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論文“A Backward Spring”:
Darwin’s On the Origin of Species and Hardy’s Poetry.
Neil Addison
I
Thomas Hardy ’ s work demonstrates a keen interest in the ebb and flowof life and the mortality of all living things. This view of nature may be, inpart, the result of his rural upbringing, his home in Higher Bockhampton
verging upon a remote heath. Hardy was familiar with the insects andanimals that inhabited it, so that, as Robert Gittings observes, “ The cottage
home on the edge of the heath put Hardy into a companionship withall fellow creatures that never left him ” (Young Thomas Hardy 38). Hardy
documented the natural world of Dorset prodigiously in his novels but
also in his poetry. In regard to the latter he remarked that “ the mission of
poetry is to record impressions, not conviction ” (Florence Hardy, The Later
Years 178). Hardy ’ s poetry can be understood as crystalizing his varied sense
impressions derived from natural observation, but these impressions werethemselves further underpinned by his broad cultural and scientific readings.
The result when committed to poetry, therefore, was rather mixed in mood.
While part pessimistic, Hardy ’ s poetry of the natural world also allows forthe possibility of better times, perhaps best demonstrated by a comment
expressed in the “ Apology ” to Late Lyrics and Earlier (1922) that while theworld appeared to be moving backwards, this may be occurring “ pour mieux
sauter, drawing back for a spring ” (Complete Poetical Works: II 325). Thissentiment appears to be further articulated in his earlier poem “A Backward
2020『ヴィクトリア朝文化研究』第号（18年）
Studies in Victorian Culture,18No.
(2020)

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Spring, ” composed in April 1917, and published in Moments of Vision (1917),
in which a number of flowers suffer the hardship of the unseasonably cold
weather while awaiting the warmth of spring. It is further evidenced in otherpoems which deal with the subject of family lineage and the leaping forwardof human heredity.
While a number of Hardy ’ s poems focus on the suffering of natural
creatures others feature seasonal change and illustrate the perpetual cycleof life. The most significant influence upon his mixed treatment of thenatural world was Charles Darwin ’ s On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural
Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (1859). In
a 1924 letter to Ernest Brennecke, Hardy disavowed the direct influence ofSchopenhauer on his work, and instead pointed out that, along with the
influence of “ Huxley, Spencer, Comte, Hume, Mill, ” his work displayed“ harmony of view with Darwin ” (Purdy and Millgate, Collected Letters: VI
259). Darwin ’ s Origin is, like many of Hardy ’ s own poems, balanced in its
representation of the natural world. The “ struggle for life ” is mitigated, as
Darwin writes, by “ beautiful adaptations everywhere, and in every part ofthe organic world ” (115). For Darwin, nature produces great beauty, but doesso blindly while engaged in an ongoing and ceaseless natural competition,and one finds examples of this in many of Hardy ’ s poems such as “ I
Watched a Blackbird, ” published in Winter Words (1928). Here, the beauty of
the creature ’ s “ crocus-coloured bill ” (Complete Poetical Works: III 202, 3) isdetailed even while its nest building appears to be founded on mere instinct,
or as Hardy puts it, being “As if so sure a nest were never shaped on spray ”(7). This unsettling and yet appreciative way of observing and cataloging thenatural world in Hardy ’ s work can be connected to the Origin, and George
Levine notes that, similarly to Darwin, Hardy ’ s novels pursue a similarly“ instinctive commitment to attend to the minutiae of nature ” (Darwin The
Writer 191).
At the same time, Hardy ’ s poetic representation of Darwin ’ s ideas should
be understood as exemplifying his own particular artistic interpretation ofDarwin’s On the Origin of Species and Hardy’s Poetry.

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them. Hardy ’ s notion of his poetry as conveying “ impressions ” (Florence
Hardy, The Later Years 178) of things and events, rather than accuracy,
demonstrated his keen awareness of his own artistic agency. In his notes herecorded that the artistic process consisted in “ so depicting the common
events of life as to bring out the features which illustrate the author ’s idiosyncratic mode of regard ” (Florence Hardy, The Early Life 294). In
other words, Hardy was well aware that his writing represented his particularversion of the world. His treatment of Darwinian and evolutionary ideas
can also be better understood as exemplifying his own artistic interpretationof them. Hardy ’ s representation of natural creatures, such as the blackbird,
while demonstrating a Darwinian observation of the “ minutia of nature ” ,as Levine puts it, also illustrate Hardy ’ s artistic power. Hence, a number ofideas that can be connected to the influence of Darwin are used in Hardy ’ spoetry in creative and individual ways.
While discussing Hardy ’ s own creative representation of the natural
world, this study will place it within a historical Darwinian and evolutionary
framework. This discussion will first examine the way in which Darwin ’ smodel of the ‘ Tree of Life ’ is imaginatively used in Hardy ’ s poetry by his
narrator to express a sense of kinship and sympathy for the competitive stateof natural creatures. These sympathetic human sentiments are shown to evolveand become more sophisticated over time. Further, such feelings are creatively
demonstrated by Hardy ’ s poetic narrators when relaying the Darwinianstruggles of natural organisms, such as fauna and flora, in anthropomorphic
terms. Finally, this discussion will address how interconnected aspects ofnineteenth-century evolutionary theory influenced Hardy ’ s representation ofhuman heredity, such as poems where, as individuals pass away, family lineage
is represented as leaping forwards across time. These three Darwinian aspects
of Hardy ’ s poetry therefore create a sense of life as both drawing backwards
but also potentially springing forwards.

