Chapter one:
Introduction
Overview
Full Book Summary
Jude Fawley dreams of studying at the university in Christminster, but his
background as an orphan raised by his working-class aunt leads him instead into
a career as a stonemason. He is inspired by the ambitions of the town
schoolmaster, Richard Phillotson, who left for Christminster when Jude was a
child. However, Jude falls in love with a young woman named Arabella, is tricked
into marrying her, and cannot leave his home village. When their marriage goes
sour and Arabella moves to Australia, Jude resolves to go to Christminster at
last. However, he finds that his attempts to enroll at the university are met with
little enthusiasm.
Jude meets his cousin Sue Bridehead and tries not to fall in love with her. He
arranges for her to work with Phillotson in order to keep her in Christminster, but
is disappointed when he discovers that the two are engaged to be married. Once
they marry, Jude is not surprised to find that Sue is not happy with her situation.
She can no longer tolerate the relationship and leaves her husband to live with
Jude.
Thomas Hardy biography
BY DAVID ROSS, EDITOR
Thomas Hardy was born at Higher Bockhampton, Dorset, on June 2,
1840, where his father worked as a master mason and builder. From
his father he gained an appreciation of music, and from his mother
an appetite for learning and the delights of the countryside about his
rural home.
Hardy was frail as a child, and did not start at the village school
until he was eight years old. One year later he transferred to a new
school in the county town of Dorchester.
At the age of 16, Hardy helped his father with the architectural
drawings for a restoration of Woodsford Castle. The owner, architect
James Hicks, was impressed by the younger Hardy's work and took
him on as an apprentice.
Hardy later moved to London to work for prominent architect Arthur
Blomfield. He began writing, but his poems were rejected by a
number of publishers. Although he enjoyed life in London, Hardy's
health was poor, and he was forced to return to Dorset.
In 1870 Hardy was sent to plan a church restoration at St Juliot in
Cornwall. There he met Emma Gifford, sister-in-law of the vicar of
St Juliot. She encouraged him in his writing, and they were married
in 1874.
Hardy published his first novel, Desperate Remedies in 1871, to
universal disinterest. But the following year Under the Greenwood
Tree brought Hardy popular acclaim for the first time. As with most
of his fictional works, Greenwood Tree incorporated real places
around Dorset into the plot, including the village school of Higher
Bockhampton that Hardy had first attended as a child.
The success of Greenwood Tree brought Hardy a commission to write
a serialized novel, A Pair of Blue Eyes, for Tinsley's Magazine. Once
more Hardy drew upon real life, and the novel mirrors his own
courtship of Emma.
Hardy followed this with Far From the Madding Crowd, set in
Puddletown (renamed Weatherby), near his birthplace. This novel
finally netted Hardy the success that enabled him to give up his
architectural practice and concentrate solely on writing.
The Hardys lived in London for a short time, then in Yeovil, then in
Sturminster Newton (Stourcastle), which Hardy described as "idyllic".
It was at Sturminster Newton that Hardy penned Return of the
Native, one of his most enduring works.
Finally the Hardys moved to Dorchester, where Thomas designed
their new house, Max Gate, into which they moved in 1885. One year
later Hardy published The Mayor of Casterbridge, followed in 1887
by The Woodlanders and in 1891 by one of his best works, Tess of
the d'Urbervilles.
Tess provoked interest, but his next work, Jude the Obscure (1896),
catapulted Hardy into the midst of a storm of
controversy. Jude outraged Victoria morality and was seen as an
attack upon the institution of marriage. Its publication caused a rift
between Thomas and Emma, who feared readers would regard it as
describing their own marriage.
Of course, the publicity did no harm to book sales, but readers hid
the book behind plain brown paper wrappers, and the Bishop of
Wakefield burned his copy! Hardy himself was bemused by the
reaction his book caused, and he turned away from writing fiction
with some disgust.
For the rest of his life, Hardy focussed on poetry, producing several
collections, including Wessex Poems (1898).
Emma Hardy died in November 1912, and was buried in Stinsford
churchyard. Thomas was stricken with guilt and remorse, but the
result was some of his best poetry, expressing his feelings for his
wife of 38 years.
All was not gloom, however, for in 1914 Hardy remarried, to
Florence Dugdale, his secretary since 1912. Thomas Hardy died on
January 11, 1928 at his house of Max Gate in Dorchester. He had
expressed the wish to be buried beside Emma, but his wishes were
only partly regarded; his body was interred in Poet's Corner,
Westminster Abbey, and only his heart was buried in Emma's grave
at Stinsford
