Wessex Tales

by Thomas Hardy

Overview

Wessex Tales is an 1888 collection of tales written by English novelist and poet Thomas Hardy, many of which are set before Hardy's birth in 1840.

In the various short stories, Hardy writes of the true nature of nineteenth-century marriage and its inherent restrictions, the use of grammar as a diluted form of thought, the disparities created by the role of class status in determining societal rank, the stance of women in society and the severity of even minor diseases causing the rapid onset of fatal symptoms prior to the introduction of sufficient medicinal practices. A focal point of all the short stories is that of social constraints acting to diminish one's contentment in life, necessitating unwanted marriages, repression of true emotion and succumbing to melancholia due to constriction within the confines of 19th-century perceived normalcy.

Six of the short stories were adapted as television dramas, forming the BBC2 anthology series Wessex Tales:

"The Withered Arm" (7 November 1973, BBC2), adapted by Rhys Adrian, directed by Desmond Davis (The Internet Movie Database claims Davis is uncredited - this is an error) and starring Billie Whitelaw.

"Fellow-Townsmen" (14 November 1973, BBC2), adapted by Douglas Livingstone, directed by Barry Davis, and starring Jane Asher.

"A Tragedy of Two Ambitions" (21 November 1973, BBC2), adapted by Dennis Potter, directed by Michael Tuchner, and starring John Hurt. This story is from Hardy's collection Life's Little Ironies.

"An Imaginative Woman" (28 November 1973, BBC2), adapted by William Trevor, directed by Gavin Millar, and starring Claire Bloom.

"The Melancholy Hussar" (5 December 1973, BBC2), adapted by Ken Taylor, directed by Mike Newell, and starring Ben Cross.

"Barbara of the House of Grebe" (12 December, 1973 BBC2), adapted by David Mercer, directed by David Jones, and starring Nick Brimble and Ben Kingsley. This story is from Hardy's collection A Group of Noble Dames. (wikipedia.org)

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781636379746
Publisher:	Bibliotech Press
Publication date:	09/29/2022
Pages:	190
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.63(d)

About the Author

Thomas Hardy, (born 1840, Higher Bockhampton, Dorset, England-died 1928, Dorchester, Dorset), English novelist and poet who set much of his work in Wessex, his name for the counties of southwestern England.

Date of Birth:

June 2, 1840

Date of Death:

January 11, 1928

Place of Birth:

Higher Brockhampon, Dorset, England

Place of Death:

Max Gate, Dorchester, England

Education:

Served as apprentice to architect James Hicks

Table of Contents

Includes:The Three StrangersA Tradition of Eighteen Hundred and FourThe Melancholy Hussar of the German LegionThe Withered Arm; Fellow-TownsmenInterlopers at the KnapThe Distracted Preacher

Editorial Reviews

• "In two minutes only those shops which could boast of no attendant save the master or the mistress remained with open eyes. These were ever somewhat less prompt to exclude customers than the others: for their owners' ears the closing hour had scarcely the cheerfulness that it possessed for the hired servants of the rest."
• "Stockdale, a lonely young fellow, who had for weeks felt a great craving for somebody on whom to throw away superfluous interest, and even tenderness, was not sorry to join her...."

― Thomas Hardy, Wessex Tales

From the Publisher

In Hardy's first collection of short stories he presents the region of Dorset in the 1880s—the lives of its people, as well as their beliefs and superstitions. Narrator Neville Jason beautifully conveys the rich depictions of people and place, including regional and historical speech patterns and characters of varying ages and stations. Romance and family life are often Hardy's focus. Many of the men fall in love with love and propose to many women, or the same one often, only to be repeatedly rebuffed. In one standout story, a married woman falls in love with a poet she's never met, a situation that ends in a double tragedy. In another story, the celebration of a baby's birth is so well rendered that listeners will feel they’re there. S.G.B. © AudioFile 2012, Portland, Maine

AUGUST 2012 - AudioFile