The Caged Bird Theory Of Evolution English Literature Essay

            The theory of evolution by natural selection has confounded both scientists and the general public alike since its introduction in 1859, and still continues to spark debate to this day. Proposed by naturalist Charles Darwin in his On the Origin of Species, it was an extremely radical idea that clashed with the social and political standards of the time. Darwin asserted that the diversity in animal species was a result, in essence, of “the survival of the fittest”. He believed nature selected the best adapted varieties of animals to survive and reproduce. While many people thought Darwin’s proposal was preposterous, there were some who accepted his theory. One of those few was the British author, Thomas Hardy, who pored over Darwin’s findings while he lived in London.

            Darwin’s theory of evolution had a profound influence on Hardy, who partially incorporated Darwin’s ideas in his 1886 novel, The Mayor of Casterbridge. In it, Hardy embraces the concept through the life of the protagonist, Michael Henchard. Although Hardy subtitled the novel The Life and Death of a Man of Character to suggest Henchard’s well-meaning nature, Henchard is also revealed to possess dark qualities. In the beginning of the novel, we see a drunken Henchard who makes a foolish decision to sell his wife and daughter. His faulty judgment instigates a series of tragic events, ultimately leading to his demise at the end of the novel. To illustrate the inner workings of Henchard’s mind and the consequences of his actions, Hardy skillfully weaves in a bird symbol, taking the form of feeble birds and caged birds, to represent Henchard’s evolution from beginning to end. While the bird in the novel delineates Henchard’s evolution from a dissatisfied farm worker trapped in an unwanted marriage, to a lonely, despondent man, it also implies that optimism is an intrinsic trait of human nature despite the obstacles we face.

In the beginning, Henchard is a naïve and imprudent man, illustrated by the comparison with a weak bird and a swallow, who has little concern for his family. The novel begins with Henchard as a young man of twenty-one with a wife and child. They walk quietly along a dusty road: “For a long time, there was [no sound], beyond the voice of a weak bird singing a trite old evening song” (Hardy 3). Here, Henchard is “weak” as he is slowly deteriorating-he leads a weary life and is stuck in the throes of despair. It seems that he would like to support his family by securing a job as a hay-trusser, but on the other hand, he does not seem motivated. Like a “weak bird”, Henchard cannot sing properly; that is, he has little effort to do what is his duty to his family and has little hope of being satisfied with his life. Perhaps the mentioning of the “trite old evening song” is an indication of Henchard’s discontent with his “old” family. Despite the silence, there is a stale familiarity between Henchard and Susan. Although they do not utter a word to each other, it seems that they are extremely comfortable with each other, as if they are old souls. As they continue to walk, they come upon a fair and stop at a tent for a drink of furmity. Henchard becomes drunk almost immediately, and in the moment, puts Susan and his daughter up for sale. As the people in the tent listen to Henchard’s preposterous offer, “a swallow, one among the last of the season, which had by chance found its way through an opening into the upper part of the tent, flew to and fro in quick curves above their heads, causing all eyes to follow it absently” (Hardy 7). Once again, Henchard is compared to a bird, more specifically, a swallow. As the swallow causes everyone in the tent to watch it fly around, Henchard similarly captures the attention of those in the tent when he makes the foolish decision to sell his family. When he becomes drunk “by chance”, his dormant thoughts about his family are revealed; his personality changes dramatically as his overbearing and forceful nature come into view. Henchard is the swallow trapped in the tent, because he is trapped in his own thoughts. He is ambivalent as he must decide between his family and freedom. In addition, the swallow is described as being “one among the last of the season”, which refers to Henchard’s last wrongdoing, that is, the last part of his former life. By selling Susan and his daughter to a passerby sailor, Henchard crosses the line and is forced to begin a new life, eventually leading to his downfall. He loses the only people in his life and is left seeking a new life alone. Henchard’s pessimistic nature is mirrored in Hardy’s own life. Born in 1840, Hardy lived during the Victorian era, a turbulent period of social and religious upheaval. At the time, life was harsh for Hardy who saw religious figures being portrayed as human not divine, a deviation in natural science through Darwin’s radical ideas, and a general shift towards a practical world. His upbringing was put to the test, and he became disillusioned with his Christian background and life itself. There seemed to be a new order as traditional values were being tossed to the side. Hardy lived through all of this, and transformed into a bitter man, disappointed with the changes he saw around him. This inner resentment is displayed in Henchard’s longing to rid himself of his family. Henchard is able to break away, but only to be led in the wrong direction.

