Write your own Tess of the d'Urbervilles story

Tess Durbeyfield

Tess is the eldest daughter of John and Joan Durbeyfield, a beautiful and sensitive young woman living in the village of Marlott. She is caught between her family's rustic poverty and the burden of their newly revealed aristocratic ancestry. Described as having a mobile red mouth, large innocent eyes, and an air of youthful freshness, she is modest, proud, and emotionally perceptive. She speaks both the local Blackmoor dialect and standard English, a sign of her education beyond her station.

John Durbeyfield (Sir John)

John Durbeyfield is a middle-aged haggler—a travelling small trader—from the village of Marlott, fond of drink and prone to self-indulgence. Upon learning from Parson Tringham that he is the last lineal descendant of the ancient d'Urberville family, he immediately adopts the persona of 'Sir John' and neglects his responsibilities. He suffers from a heart condition that may prove fatal within months or years. He is good-natured but feckless, and his vanity about his ancestry will drive key plot decisions.

Joan Durbeyfield

Joan is Tess's mother, a warm but superstitious and impractical woman who still retains traces of youthful prettiness. She is an avid singer of folk songs, a believer in fortune-telling, and habitually speaks in the local dialect. Joan is the practical schemer of the household, quickly devising a plan to send Tess to the wealthy Mrs d'Urberville of Trantridge, hoping it will lead to a grand marriage for her daughter.

Angel Clare

Angel is the youngest of three brothers on a walking holiday through the Vale of Blackmoor. Unlike his elder brothers Felix (a curate) and Cuthbert (an undergraduate), Angel seems intellectually restless and unconventional, with an 'uncribbed, uncabined' look about him. He impulsively joins the women's club dance at Marlott, but fails to choose Tess as a partner, a moment of missed connection that haunts both of them. He will become a central figure in Tess's later life.

Parson Tringham

An antiquarian parson from Stagfoot Lane who, while researching county pedigrees, discovers that the humble haggler John Durbeyfield is the last male-line descendant of the ancient Norman family of d'Urberville. He rides a gray mare and debates whether it was wise to share the information with Durbeyfield, recognising that it is of little practical value.

Abraham Durbeyfield

Abraham is Tess's young brother, around nine years old, cheerful and curious. He eagerly absorbs the family's excited talk about their noble ancestry and naively imagines grand futures involving coach rides and fine clothes. He is sent on errands during the night and is a minor but endearing presence in the household.

'Liza-Lu Durbeyfield

Eliza-Louisa, called 'Liza-Lu, is Tess's younger sister, aged about twelve and a half. She is one of the older children Tess helps care for in their mother's absence and will play a more significant role in the later portions of the novel.

Vale of Blackmoor (Blakemore)

The Vale of Blackmoor is a secluded, fertile, and richly atmospheric valley in the fictional county of Wessex, bounded by chalk ridges including Hambledon Hill, Bulbarrow, and High Stoy. Its fields are always green, its springs never dry, and its atmosphere is tinged with a languorous blue haze. Historically known as the Forest of White Hart, it retains ancient customs and a sense of timeless rural life, and is little visited by tourists.

Marlott

Marlott is a quiet, scattered village nestled in the north-eastern part of the Vale of Blackmoor. It is home to the Durbeyfield family and host to the women's club-walking tradition. The village has a crooked main street, a parish green used for dancing, and two alehouses: The Pure Drop (fully licensed) and Rolliver's (off-licence only) at opposite ends of the village.

Rolliver's Inn

Rolliver's is an alehouse at one end of Marlott that holds only an off-licence, meaning drinking on the premises is technically illegal. The landlady Mrs Rolliver nonetheless hosts local regulars in a large upstairs bedroom, improvising seating on furniture and bed-frames. It serves as a social refuge and gathering place for the village's poorer inhabitants, and is where John and Joan Durbeyfield retreat to celebrate their ancestral discovery.

The Pure Drop Inn

The Pure Drop is the fully licensed tavern at the far end of Marlott village. It provides a horse and carriage for hire and serves as a contrast to the less reputable Rolliver's. John Durbeyfield sends his errand boy there to order a carriage to carry him home in mock-aristocratic style after learning of his ancestry.

