An Indiscretion in the Life of an Heiress and Other Stories

An Indiscretion in the Life of an Heiress and Other Stories PDF Author: Thomas Hardy
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 9780192836854
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 324

Get Book Here

Book Description
'An Indiscretion in the Life of a Heiress', is one of ten stories - three collaborative, all uncollected - that are brought together in this volume. 'Indiscretion', derived from Hardy's unpublished first novel The Poor Man and the Lady, represents one of his earliest confrontations with theclass and gender issues which were to remain central to his fiction throughout his life. Several of the other stories, notably 'Destiny and a Blue Cloak', 'The Spectre of the Real', and 'The Unconquerable', raise similar questions, while at the same time illustrating, in typical Hardyan fashion,life's little (or somewhat larger) ironies. Some of the other stories are less characteristic: 'Old Mrs Chuncle', for example, approximates moral fable more closely than is usual for Hardy, while 'Our Exploits at West Poley' is anomalous not only in being (like 'The Thieves Who Couldn't Help Sneezing') a story written for children but alsoin experimenting with unreliable narration. Such stories are signifcant precisley because they incoporate varieties of technique, subject matter, and genre that are otherwise found in the Hardy canon either rarely or not at all.

An Indiscretion in the Life of an Heiress and Other Stories

An Indiscretion in the Life of an Heiress and Other Stories PDF Author: Thomas Hardy
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 9780192836854
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 324

Get Book Here

Book Description
'An Indiscretion in the Life of a Heiress', is one of ten stories - three collaborative, all uncollected - that are brought together in this volume. 'Indiscretion', derived from Hardy's unpublished first novel The Poor Man and the Lady, represents one of his earliest confrontations with theclass and gender issues which were to remain central to his fiction throughout his life. Several of the other stories, notably 'Destiny and a Blue Cloak', 'The Spectre of the Real', and 'The Unconquerable', raise similar questions, while at the same time illustrating, in typical Hardyan fashion,life's little (or somewhat larger) ironies. Some of the other stories are less characteristic: 'Old Mrs Chuncle', for example, approximates moral fable more closely than is usual for Hardy, while 'Our Exploits at West Poley' is anomalous not only in being (like 'The Thieves Who Couldn't Help Sneezing') a story written for children but alsoin experimenting with unreliable narration. Such stories are signifcant precisley because they incoporate varieties of technique, subject matter, and genre that are otherwise found in the Hardy canon either rarely or not at all.

Dickens to Hardy 1837-1884

Dickens to Hardy 1837-1884 PDF Author: Julian Wolfreys
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 113708619X
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 304

Get Book Here

Book Description
This authoritative survey examines how the Victorian middle-classes perceived themselves, through analyses of the literature of the period. Asking how the middle classes distinguished themselves from their forbears, Julian Wolfreys reads in detail major novels by: - Charles Dickens - Elizabeth Gaskell - Wilkie Collins - George Eliot - Thomas Hardy. Wolfreys explores the novelists' constructions of modernity, national identity and their understanding of 'becoming historical' in distinction from that of previous generations. He offers illuminating close readings of texts and examines narratives set in a recent past in order to investigate the role of cultural memory in the making of identity. Also featuring a helpful Chronology and an Annotated Bibliography to aid further study, this stimulating guide encourages readers to reassess the work of key writers of the nineteenth century.

The Ashgate Research Companion to Thomas Hardy

The Ashgate Research Companion to Thomas Hardy PDF Author: Rosemarie Morgan
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317041283
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 712

Get Book Here

Book Description
In The Ashgate Research Companion to Thomas Hardy, some of the most prominent Hardy specialists working today offer an overview of Hardy scholarship and suggest new directions in Hardy studies. The contributors cover virtually every area relevant to Hardy's fiction and poetry, including philosophy, palaeontology, biography, science, film, popular culture, beliefs, gender, music, masculinity, tragedy, topography, psychology, metaphysics, illustration, bibliographical studies and contemporary response. While several collections have surveyed the Hardy landscape, no previous volume has been composed especially for scholars and advanced graduate students. This companion is specially designed to aid original research on Hardy and serve as the critical basis for Hardy studies in the new millennium. Among the features are a comprehensive bibliography that includes not only works in English but, in acknowledgment of Hardy's explosion in popularity around the world, also works in languages other than English.