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II
According to Hardy ’ s notes, published in The Early Life of Thomas Hardy,“ During his stay in London he attended, on April 26 1882, the funeral of
Darwin in Westminster Abbey ” while further adding that“ as a young

man he had been among the earliest acclaimers of The Origin of Species ”(Florence Hardy 198). In calling Hardy an evolutionist, however, onemust proceed with some care. This is due to the overlapping and complex
relationship between religion and the different types of evolutionary
theory which emerged during the nineteenth century. For example, many
prominent Victorian scientists, such as anatomist Richard Owen, were natural
theologians (Brooke, Science and Religion 294), while others, such as thegeologist Charles Lyell, were opponents of early evolutionary theory such
as Lamarckism (297). Tennyson, an amateur astronomer, held, accordingto Robert Bernard Martin, “ an ambivalent attitude towards science which“ unsettled ” Tennyson ’ s faith ” (cited in Parnham, Green Man Hopkins 462)
and posed what appeared difficult scientific questions of nature in In
Memoriam A.H.H (1850). Tennyson ’ s treatment of such ideas in his verse wasinformed by his reading of Robert Chamber ’ s Vestiges of the Natural History ofCreation (1844), and, as James Secord notes, Tennyson “ followed the book ’s story of geological progress from simple in-vertebrate animals up throughfish, amphibians, reptiles, mammals, and man ” (Victorian Sensation 521).
Tennyson ’ s In Memoriam A.H.H, therefore, tied evolution to an overarchingspiritual belief, depicting a transmutation of the species that was represented
as providential and progressive. The publication of On the Origin of Species in
1859, however, founded, as John Holmes argues, a “‘ Darwinian revolution ’ ,an epiphany in the history of ideas, marking a single radical break with thetraditions of the past ” (Darwin ’ s Bards 5). It thus influenced a rich andvaried series of poetic responses, such as Hardy ’ s, to the problems posed byDarwin ’ s theory of natural selection.
Hardy ’ s poetry demonstrates, in its treatment of the natural world, a senseDarwin’s On the Origin of Species and Hardy’s Poetry.

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of both conflict and emotional sympathy which can be connected to the
influence of Darwin ’ s 1859 work. Hardy ’ s literary treatment of evolution
specifically reflects Darwin ’ s representation of all living things as being
engaged in what he called “ the war of nature ” (On the Origin of Species 459).
Darwin documented this conflict in his famous ‘ Tree of Life ’ passage fromthe Origin, detailing those who enjoy “ that superiority which now makes
them dominant in their own countries, ” while further representing the losers
as a branch that “ has decayed and dropped off ” (171-2). But Darwin also
described those who succeeded in the evolutionary struggle of life as theinheritors of a fortuitous and advantageous “ divergence of character ” (171).
In a number of Hardy ’ s poems his narrators describe this Darwinian warof nature, but at the same time do so while evidencing a more imaginativeand sympathetic mood. This is particularly demonstrated in “ The Wind
Blew Words, ” published in Moments of Vision (1917) where the narrator
describes an imaginatively envisioned scene akin to a Darwinian tree:
The wind blew words along the skies,
And these it blew to me
Through the wide dusk: ‘ Lift up your eyes,
Behold this troubled tree,
Complaining as it sways and plies;
It is a limb of thee.
‘ Yea, too, the creatures sheltering round –Dumb figures, wild and tame,
Yea, too, thy fellows who abound –Either of speech the same
Or far and strange – black, dwarfed, and browned,
They are stuff of thy own frame. ’I moved on in a surging awe
Of inarticulateness74

Neil Addison

At the pathetic Me I saw
In all his huge distress,
Making self-slaughter of the law
To kill, break, or suppress.
(Hardy, Complete Poetical Works: II 181-82)

From the first stanza Hardy ’ s tree, similarly to Darwin ’ s model, is thecenter of conflict, the lengthening and shortening lines emphasizing not justthe swaying of tree branches but the ebb and flow of life and death. Similarly
to Darwin ’ s tree of life, where the losers are those who have dropped off the
branches, the narrator observes, in the final lines of the third stanza, a battle“ To kill, break, or suppress. ”
Hardy ’ s poetic interpretation of Darwin ’ s tree is more sympathetic,
however, taking on the form of an imaginative vision. This more broadly
reflects the creative way in which Hardy represented natural phenomena in
his writing as “ impressions ” (Florence Hardy, The Later Years 178). It further
illustrates the imaginative ways in which Hardy emphasized the importantconnections between such phenomena. For example, a similar representation
or “ impression ” of a tree surrounded by lifeforms is evidenced in his
recorded notes taken from 1875. While sat under a tree to which a number of
insects are drawn, Hardy employs his imagination to enhance them:
I sit under a tree, and feel alone: I think of certain insects around me as
magnified by the microscope: creatures like elephants, flying dragons,
etc. And I feel I am by no means alone. (Florence Hardy, The Early Life
141)
This creative aspect not only enhances such creatures but emphasizes
Hardy ’ s sense of sympathy and kinship. Hardy imaginatively transforms
these insects in ways which appear to bring him the succour ofcompanionship when removed from human company.
Hardy ’ s creative and sympathetic interpretation of Darwin ’ s ideas issimilarly demonstrated in “ The Wind Blew Words. ” Here the narrator
envisions the wind as possessing speech, its words imploring him to look up

