Thomas Hardy

Overall I would say that I enjoyed reading the works of Thomas Hardy, but I really enjoyed reading and thinking about the poem Hap which is a poem about the “chance” that life is. I found some of the writing to be a bit confusing, but for the most part, I found it to be an easy read that was perfect for further examination. One thing that really stood out to me was the fact that Hardy uses the term god not as the singular God that I think of, but rather as a generic term for a higher power that he does not know. Later in the poem Hardy again refers to a higher power, but this time he uses the term “Powerfuller” and though it seems to me to be no more direct than when he used the term god, he feels the need to capitalize this word and make it stand out from the rest.

I also enjoyed this poem because it seems to be presenting an issue that a great deal of people wrestle with in their own lives and that issue is the “why me?” issue. I find that a lot of people ask the question “Why Me?” when tragedy befalls them, but there have been very few if any instances of someone asking “Why Me?” when something good and prosperous happens to them. When there is a death in a family the members of that family will sometimes wonder what they have done to deserve this loss, but when a family wins the lottery they tend not to ask any such questions. I find that this poem is not out-right asking the “Why Me?” question, but it does state that:

“If but some vengeful god would call to me
From up the sky, and laugh: “Thou suffering thing,
Know that thy sorrow is my ecstasy,
That thy love’s loss is my hate’s profiting!”

When I read this stanza I felt like Hardy was asking for something greater than he to tell him why he is suffering. I do not agree with the “Why Me?” question because someone once said to me, “People ask ‘Why Me?’, but if you really think about it ‘Why Not Me?” is a better question”. Though it is easy for us, as humans, to think about why we have to suffer it is much more difficult for us to realize “Why Not Me?”.