Jude the Obscure

Jude the Obscure PDF Author: Thomas Hardy
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191585009
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 464

Get Book Here

Book Description
'Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, and life unto the bitter in soul?' Jude Fawley, poor and working-class, longs to study at the University of Christminster, but he is rebuffed, and trapped in a loveless marriage. He falls in love with his unconventional cousin Sue Bridehead, and their refusal to marry when free to do so confirms their rejection of and by the world around them. The shocking fate that overtakes them is an indictment of a rigid and uncaring society. Hardy's last and most controversial novel, Jude the Obscure caused outrage when it was published in 1895. This is the first truly critical edition, taking account of the changes that Hardy made over twenty-five years. It includes a new chronology and bibliography and substantially revised notes. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

The Mayor of Casterbridge

The Mayor of Casterbridge PDF Author: Thomas Hardy
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191606340
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 433

Get Book Here

Book Description
'The woman is no good to me. Who'll have her?' Michael Henchard is an out-of-work hay-trusser who gets drunk at a local fair and impulsively sells his wife Susan and baby daughter. Eighteen years later Susan and her daughter seek him out, only to discover that he has become the most prominent man in Casterbridge. Henchard attempts to make amends for his youthful misdeeds but his unchanged impulsiveness clouds his relationships in love as well as his fortunes in business. Although Henchard is fated to be a modern-day tragic hero, unable to survive in the new commercial world, his story is also a journey towards love. This edition is the only critically established text of the novel, based on a comprehensive study of the manuscript and Hardy's extensive revisions. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Far from the Madding Crowd

Far from the Madding Crowd PDF Author: Thomas Hardy
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191604356
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 824

Get Book Here

Book Description
'I shall do one thing in this life - one thing for certain - that is, love you, and long for you, and keep wanting you till I die.' Gabriel Oak is only one of three suitors for the hand of the beautiful and spirited Bathsheba Everdene. He must compete with the dashing young soldier Sergeant Troy and respectable, middle-aged Farmer Boldwood. And while their fates depend upon the choice Bathsheba makes, she discovers the terrible consequences of an inconstant heart. Far from the Madding Crowd was the first of Hardy's novels to give the name of Wessex to the landscape of south-west England, and the first to gain him widespread popularity as a novelist. Set against the backdrop of the unchanging natural cycle of the year, the story both upholds and questions rural values with a startlingly modern sensibility. This new edition retains the critical text that restores previously deleted and revised passages. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

The Woodlanders

The Woodlanders PDF Author: Thomas Hardy
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191606332
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 416

Get Book Here

Book Description
'If ever I forget your name let me forget home and heaven...But no, no, my love, I never can forget 'ee; for you was a good man, and did good things!' Love, and the erratic heart, are at the centre of Hardy's 'woodland story'. Set in the beautiful Blackmoor Vale, The Woodlanders concerns the fortunes of Giles Winterborne, whose love for the well-to-do Grace Melbury is challenged by the arrival of the dashing and dissolute doctor, Edred Fitzpiers. When the mysterious Felice Charmond further complicates the romantic entanglements, marital choice and class mobility become inextricably linked. Hardy's powerful novel depicts individuals in thrall to desire and the natural law that motivates them. This is the only critical edition of The Woodlanders based on a comprehensive study of the manuscript and incorporating later revisions. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

A Pair of Blue Eyes

A Pair of Blue Eyes PDF Author: Thomas Hardy
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191606359
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 432

Get Book Here

Book Description
'Elfride Swancourt was a girl whose emotions lay very near the surface.' Elfride is the daughter of the Rector of Endelstow, a remote sea-swept parish in Cornwall based on St Juliot, where Hardy began the book during the first days of his courtship of his first wife Emma. Blue-eyed and high-spirited, Elfride has little experience of the world beyond, and becomes entangled with two men: the boyish architect, Stephen Smith, and the older literary man, Henry Knight. The former friends become rivals, and Elfride faces an agonizing choice. Written at a crucial time in Hardy's life, A Pair of Blue Eyes expresses more directly than any of his novels the events and social forces that made him the writer he was. Elfride's dilemma mirrors the difficult decision Hardy himself had to make with this novel: to pursue the profession of architecture, where he was established, or literature, where he had yet to make his name? ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Thomas Hardy on Screen

Thomas Hardy on Screen PDF Author: T. R. Wright
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521840813
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 189

Get Book Here

Book Description
A stimulating collection of essays analysing adaptations of this most cinematic of novelists.

The Withered Arm and Other Stories 1874-1888

The Withered Arm and Other Stories 1874-1888 PDF Author: Thomas Hardy
Publisher: Penguin UK
ISBN: 0141938110
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 333

Get Book Here

Book Description
"See if she is dark or fair, and if you can, notice if her hands be white; if not, see if they look as though she had ever done housework, or are milker's hands like mine." So Rhoda Brook, the abandoned mistress of Farmer Lodge, is jealous to discover details of his new bride in 'The Withered Arm', the title story in this selection of Hardy's finest short stories. Hardy's first story, 'Destiny and a Blue Cloak' was written fresh from the success of Far From the Madding Crowd. Beautiful in their own right, these stories are also testing-grounds for the novels in their controversial sexual politics, their refusal of romance structures, and their elegiac pursuit of past, lost loves. Several of the stories in The Withered Arm were collected to form the famous volume, Wessex Tales (1888), the first time Hardy denoted 'Wessex' to describe his fictional world. The Withered Arm is the first of a new two-volume selection of Hardy's short stories, edited with an introduction and notes by Kristin Brady.