ANALYSIS

Thomas Hardy' s extract tells a story about a couple who discovers that their children have committed the suicide because they didn't want to live miserly. The narrator is a third person external omniscient narrator. He describes the scenes in details. He doesn't describe directly character's thought, but he reveals them through their action and dialogues. Moreover there are no moral judgments about their story or their actions. He appeals to hearing (for example "shriek", "gasps")  and sight (for example "her eyes staring at the ceiling" ) and tact (" but the feel of their bodies in the momentary handling seemed to say that they were dead"). All these arrangements create a dramatic effect because it is as if the reader were spectator of a dramatic representation. The extract seems to be unnatural because the child is able to think like a mature man in taking the decision to commit suicide.