Darwin’s On the Origin of Species and Hardy’s Poetry.

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at the tree. This sequence leads the narrator to understand that humankind isbut part of an interconnected natural conflict and, like the other members of
the tree, may rise or fall. This effect appears to be consolidated in the thirdand final stanza where the narrator stares “At the pathetic Me I saw, / In all
his huge distress. ” Most importantly, Hardy ’ s narrator, rather like Darwin
himself, is aware of the evolutionary connection he shares with the otherinhabitants of its branches. The final line of the first stanza tells us that thetree “ is a limb of thee ” while the second stanza describes “ the creatures
sheltering round – ” the wind advising the narrator in the final line “ They
are stuff of thy own frame. ”’ The line reflects Hardy ’ s notes, made in 1890and published in The Early Life, regarding the natural connections between
humans, and how knowledge of this brings a sense of empathy:
Altruism, or The Golden Rule, or whatever ‘ Love your Neighbour as
Yourself ’ may be called, will ultimately be brought about I think by thepain we see in others reacting on ourselves, as if we and they were a partof one body. Mankind, in fact, may be and possibly will be viewed as
members of one corporeal frame. (Florence Hardy 294)
The last line of the first two stanzas establishes a sense of biologicalsympathy not just between humans but between the narrator and otherspecies. This sense is accentuated when all three stanzas are individuallyperceived as tree-shaped, as the shorter bottom line of each can be seen
as a base. Yet in the concluding stanza the penultimate and the final line
ultimately sever this connection, the narrator ruing a naturally competitive
state in which common species are “ Making self-slaughter of the law /To kill, break, or suppress. ” The final effect is mixed, the poem being
pessimistic in its perception of events and yet also altruistic in mood andfeeling. The narrator, in his awareness of the common familial ancestry
which exists between species, displays empathetic sentiments at odds with theevolutionary battle of life.
This higher sympathy, when connected to the legacy of evolutionary
theory, is famously demonstrated in Peter Kropotkin ’ s Mutual Aid: A

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Factor of Evolution (1902). While Hardy may have encountered this text,
there is no mention of it in his notebooks or his library catalogue. Instead,Hardy ’ s poetic sympathy with fellow evolutionary lifeforms can be more
fruitfully connected to what he called his loving-kindness. Peter Coxon has
demonstrated this expression as originating in The Book of Common Prayer( “ Hardy ’ s ‘ Loving-Kindness ’” 56) and possessing a quality which Ralph Pite
has described as going “ against the grain of evolutionary self-interest ” (Thomas
Hardy: The Guarded Life 474). Yet, this reading of loving-kindness is notstrictly true as Hardy saw it. While Hardy ’ s notion of loving-kindness draws
on a particular Christian quotation, such ethics are also compatible with (andcan be traced to) the general influence of Darwin on his thought. In 1910 hewrote a letter to the Secretary of the Humanitarian League in which he notedthat:
Few people seem to perceive fully as yet that the most far-reaching consequenceof the establishment of the common origin of all species, is ethical; that it
logically involved a readjustment of altruistic morals by enlarging as a necessityof rightness the application of what has been called ‘ The Golden Rule ’ beyond
the area of mere mankind to that of the whole animal kingdom. Possibly
Darwin himself did not wholly perceive it, though he alluded to it. (Florence
Hardy, Later Years 141)

Hardy ’ s interconnected Christian and Darwinian sense of loving-kindness,and the way it shaped his attitudes towards the natural world, is more
explicitly expressed in “ Compassion: An Ode ” which was published in
Human Shows (1925). The intention of the poem, composed on January 22,
1924, is, as is outlined in the subtitle, “ In Celebration of the Centenary of
The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals ” (147). The firststanza describes “ Mild creatures, despot-doomed, bewildered, plead…In deep
dumb gaze ” (Hardy, Complete Poetical Works: III 147, 7-9), reminding us of “ thecreatures sheltering round - / Dumb figures, wild and tame, ” (Hardy, Complete
Poetical Works: II 181, 7-8) who are members of Hardy ’ s tree in “ The Wind
Blew Words. ” Here, in the face of the evolutionary battle of life, Hardy ’Darwin’s On the Origin of Species and Hardy’s Poetry.

