This handbook provides the background necessary for fully understanding the nearly one thousand poems of Hardy. As it treats the poems individually and often supplements the analysis of a poem by relating it to other poems and to passages in the fiction, every comment helps build a portrait of Hardy as a poet. Originally published in 1970. A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.

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.

Explains the social reasons for Thomas Hardy's consistent pessimism expressed in all his major works. The author contends that this came from the failure of bourgeois society to correct the anachronisms in the social machinery of the day.

Thomas Hardy made a reputation in more than one genre and in more than one period, and he has constantly given rise to widely differing critical responses. This study ranges in time from Hardy's response to Romanticism through to an examination of his diverse fortunes at the hands of critics from Hardy's own time to the present day. His achievement is examined through his various forms - his letters, autobiography, novels, poems and personal writings - and set in the context of the work of those whom he knew or admired. Timothy Hands surveys Hardy's ideas, his views on society and his remarkable knowledge of the contemporary arts. The book offers to specialist, student and general reader alike an authoritative yet readable guide through the biographical, literary and critical mazes surrounding Hardy's life and work.

Susan Dean uses Hardy's own metaphor—the diorama of a dream—to interpret The Dynasts, his largest and last major composition. She shows that the poem presents a model of the human mind. In that mind is enacted an event (the war with Napoleon) and, simultaneously, the watching of that event. The author provides a reading of the poem in visual-dramatic terms, using the diorama stage as the vehicle for the poet's field of vision. She then defines various visual dimensions, the relationships between them, and the various ways in which they can be seen and understood. Her interpretation draws on Hardy's autobiography and critical essays. Originally published in 1977. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

C. Day-Lewis was a major figure in British poetry and culture from the 1930s until his death in 1972. The Golden Bridle: Selected Prose takes its title from the myth of Bellerophon and the golden bridle of Pegasus, which Day-Lewis invoked on several occasions as a metaphor for the creative process. Day-Lewis as poet is, then, the organizing idea of this anthology, and the selections indicate the scope and range of his vital engagement with English life and letters. Organised into four parts, the volume illustrates Day-Lewis's reflections on the role and function of poetry in society and culture; the creative process and the workings of the imagination as well as the nature of poetic truth and its relation to science; poets who were of particular importance to Day-Lewis; and the poetic process in relation to the composition of several of his own poems. The notes indicate the particular source, circumstances, and central issues of each piece, to provide a brief intellectual biography and critical account of this eminent poet's development and standing.