After Henchard learns of his horrible actions, the bird, or hope, in him resurfaces and he rises to the height of his greatness. Although he regrets his decision, Henchard manages to move on and wanders aimlessly, looking for work. He comes across the little-known town of Casterbridge and begins his life anew: “To birds of the more soaring kind Casterbridge must have appeared on this fine evening as a mosaic-work of subdued reds, browns, greys, and crystals, held together by a rectangular frame of deep green” (Hardy 25). Like a soaring bird, Henchard heads for Casterbridge and resides there for most of the remainder of his life. The colors of the landscape, as seen from a bird’s point of view, foreshadow the events of his life. The deep green border is representative of Henchard’s eventual wealth and power. Channeling his regret and remorse, he is able to rise from a lowly farm worker to a prominent man who owns his own farming business. The green color is also emblematic of the envy that Henchard will feel when the Scotsman Donald Farfrae takes over everything that is Henchard’s. Inside the borders of the town, there are a variety of colors. Red signifies Henchard’s internal war with himself and the battle with Farfrae. It also embodies his fatherly love for his stepdaughter, Elizabeth-Jane, and his need for the love of others. The earthy brown and grey are signs of Henchard’s desire for stability when his life unravels near the end of the novel. All of these foreboding signs come true after Henchard enters Casterbridge and rebuilds his life. When Susan and Elizabeth-Jane search for Henchard at a town meeting after years apart, Elizabeth-Jane learns of Henchard’s status in the small town from Solomon Longways, who tells her, “‘Why, my good maid, he’s the powerfullest member of the Town Council, and quite a principal man in the country besides … He worked his way up from nothing when ‘a came here; and now he’s a pillar of the town” (Hardy 33). She learns that Henchard is mayor of the town and owns a successful farming business. Clearly, he has denounced his old ways by giving up alcohol and focusing on his social life. If Henchard were to be compared to a bird, he would be considered an eagle. He is strong and powerful, influencing the town through his position as mayor, and is free to do as he pleases. As a “soaring bird”, Henchard’s optimism allows him to create a new life filled with success.

When Susan reenters his life, Henchard is doomed because his past actions tempt his fate and once again, he becomes a fragile bird. By the end of the novel, Henchard is alone because he broke Elizabeth-Jane’s trust when he created a fabrication of her death to deceive Newson, her real father. Although Henchard meant well, he ultimately hurt his relationship with Elizabeth-Jane. Despite his regret for telling the lie, Henchard still wants to repair their broken relationship: “To make one more attempt to be near her: to go back; to see her, to plead his cause before her, to ask for forgiveness for his fraud, to endeavour strenuously to hold his own in her love; it was worth the risk repulse, ay, of life itself” (Hardy 314). Believing that no one wants him in Casterbridge, Henchard leaves the town with nothing to look forward to and no sense of direction. He becomes so forlorn that he seeks Elizabeth-Jane’s love after betraying her. Although she is not his blood daughter as he once thought, he still considers her as his daughter. His yearning for her seems to be an act of desperation; he wants to “plead” and “ask forgiveness” in order to “hold his own in her love”. Although he is a fragile bird, Henchard is still hopeful that he can regain her trust. Henchard feels that his relationship with Elizabeth-Jane is the only one that he can salvage, and now that his life is in shambles, he is willing to change himself for her. For Henchard, repairing his bond with his stepdaughter is “worth the risk repulse, ay, of life itself”, meaning that it is the only thing he lives for now. He attempts this by returning to Casterbridge for Elizabeth-Jane’s marriage to Farfrae. Henchard buys her a present for her day of matrimony: “At length a caged goldfinch met his eye. The cage was a plain and small one … A sheet of newspaper was tied round the little creature’s wire prison” (Hardy 315). The purchase of the goldfinch demonstrates that Henchard is willing to do whatever it takes to make Elizabeth-Jane trust him once more. He is willing to spend his hard-earned money on a novelty gift. The plainness of the cage is symbolic of the stark nakedness of Henchard’s thoughts-his actions toward Elizabeth-Jane are his true feelings for her. His devotion to her confirms that he is not feigning those emotions.

