I'm no expert on this, but I think that Wessex WAS once a real place - it was an early medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdom. And I think that Hardy may be defining his Wessex as having roughly the same boundaries, although it's hard to know!
You can tell it overlaps with a real place because, for example, in Tess of the d'Urbervilles, there's a climactic scene that occurs at Stonehenge!
I hope you enjoy A Pair of Blue Eyes. I think it's a good way to start on Hardy.
Enjoyed this Claire! I was introduced to A Pair of Blue Eyes (and that famous cliffhanger scene) by Ronald Turnbull because he knows of my interest in Virginia Woolf and pointed out that the character of Knight appears somewhat based on Woolf's father, Leslie Stephen. (I haven't read it yet - it joins the teetering TBR pile.) Ronald's written a bit about Hardy on his substack. I particularly enjoyed his piece on Hardy's fictitious Egdon Heath and its real world analogue: https://aboutmountains.substack.com/p/egdon-heath-a-fictitious-moorland?utm_source=publication-search (in case you're interested :)
Well if the portrait of Mr Ramsay in To the Lighthouse is anything to go by - he was... difficult! I didn't know Knight was unlikable! How interesting - given that Hardy and LS knew each other in real life.
Do it!!! I really love this book (as well as the other early Hardy novels).
I love mature Hardy also, but those novels aren't how I'd recommend starting. But of course, you may have read mature Hardy already, in which case A Pair of Blue Eyes will be a bagatelle.
What a fascinating read! Thank you so much. I only knew Thomas Hardy by name and fame. I knew of Wessex without having read anything written by him, but at the same time taking Wessex as an actual, not the imaginary place which it is. I'll have to remedy this. Thank you again.
It's not even a parallel universe, he just renamed the places, eg Casterbridge is actually Dorchester. Hardy also wrote a poem on Beeny Cliff and I do prefer him as a poet, the relentless miserableness of the novels gets me down. Including of Pair of Blue Eyes.
I keep trying to like the poetry and not quite getting there, although I do plan to post about the poems he wrote after the death of his wife.
I wonder, though, about the parallel universe issue. It's true, he overlays Wessex onto England, but why, then, did he never just use the actual English names? Was he trying to suggest something slightly magical or mythical about these places? It's an interesting question to me why he would choose to call his fictional universe Wessex.
Well just as Batman lives in Gotham City rather than New York. Gives it a bit of fictional distance, and calling it Casterbridge gets rid of the kind of critic who says you can't get to Dorchester by teatime the way it says in the book. "Wessex" I see as his sense of the past coexisting with the present. Eg his note in preface to R of the N about King Lear (of Wessex) on Egdon Heath. Don't know how I could persuade you to appreciate his poetry... (Try "Wessex Heights" maybe) But if you can "enjoy" Jude or Blue Eyes or Tess you're already doing a lot better than I can.
I'm no expert on this, but I think that Wessex WAS once a real place - it was an early medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdom. And I think that Hardy may be defining his Wessex as having roughly the same boundaries, although it's hard to know!
You can tell it overlaps with a real place because, for example, in Tess of the d'Urbervilles, there's a climactic scene that occurs at Stonehenge!
I hope you enjoy A Pair of Blue Eyes. I think it's a good way to start on Hardy.
Enjoyed this Claire! I was introduced to A Pair of Blue Eyes (and that famous cliffhanger scene) by Ronald Turnbull because he knows of my interest in Virginia Woolf and pointed out that the character of Knight appears somewhat based on Woolf's father, Leslie Stephen. (I haven't read it yet - it joins the teetering TBR pile.) Ronald's written a bit about Hardy on his substack. I particularly enjoyed his piece on Hardy's fictitious Egdon Heath and its real world analogue: https://aboutmountains.substack.com/p/egdon-heath-a-fictitious-moorland?utm_source=publication-search (in case you're interested :)
Thanks, Tash! I read the piece on Egdon Heath, which reminds me how much I need to get back to Return of the Native ... it's great.
I pity VW for having to have Henry Knight (if in fact Leslie Stephen was like Knight) for a father. I find him a very dislikable character!
Well if the portrait of Mr Ramsay in To the Lighthouse is anything to go by - he was... difficult! I didn't know Knight was unlikable! How interesting - given that Hardy and LS knew each other in real life.
The image of Knight staring into the face of a fossil is brilliant writing. I may have to read the book...
Do it!!! I really love this book (as well as the other early Hardy novels).
I love mature Hardy also, but those novels aren't how I'd recommend starting. But of course, you may have read mature Hardy already, in which case A Pair of Blue Eyes will be a bagatelle.
What a fascinating read! Thank you so much. I only knew Thomas Hardy by name and fame. I knew of Wessex without having read anything written by him, but at the same time taking Wessex as an actual, not the imaginary place which it is. I'll have to remedy this. Thank you again.
Yes, he created a parallel universe in Wessex - and I just love his novels. I hope you enjoy reading them!
It's not even a parallel universe, he just renamed the places, eg Casterbridge is actually Dorchester. Hardy also wrote a poem on Beeny Cliff and I do prefer him as a poet, the relentless miserableness of the novels gets me down. Including of Pair of Blue Eyes.
http://www.poetryatlas.com/poetry/poem/579/beeny-cliff.html
I keep trying to like the poetry and not quite getting there, although I do plan to post about the poems he wrote after the death of his wife.
I wonder, though, about the parallel universe issue. It's true, he overlays Wessex onto England, but why, then, did he never just use the actual English names? Was he trying to suggest something slightly magical or mythical about these places? It's an interesting question to me why he would choose to call his fictional universe Wessex.
Well just as Batman lives in Gotham City rather than New York. Gives it a bit of fictional distance, and calling it Casterbridge gets rid of the kind of critic who says you can't get to Dorchester by teatime the way it says in the book. "Wessex" I see as his sense of the past coexisting with the present. Eg his note in preface to R of the N about King Lear (of Wessex) on Egdon Heath. Don't know how I could persuade you to appreciate his poetry... (Try "Wessex Heights" maybe) But if you can "enjoy" Jude or Blue Eyes or Tess you're already doing a lot better than I can.
I will never read Jude again. Tess is great, but it makes me cry. I find Blue Eyes entirely satisfying and well worth it.
And I love Desperate Remedies, which isn't sad at all, plus several others that also aren't sad. Under the Greenwood Tree, for example ...