Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Thomas Hardy
-
Standard Name: Hardy, Thomas
TH
was a poet by vocation and became a novelist by profession. The Wessex of his novels has made him arguably a regional novelist. As well as a prolific output in both these forms, he published a unique verse epic bringing together human and supernatural characters, short fiction, a volume for children, and two volumes of actual autobiography masquerading as a biography by his second wife. Since his career as a publishing novelist ran from the 1870s to the 1890s, and his first volume of poetry post-dated his final novel, he has been seen as a Victorian novelist but a mostly twentieth-century poet. This description, however, is not true to the facts of composition. He wrote poetry from early in his life, but did not publish it in volume form until his final novel.
In her short autobiographical article Leaving School—XI, AQ
mentions having been writing stories since the age of seven to entertain myself.
Quin, Ann. “Leaving School—XI”. London Magazine, Vol.
new series 6
, pp. 63-8.
64
Her urge to write was fostered by her discovery of Dostoyevsky
's...
Intertextuality and Influence
Phyllis Bentley
The title, from Hardy
, carries connotations of blind, indifferent fate directing the course of human existence.
Intertextuality and Influence
John Oliver Hobbes
Pearl Richards (later JOH
) read widely as a child and adolescent, and her parents' liberal views (and considerable fortune) meant that she could pursue her tastes in both the lending libraries and the less...
Intertextuality and Influence
Margaret Drabble
Imagery of postpartum fluidity, particularly lactation, characterizes the lovers' growing passion and the descriptions of female sexual desire and orgasm. The narrative alternates between a schizoid third-person dialogue
Drabble, Margaret. The Waterfall. Penguin.
130
and first-person narration as Jane attempts...
Intertextuality and Influence
Helen Dunmore
These poems deal in passing time and final partings, with the sudden recognition of changes accumulated over years. The magic cloak of invisibility longed for by children comes in the end unsought for and the...
Intertextuality and Influence
Margaret Kennedy
Kennedy shifts gears in this work to focus on a young girl's experience in learning about life and love. She foregrounds this theme by means of a quotation from Thomas Hardy
's Tess of the...
Intertextuality and Influence
Christine Brooke-Rose
This sets out to explore the effects of various technological media on the novel genre. It begins with the apparent forcible entry into a story by Jane Austen
of a great German contemporary of Austen:...
Intertextuality and Influence
Mary Augusta Ward
It is set in the late nineteenth-century on the boundary between Westmorland and Lancashire, an exquisite country
Ward, Mary Augusta. Helbeck of Bannisdale. Editor Worthington, Brian, Penguin.
86
whose landscape has a profound effect in the narrative. Alan Helbeck, of an old Catholic family...
Health
May Sinclair
As early as October 1908 MS
was told that she had strained her heart by exercise (her bicycling trip with Thomas Hardy
) and ought to be careful.
Raitt, Suzanne. May Sinclair: A Modern Victorian. Clarendon Press.
113
In view of her family's history...
Friends, Associates
Evelyn Sharp
Others with whom she shared this or that memorable experience were the Meynells (Wilfrid
, Alice
, and Viola
), Clarence Rook
and his wife, and Henry W. Nevinson
, whom she eventually married...
She was introduced to writer Thomas Hardy
some time in 1889. They had a flirtation (both in person and by letter) which left Hardy the disappointed partner,
Leighton, Angela, and Margaret Reynolds, editors. Victorian Women Poets: An Anthology. Blackwell.
581
possibly after she rejected his advances in...
Friends, Associates
Dora Sigerson
After her marriage, DS
became acquainted with a number of notable literary figures, including George Meredith
(who wrote the introduction to The Collected Poems of Dora Sigerson Shorter, 1907), Thomas Hardy
(who wrote the...
Friends, Associates
Frances Cornford
Frances's association with Rupert Brooke
began with the rehearsals for the play and grew into friendship. They discussed their poetry with each other, and Frances counselled and consoled Rupert in his many love affairs. She...