Kingsbere-sub-Greenhill

Kingsbere is a small town described as a 'one-eyed, blinking sort of place' but of great ancestral significance to the d'Urbervilles. Beneath the local church lie rows of d'Urberville ancestors in great lead coffins, beneath Purbeck-marble canopies with effigies in coats of mail. It is the spiritual and dynastic heart of the decayed d'Urberville legacy, and a place John Durbeyfield obsessively invokes.

Trantridge and The Chase

Trantridge is an area on the edge of a great woodland called The Chase, where the wealthy Mrs d'Urberville (no true relation to the ancient family) resides. Joan Durbeyfield devises a plan to send Tess there to 'claim kin' and hopefully secure a prosperous match. The Chase is an ancient forest that will become significant in later events.

Shaston

Shaston is a nearby town from which John Durbeyfield walks at the novel's opening, having visited a doctor and attended the market. It lies north-east of the Vale of Blackmoor and serves as a regional market and commercial hub for the surrounding villages.

The Marlott Women's Club

The Marlott Women's Club is an all-female benefit society and ceremonial sisterhood that performs an annual club-walking procession on a May evening. Its members dress entirely in white gowns and carry peeled willow wands and white flowers. The tradition is a survival of ancient May-Day customs, now the only women's walking club still maintaining this public ritual. It is during this event that Tess first encounters Angel Clare.

The d'Urberville Family (Ancient)

The d'Urbervilles were a great Norman knightly family who came to England with William the Conqueror. At their height they held numerous manors across South Wessex, contributed to battles in Glamorganshire, gave lands to the Knights Hospitallers, and were summoned to Parliament. They were made Knights of the Royal Oak under Charles II. The family has entirely died out as a landowning county family, their only surviving remnant being the impoverished Durbeyfield line and their tombs at Kingsbere.

The d'Urberville Pedigree Discovery

Parson Tringham, while compiling a county history, traced the ancient Norman family of d'Urberville and identified the humble haggler John Durbeyfield as its last male-line descendant. The family once held estates at Kingsbere, Sherton, Millpond, Lullstead, and Wellbridge. They are now 'extinct as a county family,' their ancestral vaults lying under the church at Kingsbere-sub-Greenhill. This discovery, though historically interesting, holds no legal or material value, yet it immediately inflates John's ego and sets the plot in motion.

The Compleat Fortune-Teller

The Compleat Fortune-Teller is a worn, grimy old book kept by Joan Durbeyfield, so heavily consulted that its margins have worn away. Joan consults it on significant occasions and refuses to let it stay in the house overnight, keeping it in the thatch of the outhouse out of a superstitious fear. She claims it predicted that Tess would make a grand marriage, which shapes Joan's plan to send Tess to the d'Urberville estate at Trantridge.

The Forest of White Hart

The Vale of Blackmoor was known in medieval times as the Forest of White Hart, named after a legend from the reign of King Henry III. A man named Thomas de la Lynd killed a beautiful white hart that the king had spared after a hunt, and was heavily fined for the act. The ancient forest has mostly disappeared, but old oak copses and hollow-trunked trees on the valley slopes remain as traces of this earlier landscape.

Club-Walking Tradition

The club-walking or 'local Cerealia' is an annual May-Day procession performed by the women of Marlott's benefit club, believed to have continued for hundreds of years. Members dress in white, carry willow wands and white flowers, march around the parish, and then dance on the village green. It is a survival of pre-Christian spring ritual, now stripped of its original meaning but retaining ceremonial charm. It is one of the last such women's walking clubs still active in the region.

Key Story Phases

The novel is divided into seven named phases: Phase the First (The Maiden), Phase the Second (Maiden No More), Phase the Third (The Rally), Phase the Fourth (The Consequence), Phase the Fifth (The Woman Pays), Phase the Sixth (The Convert), and Phase the Seventh (Fulfilment). Each phase marks a distinct stage in Tess's life and downfall. The opening chapters belong to Phase the First, depicting Tess's innocent youth and the fateful discovery of the d'Urberville lineage.