far from the madding crowd analysis
- This is a preview of the essay.
To view the full text you must login!
THOMAS HARDY A SHORT BIOGRAPHY
Thomas Hardy lived from June 2, 1840, to January 11, 1928. He grew up in Higherbockhampton, Dorset, the eldest son of a stonemason. He had one brother and two sisters. Sickly from an early age, he was educated at home until he was sixteen. He then began an apprenticeship, and then a career, as an architect. He started writing poetry in the 1860s but did not publish his first novel until 1871. He married Emma Lavinia Gifford in 1874.
It was not until the publication of Far from the Madding Crowd, Hardy's fourth novel that Hardy won widespread popularity as a writer, and he was able to give up architecture. The book was published serially in 1874, in Corn Hill Magazine; a journal edited by Leslie Stephens, the father of Virginia Woolf. The novel was published in short sections, and as you read it, you can see that they intentionally leave the reader in suspense; this was a device to motivate readers to buy the next issue of the magazine...