Wednesday, October 29, 2008
So You Say I Have a Chance
A belief in determinism engenders a lack of chance in life. Things happen for a reason to determinists. There are no coincidences or random occurrences. We just finished reading Hardy’s poem, “Hap,” which personifies the idea of Chance. The character rails against god (line 1) and Fate (Casualty, line 11) who are making his life miserable. Find some examples of “chance” or happenstance that occur in Far From the Madding Crowd. Post them here for all to see.
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I don't have a quote but to me the situation with Oak finding himself in the wagon with people that end up being at the same place that Oaks love Bathsheba happens to be is "chance" or happenstance.
Bathsheba meeting Troy. Boldwood even says it, that if she hadn't met him by chance that she would have agreed to marry Boldwood instead. But fate or happenstance threw Bathsheba into Troy's path and I predict it will end badly.
Also it was chance that Bathsheba sent the valentine to Boldwood and ruined his content existence. She tossed the book and it landed in the way to send to Boldwood as a jest. If she had never done that he would have never known of her existence and not turned into the desperate, love stricken person he is now.
"Well, My hat is gone, however...","it went over the hedge." on page 21. Bastheba has to lose her hat that way she can meet Gabriel Oak and they can talk. Gabriel hears her say this and so he then goes to look for her hat and keeps it until he sees her looking for it the next day. It was just coincidental that Gabriel hears her saying that and goes to find the hat so that he can meet her!
As a follow up to my first post, it is also by chance that Gabriel Oak fell asleep without opening one of the hatch's in his hut. His hut then filled with smoke or something and Bastheba had to save him. She then learns his name and tells him that she wants nothing to do with him so she doesn't tell him her name. She does tell him to ask her aunt.
Farmer Crick came upon Bathsheba by chance. She just happened to lose her hat. He also came upon her later and happened to see her go to get food and come back and eventually talk to her.
I think that the part in chapter five when Gabriel Oaks dog killed his sheep. It is really by chance or fate that he loses everything, it seems, all at once. I thought that it was pretty funny only because Bathsheba turned him down, she leaves without saying anything to him, and then his dog kills his sheep. ha.
I agree with Heather. I aslso thought of the scene where Grabriel loses all of his sheep when his dog attacks them in the middle of the night. This may have happened by chance or fate so that Grabriel was forced to leave home to find work and run into Bathsheba again. Coincidence?
Is it also a coinincidence that After Basheba turns Gabriel's proposal down that he loses everything?
"Thank God I am not married: what would she have done in the poverty now coming upon me!" (p.43)
Gabriel says this after he finds that all of his ewes have been killed.
The first quote that came to my mind was the one Danielle stated above. "Thank God I am not married: what would she have done in the poverty now coming upon me!" (p.43). I found it almost ironic along with coincidental, that just a few pages ago he was pledging all his love to Bastheba and everything he owns to give her a happy life with him. Now he has lost all his sheep, he has lost everything.
In Madding Crowd, Hardy uses fate/determinism again to form the plot of the novel. Gabriel Oak was fated to be denied his first attempt of marriage to Bathsheba and then losing his flock. Oak states, "Thank God I am not married: what would she have done in the poverty now coming upon me!" (p. 43). Later when Farmer Oak is jobless, seeking work as a shepherd, he stumbles across a fire on his way to find Bathsheba. Ironically, he discovers her at the fire, in a postion of power as the owner of the farm. It was fated for Oak to find this fire and be hired as Bathsheba's farm's shepherd. Hardy doesn't stray from his fated ways. Some may claim that these events have all occurred due to chance, but Hardy believes in fate and stuck to it in "Far from the Madding Crowd".
When Gabriel Oak was on his way to the Malthouse, he runs into a girl by "chance", so it seems, and observes that she hasn't any money or place to stay. He lends her a shilling, for that is all he has, and goes on his way as she desired. By the sounds of it, we may see this woman again, and the meeting between her and Oak may have been fated after all. I don't believe there are instances of "chance" in Madding Crowd, though it may seem that way at first, I'm sure it will all result in a sort of predetermined way, foreshadowed earlier by the "chance"-like events.
The one big instance of "chance" that comes to mind is that of Bathsheba meeting Troy in the dark of night on a path. Another incidence of chance could have been the seal that Bathsheba used to seal the valentine to Boldwood with. She had no idea what was on the seal, but decided to use it. Then, for whatever reason, she delivered the letter even though the message on it stated, "Marry me" when really she had no intention of doing or wanting so. Another incidence of chance was when Gabriel lost his farm and was looking for a job. He was having no luck at, what were basically, job fairs, when he decides to dress as a shepherd. On his journey onward to the next town for yet another shot at finding work the next day, he happens to stumble upon a fire and helps to maintain it. It's with this that he happens to be invited back to a farm for work, where he finds Bathsheba; another instance of chance as he just so happens to end up under her authority at what is now her farm.
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