Jude and Sue begin to lose work and respect because of their unmarried status, but they find they can’t go through with the wedding ceremony. He has no name but is called “ Little Father Time,” and is a gloomy, world-weary child. Jude and Sue agree to take the unwanted boy in, and he arrives soon after. Arabella reveals to Jude that she had a son by him while in Australia. Jude and Sue are united, but they live platonically for a while and they agree not to get married. Phillotson agrees to let Sue leave him for Jude, but he suffers for this decision, which seems morally right to him, by losing his job and his social respectability. Soon afterward Sue admits her feelings for Jude to Phillotson, and asks him if they can live apart. Jude and Sue keep meeting and Sue reveals that she is unhappy in her marriage, as she is repulsed by Phillotson’s physical presence. Jude gets depressed and turns to alcohol, and he is reunited with Arabella (who has returned from Australia) for one night.

Sue is stung to learn about Jude’s previous marriage, however, so she goes through with her marriage to Phillotson. Jude loves Sue passionately but Sue’s own feelings are less clear. Sue soon gets engaged to Phillotson, but her relationship with Jude also grows stronger and the two cousins become very close. He gets Sue a job with Phillotson, who has also failed to be accepted at a university and is a schoolteacher again. He immediately falls in love with her, though he tries to resist his feelings. While in Christminster Jude meets his intelligent, religiously agnostic cousin Sue Bridehead.

At first he is enthralled by the place but he soon finds he cannot enter the university without wealth and social stature. Arabella moves to Australia and Jude finally makes his way to Christminster. Arabella pretends she is pregnant and tricks the honorable Jude into marrying her, but the marriage soon falls apart. Jude starts teaching himself classical languages and learning stonemasonry work, but he is distracted from his studies by Arabella Donn, a vain, sensual young woman. He is inspired in this dream by his old teacher, Richard Phillotson, who left with similar ambitions when Jude was a child. Jude Fawley is a poor orphan raised by his great-aunt, but he dreams of studying at the university in Christminster, a nearby town. Jude the Obscure takes place in Wessex, England in the Victorian era.

Jude the obscure novel