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Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), novelist and poet, was born on 2 June 1840, in Higher Bockhampton, Dorset. The eldest child of Thomas Hardy and Jemima Hand, Hardy had three younger siblings: Mary, Henry, and Katharine. Hardy learned to read at a very young age, and developed a fascination with the services he regular attended at Stinsford church. He also grew to love the music that accompanied church ritual. His father had once been a member of the Stinsford church musicians - the group Hardy later memorialised in Under the Greenwood Tree - and taught him to play the violin, with the pair occasionally performing together at local dance parties. Whilst attending the church services, Hardy developed a fascination for a skull which formed part of the Grey family monument. He memorised the accompanying inscription (containing the name 'Angel', which he would later use in his novel Tess of the d'Urbervilles) so intently that he was still able to recite it well into old age. Thomas Hardy By Bain News Service [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons Adulthood Between the years of 1856-1862, Hardy worked as a trainee architect. He formed an important friendship...
Read the essay: Thomas Hardy by Charlotte Barrett
# Title Description Contributor
1 Useful Frames and Dead Pasteboard

Sarah Hook looks at Victorian photographic card portraits, and charts their appearances in...

Sarah Hook
# Essay Title Description Contributor
1 Literature and Victorian Religion

Most of the high profile female writers of this period were committed Christians. The Broad...

Julian Thompson
2 Victorian Poetry and Fiction

The years 1837-1901 in which Queen Victoria reigned were highly influential in the development...

Charlotte Barrett
3 Victorian Publishing History

During the nineteenth century, the population of England grew from 8.9 to 32.5 million. This...

Charlotte Barrett
4 ‘‘Beauty […] lay not within the thing but in what the thing symbolised’’: Female Clothing and the Senses in the Works of Thomas Hardy

By Charlotte Barrett ...

Charlotte Barrett
5 Character and Environment in Thomas Hardy's Fiction

Thomas Hardy was born in Upper Bockhampton, Dorset and lived within the county for much of his...

Charlotte Barrett
6 Thomas Hardy

Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), novelist and poet, was born on 2 June 1840, in Higher Bockhampton,...

Charlotte Barrett
7 Science and Religion

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, William Paley published Natural Theology (...

Charlotte Barrett
# Title Description Author
1 Tess of the d'Urbervilles

ebook version of Tess of the d'Urbervilles

Hardy, Thomas, 1840-1928
2 The Woodlanders

ebook version of The Woodlanders

Hardy, Thomas, 1840-1928
3 A pair of blue eyes

ebook version of A pair of blue eyes

Hardy, Thomas, 1840-1928
4 Far from the madding crowd

ebook version of Far from the madding crowd

Hardy, Thomas, 1840-1928
5 Mayor of Casterbridge

ebook version of Mayor of Casterbridge

Hardy, Thomas, 1840-1928
6 The Cornhill Magazine (vol 29)

January - June 1874.
Contains serialised versions of stories (including Hardy's 'Far...

7 On the Origin of Species

Publisher info: London: John Murray, 1859.

Charles Darwin
8 The Poetical Works of Thomas Hardy (vol 1) Thomas Hardy
9 The Mayor of Casterbridge Thomas Hardy
10 Far From the Madding Crowd Thomas Hardy
11 The Woodlanders

In three volumes.

Thomas Hardy
12 The Return of the Native Thomas Hardy
# Resource Title Description Contributor
1 Science and the Supernatural

In this short blog post, Melissa Dickson explores the connection between developments in...

Melissa Dickson
2 On the Subject of Speed: Thomas Hardy

In this short blog post, Catherine Charlwood considers the dramatic social, scientific and...

Catherine Charlwood
3 thedimofdawn.com

A resource for IGCSE students studying the poems of Thomas Hardy, including background and...

Students at The King’s School Canterbury