The Return of the Native Language and Communication Quotes

Darkness represents a lot of different things in this story – danger, the past, mystical things. But, here, it's illuminating, in a sense – darkness functions as a space for "truth." Once again, nature (night and the heath) are personified with the ability to speak and "tell" a story. However, this story is told not through words but through "feelings," which makes sense in a novel where mood and atmosphere are very important.

The heath is likened to a person again, with the wind functioning as a singing voice, and a sort of chorus of voices. This diction casts the heath and its "voice" as very old too, with words like "worn," "dry," and "ruins."

Silences are as significant, if not more significant, than words in this novel, as Wildeve's lack of words prove here. This instance is very funny, though, since it also demonstrates just how arrogant Wildeve is.

There is a running gambling motif in this novel – we have themes of fate, a very tense gambling scene, a lot of changing fortunes, and this interesting reference to a "card." Diggory is playing a game, in a sense, and he "plays" his last verbal card in this scene. It's notable that his last resort card is "truth," though.

Eustacia introduces an interesting idea here – the concept that people can cause others to say things they don't mean or don't want to say. Eustacia seems to lose her impulse control and her internal filter around others, especially Damon and Clym.

Eustacia's acceptance of Clym's proposal should have sent up red flags for him, but he apparently has selective hearing. This is actually a common problem for characters in this novel.

Society and language themes come into contact here, as Clym suggests that the people in the universities don't talk to the working class. What's ironic is that Clym himself doesn't really speak very well to those people either.

Hardy doesn't just give us the dialogue but instead provides us with a brief psych profile before moving on to Eustacia's speech. The structure of this passage shows us how a lot of things go on internally before words are spoken.

The book's often warped sense of humor crops up again here as both Clym and Eustacia refer to how potentially superficial their love is. Clym wonders if his looks determine Eustacia's feelings, and Eustacia alludes to how Clym's words may kill her feelings.

This is a fantastic little detail about Eustacia and it's really cool how a seemingly small and insignificant sentence can pack so much meaning into it. In a way, Eustacia's "looks" speak for her. This sentence is also in contrast to Eustacia's tendency to say things without really meaning to around Clym and Damon.

Eustacia should write a self-help book with tips like that. It's notable that Eustacia finds actions easier than words, or claims to at least. Then again, when she chooses to, Eustacia seems to have a lot to say. And, as much as she's an action girl, she sometimes difficulty doing just that (her considered suicide-by-shooting, her botched elopement with Damon, twice).

Clym uses words as a weapon in his epic fight with Eustacia. He basically bludgeons her with words for an entire chapter. But here he accuses her of "knowing" what he is talking about, though he insists on "telling" her anyway. He seems to take pleasure in the "telling."

Clym raises a really fascinating point and this seems like a major thematic idea. This is one of the few places where communing with the dead pops up, but the book does have an alternative thematic take on this: communing with the past. Clym wishes to speak to an individual deceased person, but the heath itself is practically "alive" with past, dead voices (in the wind, mostly). So the heath is perhaps trying to "teach" the living. The link Clym establishes between death to prison is also really intriguing, though he may have it backwards given how claustrophobic life on the heath can be for people.

While Clym uses words as a weapon against Eustacia during their fight, Eustacia turns right around and uses stubborn, defiant silence as a weapon against him. The communication wars continue.

Stylistically, this passage departs some from the rest of the novel in that it talks about our major characters and the plot in distant, generalized terms, considering how society at large would discuss them and perceive them. The tendency of stories to grow more elaborate and outlandish in the telling is a major point here, and is also a humorous, winking, reference to the melodramatic nature of the novel itself.