77s narrator celebrates the springing forward of another, more organized typeof evolution. The opening line celebrates the emergence of a new life, thatof the kindness and compassion of human society, relaying how, “ Backward
among the dusky years / A lonesome lamp is seen arise ” (Hardy, Complete
Poetical Works: III 147, 1-2). By the second stanza, Hardy ’ s narrator has traced
the evolution of this organization to the present day:What was faint-written, read in a breath
In that year – ten times ten away –A larger louder conscience saithMore sturdily to-day. –(147-48, 11-14)

The RSPCA movement, and its demonstration of the human compassion
for animals, is therefore shown as part of a developing process that, for
Hardy ’ s narrator, must and will continue. Just as Hardy ’ s loving-kindness istaken from The Book of Common Prayer, so this poem ends with an expression
from The Bible. Tracing the progress of the RSPCA organization, Hardy ’ spoem concludes with a quotation from Matthew 5.7, a mighty voice calling‘“And ‘ Blessed are the merciful! ’” (148, 29). Hardy ’ s poetry thus illustrates
that human beings, similarly to the creatures featured in Darwin ’ s ‘ Treeof Life, ’ are a mere biological outgrowth of the natural world. At the sametime, Hardy ’ s narrator envisions humans as able, through the evolution oforganized societies which promote compassion, to express a more developed
sense of kinship and emotional sympathy with other species. Hardy, throughhis creative interpretation of Darwin ’ s ideas, is therefore able to exemplify
this important, more highly evolved, emotional human quality.

III
Hardy ’ s poetic narrators display a sympathetic awareness of the ways
in which humans share a biological relationship with other aspects of thenatural world. This awareness is further informed by Hardy ’ s “ idiosyncratic

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Neil Addisonmode of regard ” (Florence Hardy, The Early Life 294), or, as he stateselsewhere, “ impressions ” (Florence Hardy, The Later Years 178) of natural
phenomena. Hence, Hardy ’ s empathy for flora and fauna involves creatively
representing it, personifying it in anthropomorphic terms. While a numberof poems appear to rue the human-like suffering of plants and flowers, theflowering of specific life-forms is also celebrated. In some of these poems,
Hardy depicts trees, flowers and plants as appearing to be “ drawing backfor a spring ” (Complete Poetical Works: II 325), awaiting the return of thesun which may or may not arrive in time. This is often connected to theenvironment, and can be brought about by the changing of the seasons andthe difference in temperatures, adding an extra element of fortune to survival.
In the ‘ Tree of Life ’ section of the Origin, Darwin had represented thesurvivors of natural selection as the beneficiaries of arbitrary luck, enjoying
a fortune, as he put it, “ which by some chance has been favoured ” (172).
This fortune was specifically related to environment; flora and fauna may
thrive or suffer, depending on whether they were suited to the climate andconditions. There are various accounts of this theme in Hardy ’ s verse, whereenvironment, climate and seasonal change play a part in dealing out survival
or death, and in such cases, such as the coming of winter, it is not necessarily
the brightest or the most beautiful but instead the more simple and robust
which survives and flourishes. Such verse can convey mixed sensations; onelaments the death of the former group and draws solace from the enduranceof the latter.
Hardy ’ s poetry also notes how the changing of the seasons offers life, andshows how the coming of the next spring lessens the sadness of winter death,illustrating the perpetual cycle of things.

Hardy ’ s personified treatmentof these aspects is part-imaginative, but can also be connected to hisinterpretation of Darwin ’ s account of natural beauty in the ‘ Tree of Life ’ ;Taylor notes that Hardy read this passage from On the Origin of Species andwas impressed “ with its ever-branching and beautiful ramifications ” (Hardy ’s Poetry 1860-1928 60). Yet, similarly to Darwin ’ s passage, the vitality, andDarwin’s On the Origin of Species and Hardy’s Poetry.

79

perhaps even joy, of these beautiful ramifications resonate briefly, subtly, andin some cases powerfully in Hardy ’ s works. Such examples can be located ineven the ostensibly bleakest and wintriest of Hardy ’ s poems, especially when
juxtaposed against the way in which similar ideas are expressed in his novels.
This is true even when the natural environment is represented in Hardy ’ swork as a malignant or sinister force.
The notion of nature as malevolent was a prevalent theme in the latter halfof the Victoria era. As Morton notes, John Ruskin ’ s 1884 Storm Cloud of the
Nineteenth Century promoted the rather paranoid view of the deterioration of
the English weather with Ruskin ’ s “ own blighted garden as a concentrated
image of the corruption of nature ” (The Vital Science 86). Ruskin ’ s
psychological state had deteriorated greatly by the time he gave theselectures, and yet, the image of nature as a garden filled with weeds was used,
as Morton notes, “ quite consciously by writers as diverse as Mill, Hardy,
Gissing and, above all, by T.H. Huxley ” (86). Certainly Hardy employedsuch themes in Tess of the d ’ Urbervilles, where the narrative appears to follow
a deteriorating series of stages as the weather becomes progressively colder
and darker. Ken Ireland notes that in Tess Hardy uses a pattern of Phases,
documenting Tess ’ s journeys around Wessex while she also journeys throughthe seasons from her rural innocence in “ the fertility of the Blackmore Vale
(Phase the First), ” to the “ edenic lushness of Talbothays (Phase the Third), ”
to the “ wretchedness of Flintcomb-Ash (Phase the Fifth), ” and finally to her
tragic fate amongst the “ starkness of Stonehenge (Phase the Seventh) ” (Thomas
Hardy, Time and Narrative 168). Moving through the seasons in this way
appears to accentuate Tess ’ s slow deterioration from youthful vitality towards
death, but, additionally, and particularly with reference to the Flintcomb-Ash
section, this suffering appears to be accentuated by the seasons. Unlike theharmony between man and nature which Hardy describes in the Talbothays
passages, where Tess thrives, at Flintcomb Tess is ill-suited to the environment
and the climate in which she finds herself. With its tragic narrative arc, thenovel proceeds onwards to the even bleaker stage of Stonehenge. While the80

