How Far From the Madding Crowd?

The setting of Far From the Madding Crowd is very different from that of Moll Flanders, Persuasion, and Wives and Daughters. Naturally, how characters will act is a function of setting. How different are Hardy's characters from the characters in the other novels? Is this difference just attributed to setting, do you think?

The Book is Better . . . .(?)

In what specific ways does the film of Persuasion we saw differ from the novel, and how do those changes affect your response to the story and the characters?

Yes, I admit, I worked long and hard on that prompt!!

Moll and Anne

Defoe's and Austen's protagonists could not be more different, I'd suggest (feel free to disagree), but the ideas in the novels are similar. Compare and contrast the treatment of the various themes--you choose--in Moll Flanders and Persuasion.

Sociable versus Personal Morality

Eagleton brings up the question of innate human moral sense, of duty and conscience, "a kind of inner light which will instruct us in the difference between right and wrong conduct quite independently of the opinions of others." He constrasts this to a "sociable idea of morality," which states that the good influence of others teaches us virtue (110). He claims that Persuasion (obviously) investigates the question of "whether it is right or wrong to be morally persuaded by another;" do you follow your own conscience or allow yourself to be "shaped by social pressures" (110).

In the first half of the novel, how is this played out? How does the conduct of many of the major characters show what is more important, personal value or social acceptance?

Is it Authentic?

Does it matter to your understanding of Moll Flanders as a character, or to your interpretation of the themes in the novel, that while the novel is an "autobiography," its writer is a man? Can you see anything masculine about Moll Flanders the novel or Moll Flanders the character? Is she authentic?