ABSTRACT
Critical discussion of The Mayor of Casterbridge has focused on Michael Henchard, a character much admired but little understood. Like Tess of the d'Urbervilles, The Mayor of Casterbridge is heavily rhetorical, and again the narrator's interpretations and judgments are out of harmony with the mimesis. Henchard is still full of conflict when we see him again, after the passage of nineteen years. A "masterful, coercive" man with "no pity for weakness", he has "worked his way up from nothing" to be a wealthy corn factor and Mayor of Casterbridge. Michael Henchard's will reflects the same kinds of conflicting feelings, needs, and defenses that are operative in his last meeting with Elizabeth-Jane. While Henchard is the hero of a tragic education plot, Elizabeth-Jane is the protagonist in a comic vindication action. Elizabeth-Jane feels threatened by her prosperity and must keep reminding herself of its meaningless and impermanence.