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architecture of Hardy ’ s narratives are often tragic in shape and conclusion,
beginning with life, and ending in death, his verse addresses similar ideas tohis novels in a more balanced style.
This is the case with the ostensibly foreboding “ A Backward Spring, ”
published in Moments of Vision in 1917. From Chaucer ’ s The Canterbury Tales
and Shakespeare ’ s Much Ado About Nothing to A. E. Housman ’ s “ Spring
Morning, ” the season of spring has been widely employed in very different
periods of English literature as a metaphor for renewal and rebirth. Thereis also another tradition, however, in which spring has been used negatively
in late Victorian sonnets to represent the failure of personal rejuvenation(Holmes, Dante Gabriel Rossetti 59-60). Hardy ’ s poem can be better placed
within the context of this latter tradition although unlike the sonnet form it
has fifteen lines, and, being composed in the April of 1917, it can additionallybe seen as a reference to the First World War. Hardy ’ s poem begins in springby representing the flowers ’ innocence, and yet appears to conclude with theprospect of their tragic fate in the coming winter:
The trees are afraid to put forth buds,
And there is timidity in the grass;
The plots lie gray where gouged by spuds,
And whether next week will passFree of sly sour winds is the fret of each bushOf barberry waiting to bloom.
Yet the snowdrop ’ s face betrays no gloom,
And the primrose pants in its heedless push,Though the myrtle asks if it ’ s worth the fightThis year with frost and rime
To venture one more time
On delicate leaves and buttons of white
From the selfsame bough as at last year ’ s prime,
And never to ruminate on or rememberDarwin’s On the Origin of Species and Hardy’s Poetry.

81

What happened to it in mid-December.
(Hardy, Complete Poetical Works: II 243)

The flowers are described anthropomorphically, and a sense of foreboding
hovers gloomily over the poem, so that “ The trees are afraid to put forthbuds. ” This sense of fear is connected to the flowers ’ apprehension of
winter ’ s chill, and thus death. The reluctance to “ put forth buds, ” however,is also related to a more general questioning of whether “ it ’ s worth thefight. ” The enjoyment of present bounties, and a consideration of the future ’s possibilities, however joyous, must always be compromised by awareness oflife ’ s darker probabilities, and in “A Backward Spring ” the flowers fret andquestion “ whether next week will pass / Free of sly sour winds. ”
It is tempting to read Hardy ’ s treatment of the flowers in “ A Backward
Spring ” in purely pessimistic terms, the poem appearing to resemble
the verse of his poetic contemporary T.S Eliot. The Waste Land famously
introduces spring by declaring “ April is the cruellest month, breeding /Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing / Memory and desire ” (27 1-3). After
winter ’ s long freeze, spring prompts, tempts and seduces; yet, in reawakening
one ’ s feelings after such a long cessation of sensation, the new season also
reawakens painful memories. Similarly, the myrtle reminds us of Eliot ’ slilacs, and in the midst of its bloom it recalls the negative sensations felt
during the previous winter. While the primrose pushes forth, the myrtle
questions whether undertaking the same process yet again is really worth
the effort. Further, like Eliot ’ s poem, Hardy ’ s piece reflects the Great War,the “ heedless push ” of the primrose seeming to reference the troops leaving
their trenches and climbing towards the enemy guns. The apprehension of
the flowers, with their reluctance to “ put forth buds ” reflects Hardy ’ s own
notes on the war, his Later Years containing his reactions to a July 27, 1916
Times Literary Supplement article on “ What is Militarism? ” Hardy ’ s notes
also record his own answer as “‘ apprehensiveness ’ . The term would fit someof the facts like a glove ” (Florence Hardy 172). The myrtle ’ s questioning ofwhether the enterprise is “ worth the fight ” also accentuates this connection

