1 Joanna Stolarek Siedlce University of Natural Sciences and Humanities, Poland A Comparative Analysis of the Portraits of Tess in Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles and Roman Polański’s Tess Synopsis The aim of this article is to examine the complex and profound portrait of Tess in Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles and Roman Polanski’s Tess with respect to nature, landscape, mythology, ritual practices and above all in terms of tempestuous social relations, in particular men’s degrading treatment of women in conservative Victorian society. The author of the paper would like to depict and explore these issues, with a focus placed on Hardy’s and Polanski’s fascination with the heroine on the one hand as well as on their artistic manipulation of the eponymous character on the other hand. Key words: T. Hardy, R. Polansky, Tess, nature, mythology, Victorian society Gender, sexuality and tempestuous relations between men and women constitute the core of almost all Thomas Hardy’s novels: a writer who was sceptical, distrustful, and hostile to the dramatic social and cultural change - predominantly technological - change that affected English farms and villages in the second half of the 19 th century. The author’s seeming conservatism, based on devotion to the rustic, pastoral picture of the English countryside, in particular his home (rural Dorset), did not, however, prevent him from exploring topics related to sex, physical desire, extramarital love and strained, love-hate male-female relations, which were considered taboo by the majority of writers in the Victorian era. The issues of gender and sexuality are ubiquitous in Hardy’s work, especially in the novels of character and environment, such as Under the Greenwood Tree (1872), Far From the Madding Crowd (1874), Tess of the d’Urbervilles (1891) or Jude the Obscure (1895). In these novels the author presents the emotions experienced by his powerful, elemental characters, principally those of his female protagonists. It is undoubtedly in Tess of the d’Urbervilles that Hardy created the most profound and mature picture of a woman and yet simultaneously raised the most controversial issues related to gender at that time - femininity, male-female relations - thus mocking Victorian conservative attitudes to women, the hypocrisy and two-facedness of rural communities, particularly their silent acceptance of domestic violence, disregard for women’s education, intellectual development and independence, and above all, their lack of respect for female