The Deserving Poor
08/January/2008 Filed in:
JottingsAm greatly enjoying Claire Tomalin's excellent biography of Hardy, Thomas Hardy the Time-Torn Man. She seems to have understood better than many Hardy's ambivalence and tension concerning his own social status and the interplay with his ambition as a writer. Like all good biographies, it makes one want to reread the novels and poetry at a gallop. I was leafing through Under the Greenwood Tree again and wondering whether attitudes to the poor shape literature about them or literature about the poor shapes attitudes to them. The phrase "the deserving poor" is a case in point. It is never difficult to help those one considers to be deserving, it's the people one has doubts about that really test one's generosity and kindness. Just as well God doesn't "means test" his creation since none of us is worthy of his love. It is all gift.