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Neil Addisonwith the trauma of the war.
At the same time, while Hardy ’ s poem can be parsed in this way, it alsosignifies the influence of a Darwinian worldview. Interestingly, although
Hardy ’ s “ A Backward Spring ” chiefly concerns the budding flora, thecollective term ‘ flowers ’ is not actually used. Instead Hardy documents eachof the flowers in turn as different types, the “ barberry, ” the “ snowdrop, ” the“ primrose ” and the “ myrtle ” appearing as if in competition with each otherfor survival. It is the latter which chiefly symbolises the poem ’ s pervading
sense of transient ennui, set against “ frost and rime ” upon “ delicate leaves
and buttons of white. ” The poem concludes with the prediction that thesame thing will happen to the myrtle, and indeed many of the other flowers,
as previously “ happened to it in mid-December. ” It appears that the struggle
between the plants is at heart a Darwinian battle for survival, and yet,although some of the plants must fall, this is not wholly pessimistic. Hardy ’s Darwinian division of the flowers into natural categories indicates thatcertain types are clearly better fitted to survive longer throughout the year
than others. The myrtle is the weakest of the flowers because it originatesfrom warmer climes, and cannot adapt successfully to colder weather. Thus,in terms of natural selection, the fittest of the flowers is the snowdrop,
being the strongest because it is suited to the British climate and thus fitted
to its environment. Often blooming and surviving for longer in winter,the snowdrop signifies the poem ’ s faint sense of hope, hence why “ thesnowdrop ’ s face betrays no gloom. ”
This aspect can be further demonstrated by comparing Hardy ’ s treatmentof the snowdrop with the way it is represented in Dante Gabriel Rossetti ’ smuch earlier “A Barren Spring. ” Hardy was given a copy of Rossetti ’ s Poetical
Works by Florence Henniker in 1893, noting parts of “ Spheral Change ” inhis notebooks (Lennart Bjork, The Literary Notebooks 60). Much earlier in
Desperate Remedies, his first published novel, Hardy had described his heroine
Cytherea Gray by referencing Rossetti ’ s 1850 poem The Blessed Damosel. As
Cytherea looks outwards from the open upper window she is described asDarwin’s On the Origin of Species and Hardy’s Poetry.

83

leaning “ out upon the sill like another Blessed Damozel ” (71). It is therefore
quite likely that Hardy, being familiar with Rossetti ’ s verse, would have readhis sonnet “ A Barren Spring, ” part of his larger sonnet sequence from The
House of Life (1870). The poem juxtaposes the changing of the season, andthe arrival of spring, with the failure of personal rejuvenation. In the poem,
Rossetti ’ s narrator describes the new spring as meaning nothing for him, hebeing “ twin ’ d / With the dead boughs that winter still must bind ” (163,6-7). Therefore, the speaker implores us to “ Behold, this crocus is a withering
flame; / This snowdrop, snow; ” (9-10). Here, the crocus and the snowdrop
are seen through the pessimistic prism of the narrator ’ s personal ennui, but
Hardy ’ s Darwinian inspired vision affords a broader view of such naturaldetails which transcends the narrator. Hardy ’ s poetic speaker in “ I Watcheda Blackbird ” marvels at the vitality of the creature ’ s “ crocus-coloured bill ”(Complete Poetical Works: III 202, 3). Further, the impersonal narrator of “ A
Backward Spring ” describes the individual prospects of flowers such as thesnowdrop. This creates a more objective and varied effect, in which eachflower ’ s experience of spring is seen as different and unique.
In Hardy ’ s Darwinian world, therefore, while the myrtle faces hardship,
the snowdrop appears able to sturdily endure for longer. Hardy ’ s spring isbackward rather than barren, and while this indicates a regression of sorts, italso connotes something else. When backward is read in conjunction withspring as a noun, it can indicate that the season is late or has failed, but whenspring is read as a verb it can signify the image of a crouched backward stancepreceding a sudden jump forward. Hardy ’ s use of the snowdrop is therefore
thematically important, being a flower which proves not just capable ofsurviving the colder weather but which springs through the ground in
January and February. While other flowers are yet to bloom, snowdrops
remind onlookers, such as Hardy ’ s poetic speaker, that the January weather
is “ drawing back for a spring ” (Complete Poetical Works: II 325), becoming
briefly colder but also signposting the oncoming April ’ s warmer weather.
Thus, while Hardy ’ s poem appears pessimistic in tone, concluding with the

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Neil Addisontransience of the myrtle ’ s beauty, this is subtly contrasted in the middleof the verse by the environmental robustness of the hardy snowdrop. Just
as there will be inevitable losers, Hardy ’ s poem also presents us with what
appears will be a survivor in his creative interpretation of Darwin ’ s universe.

