XI explained

What happens

Themes in this chapter

• Love and Marriage

  Jude and Arabella's marriage is revealed as a disastrous mistake, based on temporary feeling rather than lasting affinity, echoing the Fawley family curse.

• Suffering and Tragedy

  Jude's despair leads him to contemplate suicide, and he learns of his mother's suicide, reinforcing the tragic pattern in his family.

• Fate and Free Will

  Jude reflects on the Fawley bloodline's incompatibility with wedlock, suggesting a hereditary fate that he cannot escape.

Characters to notice

• Jude Fawley

  Jude experiences the final breakdown of his marriage, sells his belongings, burns his portrait, and learns from Aunt Drusilla about his parents' tragic separation.

• Arabella Donn

  Arabella argues with Jude, throws his books, leaves the house, and later writes to say she is emigrating to Australia with her parents.

• Aunt Drusilla

  Aunt Drusilla tells Jude about the Fawley family history of marital failure, including his mother's suicide and his aunt's departure.

Key passages

• “The utter death of every tender sentiment in his wife, as brought home to him by this mute and undesigned evidence of her sale of his portrait and gift, was the conclusive little stroke required to demolish all sentiment in him.”

  Finding his wedding portrait for sale in a broker's shop destroyed any remaining affection Jude had for Arabella.

  Jude's emotional turning point after Arabella's departure.

• “The Fawleys were not made for wedlock: it never seemed to sit well upon us. There’s sommat in our blood that won’t take kindly to the notion of being bound to do what we do readily enough if not bound.”

  Aunt Drusilla explains that the Fawley family has a hereditary aversion to marriage.

  Jude learns of his family's curse of failed marriages.