Analysis of the Extract Done Because We Are too Menny from Jude the Obscure

The extract is taken from the sixth part of the second chapter of Thomas Hardy's novel Jude the Obscure. It deals with the hanging of Jude's three sons and the reaction of the man and of Sue, the woman he loves.
The text is composed of six sequences and there is a third person omniscient and external narrator, who only presents the events (technique of showing) and allows the reader to make his own opinion.
In the first sequence Jude discovers the bodies of his sons. He is introduced right from the beginning of the extract as a modern man: he is cooking, an action that in the Victorian thought a woman should do. The central event of the extract is introduced throughout a hearing impression: Jude hears Sue's shriek and he discovers the woman lied on the floor and no child in the room. He looks quickly around the chamber: the narrator says that in the room there is confusion and it makes the reader understand the condition of life of these people. They have refused to follow Victorian laws and it seems to be their punishment.
The narrator obtains a ghostly effect describing in detail the corpse of three children. The narrator says that under the hanged corpse of the little Jude, Jude's first son, there is a chair: it makes the reader understand that he has hanged his two little brothers and then he has killed himself. Moreover his eyes are open, while he has closed his brothers' eyes, as if he wanted to make sleep them and not make see them the terrible reality around them.
The second sequence presents Jude's reaction to what he has seen. He his half-paralyzed and he is not able to breath, but he reacts: he puts Sue, who is fainted, on the bed of the other room, he cuts the cords and puts the children on the bed and then he calls the landlady and goes out to look for a doctor, even if he has already realized that the corpse are cold (he is not able to believe to what has happened). Using the word "threw" referring to the corpse, the narrator uses again the grotesque to create a ghostly atmosphere: the children here are considered as objects, underlining they are dead.
In this part there is also a comment of the narrator of which the reader may not be aware when the narrator says "half-paralyzed".
In the third sequence Jude comes back home; the narrator presents also the explanation the man and Sue have made about what had happened. The language used by the narrator is very harsh: the women are making "wild efforts" to restore the children, showing their desperation, and "the triplet of little corpses" contributes to give the idea of three objects without life on the bed. Furthermore he uses also a scientific language: Jude "had inferred" and "it was conjectured" show it.
Jude and Sue have also found a piece of paper on the floor, on which the little Jude has written the reason because he has done it. He thought that he and his brothers were a weight for the family and that it was their fault if they have been living in such conditions.
The narrator gives information about the family, saying that they are so poor that they can neither buy a pencil. He gives also an information about the Little Father Time throughout Jude and Sue: they say that probably the little Jude was frightened because he did not find Sue in the room when he woke up and it had shocked him, in addiction to what he discovered the evening before (he heard his parents talking about their economic problems). So the reader thinks that the little Jude was a sensible boy.
The fourth sequence presents Sue's reaction to what they have read on the piece of paper. She feels guilty of the children's death because she revealed to the little Jude the evening before the precarious conditions of the family. She has convulsions and they bring her in the other room.
In this sequence there is information about the structure of a Victorian poor house.
In the fifth sequence the narrator goes on presenting Sue's reaction: she wants to stay with the children and Jude tells her that she has to take care of herself because of her pregnancy and that if there is hope they will call her upstairs. The reader understands that they have not told Sue all the truth and at the end Jude is compelled to tell her everything. The woman reveals the man she thinks to be the cause of that tragedy.
In the sixth sequence the narrator presents a scientific explanation of what has happened using the character of Jude. In this way Jude is presented again as a modern man and the reader is free to believe in his words or not. Jude says that the doctor said that the hanging is due to a natural cause: little Jude belonged to a new generation of people that do not believe in anything, controlled by an upcoming "universal wish to not live". In this part there are Darwinism theories about natural selection. Moreover one of the most important themes of Modernism is introduced: the problem of the loss of all the points of reference in life.
In the seventh sequence Jude's nerves break up and Sue sympathizes with him. At the end he allows Sue to see the corpses of the children.
In the last sequence the scene changes: Jude and Sue go together in the room where the bodies are. Little Father Time is defined now as a "shape" and it contributes to give the idea of something empty of live. His face is the perfect representation of their past, present and future life condition: there is no hope for he who goes against the rules and do not adapt to his society.