IV
This theme is explored more substantially by Hardy in poems where
human individuals are imagined as able to extend their lineage into the
future through biological heredity. The theme of human heredity and its
connection to Darwin ’ s ideas was an important and substantial topic for
Hardy, and is often encountered in his fiction and poetry. In his novels, as
a number of critics such as Morton (The Vital Science) and Dale (In Pursuit ofa Scientific Culture) have argued, his representation of the topic appears morenegative, and connects heredity to the once prevalent nineteenth-century
idea of degeneration. This is not so much the case with his poetry, especially
not in verse published during the twentieth century after degeneration hadlargely fallen out of favor, which interprets the subject of heredity in a more
subtly optimistic manner. Hardy ’ s verse contains various examples of how
human heredity carries one ’ s facial features and genetic imprimatur onwards,
and conveys the idea that while humans will die they can at least live on
through their progeny. In this way, through their continuous lineage, humanbeings seem to be part of something larger, and seem to count collectively as
members of a family unit.
Hardy ’ s particular interpretation of Darwin, and the way this creatively
manifests in his work in both pessimistic and more hopeful fashion, canbe demonstrated through examining his treatment of human heredity. This
theme is employed in Hardy ’ s novels, such as Tess of the d ’ Urbervilles, where,
at the end of the novel Tess ’ s younger sister Liza-Lu appears to take herplace at Angel ’ s side, and while Tess will not live on immortally throughsalvation, the text indicates that Tess ’ s indirect biological descendantsDarwin’s On the Origin of Species and Hardy’s Poetry.

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may succeed her. The source of this idea may lay in Hardy ’ s post-Origin
readings; Morton notes that in 1890, while revising Tess, Hardy read the NeoDarwinist August Weismann ’ s Essays Upon Heredity (The Vital Science 199).
Weismann ’ s pre-Mendelian writings on natural selection offered support for
Darwin ’ s theories of natural selection, and also allowed for the possibility of
biological degeneration. This has led Morton to argue that Hardy ’ s readingsof Weismann possibly shaped his negative treatment of heredity in novels
such as Tess and Jude (199), and Parnham, in his study of both The Mayor ofCasterbridge and The Woodlanders, argues that the characters of Elizabeth Janeand Marty offer examples of this (Green Man Hopkins 49). Dale widens thisanalysis further, comparing Tess with Jude the Obscure, and connecting thetheme of Tess ’ degenerative condition with “ Jude Fawley and Sue Bridehead,cousins whose genetic ‘ flaw ’ (Jude ’ s family name contains the word) makes
them and their offspring as openly ‘ degenerate ’ ” (In Pursuit of a Scientific
Culture 238).
While Morton, Dale and Parnham argue that the theme of biologicaldegeneration pervades Hardy ’ s narratives such as Tess, the prospect ofhereditary advancement, as opposed to degeneration, is also evident. Tessrefers to Liza-Lu, her successor, as possessing all of her good qualities
without her bad ones. In light of reading Weismann ’ s Essays, Hardy appears
to play in his novels with different aspects of the theme of heredity, such as
degeneration. The topic is also addressed in some of his later verse, which
followed William Bateson ’ s translation of Mendel ’ s Principles of Heredity(1902) which Hardy may possibly have read. The poem “ Heredity ” which
was published in Moments of Vision (1917), and was written, as Morton
documents, “ about fifteen years ” (199) after Tess, represents a more
ambiguous view which can be interpreted in positive and negative ways. In
the verse the narrator transcends the “ oblivion ” of death by the handing
down of his biological data to future generations:
I am the family face;
Flesh perishes, I live on,

86

Neil Addison

Projecting trait and trace
Through time to times anon,
And leaping from place to place
Over oblivion.
The years-heired feature that can
In curve and voice and eye
Despise the human span
Of durance--that is I;
The eternal thing in man,That heeds no call to die.
(Hardy, Complete Poetical Works: II 166-67)

While this poem is about human lineage, it is pertinent that thenarrator does not appear to be human. While elsewhere Hardy creatively
anthropomorphizes flora and fauna, here he bequeaths what appears to be agene with human qualities. By making a gene the speaker of the poem Hardy
creates an effect which is somewhat unnerving and even chilling. The speaker,
in despising “ the human span / Of durance, ” conveys the tacit impressionthat he, she, or it, also extends this sentiment towards humanity. In
transcending the generations, therefore the face survives as a template while
the individuals themselves die. Yet the first stanza also creates the effect thatsomething alive will persist, and that this is tied to humanity. The meter ofthe first stanza lengthens, line by line, as it relays the “ family face ” enduringand “ leaping from place to place ” until suddenly restricting and shortening
in the last line. This gives the forceful sense that the threat of “ oblivion ”
has been reduced or even prevented by something which is alive and isspringing or “ leaping ” forwards. Further, if the speaker is a human gene,then its narration is also relatable to readers at a particularly visceral level,
demonstrating “ In curve and voice and eye ” important visual and acoustic
human markers. The poem ’ s mood is thus mixed, being somewhat coldand detached and yet also strangely consoling. It gives us the sense that theDarwin’s On the Origin of Species and Hardy’s Poetry.