When Henchard is rejected by the woman who matters most in his life, he takes a downturn and becomes trapped in the life of a caged bird that leads to his death. Several weeks after Henchard leaves Elizabeth-Jane’s wedding, she finds something that Henchard left behind: “Mrs. Donald Farfrae had discovered in a screened corner a new bird-cage, shrouded in newspaper, and at the bottom of the cage a little ball of feathers-the dead body of a goldfinch. Nobody could tell how the bird and cage had come there; though that the poor little songster had been starved to death was evident” (Hardy 321). The dead goldfinch that Elizabeth-Jane finds is symbolic not only of Henchard himself and his dreadful feelings, but also his love for his stepdaughter. Similar to the finch, Henchard’s hope in reviving his relationship with Elizabeth-Jane is dead. When she sends him away, saying that she cannot trust him anymore, Henchard takes her words to heart, vowing never to come back and bother Elizabeth-Jane. His consideration for her life and thoughts shows a remarkable transformation on Henchard’s part; he is able to take into account the feelings of others. The goldfinch is also a direct reference to Henchard. When the people of Casterbridge discover a part of Henchard’s past that he kept secret for two decades, Henchard withers away under the eye of public scrutiny. This is similar to the finch in the cage “shrouded in newspaper”, where the newspaper is symbolic of the criticism of the townspeople. Quickly after finding the bird, Elizabeth-Jane realizes how much Henchard loved her and she goes to find Henchard; she is now on the reconciling end. She and Farfrae find Abel Whittle along the way, who recounts, “‘But he didn’t gain strength, for you see, ma’am, he couldn’t eat-no, no appetite at all-and he got weaker; and to-day he died'” (Hardy 325). According to Whittle, Henchard literally starved to death because he had “no appetite”. In a very real sense, the way that Whittle describes Henchard’s death links Henchard directly to the dead goldfinch that Elizabeth-Jane comes across. They both have the same outcome-their cause of death is starvation. For Henchard, his fate was sealed in that furmity tent decades ago. However, some critics have a different perspective. English teacher Mark Asquith asserts that Henchard’s misery cannot be attributed to the selling of his wife, but rather his personality: “If any crime has been committed at all, it is simply that of possessing too forceful a character in a world that rewards acceptance and moderation, a fact to which his egocentricity makes him blind” (Asquith). Although it is true that Henchard has a “forceful” nature, this is not sufficient enough to explain what eventually happens to him. At the end of the novel, we see Henchard as a gentle man, capable of giving and receiving love, unlike the young Henchard that was first introduced; it is his actions that are to blame. Readers get the impression that Henchard is almost opposite of the person seen at the novel’s beginning. While Henchard is demanding and weak as a young man, he is resilient and saddened when he dies. Although he is “trapped”, it is clear that Henchard accepts the consequences of the actions he made in his former life.

Whether Henchard can be considered “a man of character” is debatable, but he is unarguably a changed man at the end of his life. In a sense, Henchard is a very realistic character. Hardy represented the woes of human emotion and the consequences of one’s actions through the invention of the bird symbol, which illustrates the three main stages that Henchard passes through. At the age of twenty-one, Hardy characterizes Henchard as a “weak bird” for his rash decisions and lack of motivation to support his family. In the second stage, Henchard, as mayor, is characterized as a “soaring bird”, as he is a powerful person in Casterbridge and nothing ties him down. When Susan returns, Henchard passes on to the third stage, in which he is compared to a “caged goldfinch”. At this point, Henchard is depressed and is trapped in a life of loneliness. He is forced to spend the remainder of his life as a worker. Through it all, it is ironic that Henchard begins and ends his tragic life as a deserted farm worker.

According to educational writer Candyce Norvell, Hardy sought to make Henchard a realistic character not only so that readers can identify with his suffering, guilt, regret, and loneliness, but also so that “readers understand that this story is not just the story of one man’s life; it is also about how life works for all human beings” (Norvell). Norvell is right in making that assumption. The anguish and sympathy readers feel after discovering that Henchard dies alone shows that Henchard is not the only person to have these experiences. As humans, we are capable of a wide range of emotions, from compassion to resentment, and though we try our best to be jovial, it is inevitable that we feel some form of sorrow. We believe that we can control our lives through our actions, but mistakes cannot be avoided, and the drastic consequences of our faults are exaggerated in Henchard’s tale. However much we can connect with Henchard, it must be noted that what ultimately happens to him is his own fault. If only he had not laced his furmity drink with alcohol all those years ago, his life may have turned out completely different. Yet, Henchard does not dwell on these suppositions, but faces life head on, willing to suffer in order to repent. Hardy’s creation of Henchard’s character reminds readers that, like the finches that Darwin observed on the Galapagos Islands, we must adapt in order to survive.