemed to turn a hair at that, and were instead offended over childbirth out of wedlock.

Could be a question of changing values for changing times, but I always found that odd.

HaroldMeaker · 22/05/2025 14:48

Mousetrap spoilers 🤣

Poor Hardy received such a terrible backlash from an appalled public after he published Jude, he refused to publish his novels ever again. He just stuck with his nice poems instead.

ThatCyanCat · 22/05/2025 14:22

Hardy dropped it 134 years ago and it's not a famous whodunit that specifically requests the audience never to reveal the twist ending.

It doesn't require a spoiler warning.

Brefugee · 22/05/2025 14:20

BIossomtoes · 22/05/2025 14:15

Given that you can read the entire plot of The Mousetrap online in great detail, this is one of the silliest posts I’ve seen here for some time.

whatever. There are PLENTY of people who don't go out of their way to look for spoilers for anything.

You do you

BIossomtoes · 22/05/2025 14:15

VimesandhisCardboardBoots · 22/05/2025 14:14

But what book?!

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Tess of the D’urbervilles.

BIossomtoes · 22/05/2025 14:15

Given that you can read the entire plot of The Mousetrap online in great detail, this is one of the silliest posts I’ve seen here for some time.

Original poster
WallaceinAnderland · 22/05/2025 14:15

Well you know, threads about real people not book/TV/show characters.

There's currently a thread in AIBU about Peppa Pig.

There's no rules about what subjects can be discussed in AIBU.

I must admit, it didn't really occur to me that people who didn't get the reference to a classic book would be bothered about reading the thread or posting on it.

OP posts:
VimesandhisCardboardBoots · 22/05/2025 14:14

WallaceinAnderland · 22/05/2025 00:24

TV?

It's a book!

But what book?!

MrsBennetsPoorNerves · 22/05/2025 14:06

Brefugee · 22/05/2025 14:00

no I'm not joking.

I have read it - plenty of people have not.

Do you post spoilers for the Mousetrap for fun?

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Lol, I saw the mousetrap years ago and can't remember a thing about it... so I couldn't post spoilers even if I tried!😂

PlutoCat · 22/05/2025 14:05

Brefugee · 22/05/2025 14:00

no I'm not joking.

I have read it - plenty of people have not.

Do you post spoilers for the Mousetrap for fun?

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The Mousetrap is a play that has been running for a few decades and there is an accepted etiquette about not spoiling it for other theatre goers.

Tess of the Dubervilles was published in 1891.

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