87

individuals who hand down their progeny are part of, and indeed contributetowards, a continuing and ongoing process.
This idea is associated more strongly with human and familial qualities
in the later “ The Rover Come Home, ” published in Human Shows (1925),
whereby a global traveler arrives home after years abroad. Hardy ’ s narrator
describes him as having experienced adventures and hardship in America, thesouthern Americas, Cape Horn, East India and the Behring Strait, detailing
his catalogue of adventures, battles and struggles. Finally, upon his arrivalhome he is described as talking by the fireside, and in the third and final
stanza, Hardy ’ s narrator asks us:
And what is written in his glanceStressed by such foreign wear,
After such alien circumstance
What does his face declare?
His mother ’ s; she who saw him not
After his starting year,
Who never left her native spot,
And lies in the churchyard near.
(Hardy, Complete Poetical Works: III 127-28, 17-24)

There are aspects to the poem which can seem reductive; the descriptionof the traveler ’ s mother as being buried after having “ never left her native
spot ” appears to imply a Hardyan irony. Read in this way, it appears thattraveler, for example, cannot escape his fate, being drawn back to and dying
in his hereditary place of origin. Yet, this also strengthens the sense ofhereditary connection and human kinship which exists between mother andson. Further, the poem can also be read as exemplifying a diametrically
opposite sentiment, noting how such descendants, in carrying on the family
lineage, can potentially spread it far and wide. In “ The Rover Come Home ”
the mother ’ s lineage, geographically restricted during her own life, appears
boundless, and her visage and features spring outwards to far wider vistas
through the travels of her son. Hence, while he far eclipses her own life, the88Neil Addison

son ’ s features “ stressed by such foreign wear ” also carry the mark of his
mother. While he eventually returns home, Hardy demonstrates in this poemthe possibility for the lineage of ordinary men and women to spread far andwide across the globe. By implication, therefore, the mother ’ s heredity may
not just be carried onwards but quite possibly outwards across the globe bylater family generations.

V
Amidst the sense of hardship, tragedy and death in Hardy ’ s work, his
poetry also contains instances where natural lifeforms are shown to endureand even prosper. The perpetual curtailing and flowering of life one finds
in Hardy ’ s poetry is indicative of his rural Dorset background, but at thesame time can be seen as adapting the ideas of Darwin ’ s On the Origin ofSpecies. It therefore allows us to locate, as George Levine has identified in
his novels, a “ prevailing sensation in Hardy ’ s work equally strongly related
to his understanding of Darwin ” (Darwin The Writer 187). Indeed, Darwin ’s “ beautiful adaptations ” (115) are sometimes represented in Hardy ’ s poetry
in rather surprising and life-affirming ways. For Darwin, nature arbitrarily
produced beauty while engaged in ceaseless natural competition which
provided both winners and losers. It is true that, like in Darwin ’ s Origin,animals and plants which are not fitted to their environment will fail, andthey are often shown to suffer in Hardy ’ s work.

But significantly, thewinners of such struggle are also noted and represented.
Further, Hardy ’ s art is empathetic in mood, emphasizing in creative
and anthropomorphic ways the connections between humans and natural
lifeforms. This is of course not to ignore that Hardy ’ s poetry sometimes
demonstrates, to borrow Herbert Spencer ’ s famous phrase, a “ survival of thefittest ” (Principles of Biology 445). What can be considered the fittest or thehighest form of survival, however, in Hardy ’ s mind, is the development ofsophisticated human values such as kindness. Therefore, the human subjects

Darwin’s On the Origin of Species and Hardy’s Poetry.

89

and narrators of his poems, while represented as part of the biological treeof life, are able to extend their sympathy and kindness to animals. Suchsentiments are shown to spring forwards, becoming collectively organized andstructured in the form of groups and societies, such as the RSPCA, from what
were simple origins. Moreover, in a number of his poems, Hardy ’ s narrators
demonstrate an evolved sense of empathy with the sufferings and successesof natural creatures and other lifeforms. His poems indicate awareness that,while Darwinian competition condemns some species to evolutionary
failure, it also affords other species evolutionary success. Certain forms offlora are shown to better endure inclement conditions, such as a colder
than usual springtime, through possessing a hardy nature. Hardy ’ s poems
also additionally show how the human victors of such struggles possess thepower to extend their lineage through biological heredity.

Human genes

and family visages are imagined in Hardy ’ s art as transcending individuals,
springing forward from successive generation to generation. Hardy ’ s creative
representation of the Darwinian world therefore helps his readers to noticesomething significant. Namely, it helps us to remember that, even when life
appears to be taking a backward turn, the future possibility of better times
cannot be discounted. Hardy ’ s poetry reminds us, therefore, that even when
the year is at its coldest and the day is at its darkest, we may individually andcollectively be readying for a spring forward.

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Brooke, John Hedley. Science and Religion: Some Historical Perspectives. Cambridge U
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Coxon, Peter. W. “ Hardy ’ s ‘ Loving-Kindness. ’” The Hardy Society Journal, vol. 14,

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Darwin, Charles. On The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, Or The
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Eliot, Thomas Stearns. The Waste Land and Other Poems. Faber and Faber, 1954.
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________. The Later Years of Thomas Hardy: 1892 -1928. MacMillan & Co, 1930.
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Weismann, August. Essays Upon Heredity and Kindred Biological Problems, translator
A.E.Shipley. Oxford at the Clarendon P, 1891. Archive.Org, https://archive.
org/details/essaysuponheredi922weis―Associate Professor, Japan Women ’ s University