Thomas Hardy

A novelist and a poet, Thomas Hardy is best known and loved for his evocative portraits of rural England described in his novels. The Mayor of Casterbridge is one such tale. Set in the 1840's, this powerful story of a man who cannot escape his past is now presented in a stunning dramatization, originally conceived for BBC broadcast and produced by the world's foremost creators of radio entertainment. This exclusive production immediately engages listeners from the spectacular opening scene to the breathtaking series of discoveries at its conclusion, transporting them back in time with a full-cast, authentic sound effects, and a stirring musical score. The Mayor of CasterbridgeDrunk on rum at a country fair, Michael Henchard sells his wife and daughter to a passing sailor for five guineas. The next day, sober and overcome with guilt and remorse, he tries in vain to find them. Abandoning his search, he takes a vow of abstinence for twenty-one years and makes his way towards the town of Casterbridge. Nineteen years later, Henchard's wife seeks him out in Casterbridge, where, as a flourishing corn trader, he has gained both wealth and the well-respected position of mayor. His family now restored to him, his happiness should be complete, but beneath the surface still smolders the same character flaws which combine with fate to bring about his degradation and ultimate ruin. The Mayor of Casterbridge claims a unique place among Thomas Hardy's finest and most powerful novels. Rooted in an actual case of wife-selling in early nineteenth-century England, this awesome drama of guilt and revenge introduces listeners to one of the greatest tragic heroes in fiction history.

The darkly passionate short stories of Thomas Hardy are compelling explorations of love, social class, superstition and legend. This collection contains many of his finest and most representative, and includes 'The Withered Arm', an eerie depiction of arcane witchcraft in nineteenth-century England; 'Barbara of the House of Grebe', in which a beautiful man's tragic disfigurement by fire is savagely exploited by his rival; 'The Son's Veto', showing the cruelty of an educated youth towards his ignorant but tender mother; and 'The Distracted Preacher', the story of one man's conflict between heartfelt love and his own sense of moral and civic duty. By turns moving and poetic, and surprisingly modern and brutally macabre, these eloquent tales may be numbered among the greatest creations of Hardy's genius.

Introduction and Notes by Jane Thomas, University of Hull. The Well-Beloved completes the cycle of Hardy’s great novels, reiterating his favourite themes of man’s eternal quest for perfection in both love and art, and the suffering that ensues. Jocelyn Pierston, celebrated sculptor, tries to create an image of his ideal woman - his imaginary Well-Beloved - in stone, just as he tries to find her in the flesh. Powerful symbolism marks this romantic fantasy that Hardy has grounded firmly in reality with a characteristically authentic rendering of location, the Isle of Slingers, or Portland as we know it. Overt exploration of the relationship between erotic fascination and creativity makes this novel a nineteenth-century landmark in the persistent debate about art, aesthetics and gender. This volume breaks new ground by including in full the1892 serialised version of the novel - The Pursuit of the Well-Beloved.