Volume 29, Number 15 · October 7, 1982
The Two Hardys
By John Bayley
Thomas Hardy: A Biography
by Michael Millgate
Random House, 637 pp., $25.00
The Short Stories of Thomas Hardy
by Kristin Brady
St. Martin's, 235 pp., $22.50
The Collected Letters of Thomas Hardy: Volume 3, 1902-1908
edited by Richard Little Purdy, edited by Michael Millgate
Oxford University Press, 367 pp., $45.00
Hardy at one time seemed the very spirit of subversion and pessimism, the author whose last novel, Jude the Obscure, was burned by a bishop—in despair 'presumably'—as Hardy observed—'at not being able to burn me.' As late as 1905, when he went to receive an honorary degree at Aberdeen University, he was forcibly attacked in the Scottish press. To his friend Sir George Douglas be wrote that Swinburne had shown him a cutting which stated: 'Swinburne planted, & Hardy watered, & Satan giveth the increase.' A year later he wrote to Millicent Fawcett, the women's suffrage leader, stating his principles in terms that still sound an echo today.
Review, 4401 words
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