Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Last night my husband and I finished watching a two hour BBC production of Thomas Hardy's "Tess of the D'urbervilles", and it was well acted and relevant today.  The tragedy of the story was the mixed messages of speaking versus silence.  Tess wanted to speak out when she was raped and became pregnant, but her mother advised her to keep silent, especially after the baby died.  Tess' heart told her to be honest, because though poor and uneducated, she had integrity, which no one seemed to appreciate.  Her rapist was of the upper class, so her word would be valueless.  She hides her shame, anger and sorrow, with no one to comfort her.  When she falls in love with Angel Clare and he asks her to marry him, she knows she must tell him and writes a letter, which inadvertently he does not see, and she wants love so badly she burns the letter.  On their wedding night he tells her of an indiscretion, and she feels she must be transparent as well, for surely he will not judge her since he himself is not a virgin.  But her mother is proved right, and he abandons her.  She struggles, but no help is forthcoming, and her mother sells her to her rapist to put take care of her other children.  When Angel returns and wants her back, she kills the rapist, is caught and hanged.

Her mother knows the world and it's judgments of women, and Tess cannot live with lies and tortured by the rapist, who resembles a stalker completely.  There no relief in honesty, as a woman must be pure above all else, and a man's ownership of his wife requires perfection.  Both Tess and Angel are undone by the mores of their world.

To offer up your secrets as a pledge of love is still, to this day, a dangerous enterprise.  Many a man or woman has been taunted by such honesty, and right speech, in this case, is the true test of love and respect.  Yes, one should be able to tell people you trust about an incident that is crucial to who you are, but can you?  Silence is often the right choice in the vow to be your own protector, as the Buddha said.  Your history is private, and though practically nothing is these days, with the internet, what you choose to tell to another and when is so very complicated.  Even Dear Abby type columns in the newspaper counsel against back history with the husband or wife.  It's sure to do harm, and unlikely to to make the teller feel better.  Would that it were a world in which transparency is treasured and not taken advantage of, but it is not.  Better to be circumspect, and watch out what intention you have with honesty, and be sure that is not a romantic notion from novels but important enough to find out how unromantic the world can be.