- Paperback: 368 pages
- Publisher: Penguin Classic (Jun 28 2005)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0140431241
- ISBN-13: 978-0140431247
- Product Dimensions: 13.5 x 1.9 x 19.7 cm
- Shipping Weight: 272 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #1,960,893 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
Product Description
The darkly passionate short stories of Thomas Hardy are compelling explorations of love, social class, superstition and legend. This collection contains many of his finest and most representative, and includes The Withered Arm', an eerie depiction of arcane witchcraft in nineteenth-century England; Barbara of the House of Grebe', in which a beautiful man's tragic disfigurement by fire is savagely exploited by his rival; The Son's Veto', showing the cruelty of an educated youth towards his ignorant but tender mother; and The Distracted Preacher', the story of one man's conflict between heartfelt love and his own sense of moral and civic duty. By turns moving and poetic, and surprisingly modern and brutally macabre, these eloquent tales may be numbered among the greatest creations of Hardy's genius.
About the Author
Thomas Hardy was born on 2 June 1840. He wrote novels and poetry, much of which is set in the semi-imaginary county of Wessex. His novels include Far From the Madding Crowd (1874), The Return of the Native (1878), The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886), Tess of the D'Urbervilles(1891) and Jude the Obscure (1895). He published his first volume of poetry, Wessex Poems, in 1898 and continued to publish collections of poems until his death on 11 January 1928.
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
Something delayed the arrival of the Wesleyan minister, and a young man came temporarily in his stead. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
Something delayed the arrival of the Wesleyan minister, and a young man came temporarily in his stead. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Master in Miniature,
By A Customer
This review is from: Penguin Classics Distracted Preacher And Other Tales (Paperback)
Hardy's novels continue to be justly popular and his poetry (which he considered his most important work)has worn well with the critics, but the short stories deserve a much wider audience than they have received. This collection, which contains some of his best, provides a fine introduction to the dark vision of the late Victorian master. The title story is uncharacteristically happy, a pastoral piece in which Hardy tells a comic tale about a young woman's unexpected talent for criminal activity. The other stories are much more representative, being concerned with the perils of love, the cruelty of convention and the tragic vulnerability of human aspirations to the whims of fate. Many of the tales are also wrapped in the Gothic and even grotesque trappings that Hardy seemed to favour when the mood was upon him. This collection gives Bram Stoker and Stephen King a run for their money, featuring a corpse with a stake driven through its heart, a new bride spending her wedding night with her new husband by her side and the corpse of her first husband in the next room, parricide, suicide and kidnapping. The mood of the pieces varies from the sunny high jinks of "The Distracted Preacher" to the wrenching tragedy of "A Son's Veto" and the relentless horror of "The Withered Arm." Overall, this group of tales gives the newcomer to Hardy an excellent introduction to his talents as a storyteller, and fans of his novels will enjoy the opportunity to see the master at work on a smaller stage.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Hardy was NOT a great short story writer...,
By A Customer
This review is from: Penguin Classics Distracted Preacher And Other Tales (Paperback)
but these stories, culled from his archives, represent the absolute best of his short work.Hardy's tales here evoke early 19th century England; not just the Wessex Heath of Return of the Native (a novel whose opening four pages are among the best in all of literature) but the small towns where bootleggers operate and ghosts walk the back lanes. All these stories have an "oral" quality about them, as if they were told by a hoary English gent, his face wreathed in smoke from an old Meerschaum. None of these stories will knock you out, but there were some pleasant surprises, including "An Imaginative Woman" (the best Hardy short story I've read so far), and "A Tragedy of Two Ambitions," which raises intriguing questions on murder and responsibility. Hardy's favorite tale, "The Son's Veto" is also included, but I found this story, along with "Fiddler of the Reels" to be a dud. "Barbara of the House of Grebe" is unintentionally funny - an execrable Gothic exercise, where Hardy sounds more formulaic than ever. Thankfully, the too-oft anthologized (but lovely) "The Three Strangers" is not included. Hardy wrote a lot of garbage short stories in his career - so, kudos to the editor for weeding through them and presenting us with the best of his short works. Read his novels. They are much better.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Wonderful little Hardy vistas!,
By
This review is from: Penguin Classics Distracted Preacher And Other Tales (Paperback)
If you are familiar with Hardy, you probably know him as a brilliant novelist and possibly, a poet (he excelled in both areas). However, he shone in the short story form as well, as this collection vividly demonstrates. This book includes some of Hardy's best known and most poignant stories, including the spectacular 'Grave by the Handpost' and the 'Fiddler of the Reels,' which echo with the tragic themes prevalent in his later novels. Hardy's prose style is incredibly moving and poetic in his short stories. He used words to serve a purpose, which is more than I can say for a number of Victorian writers. These stories are a wonderful introduction to Hardy if you have not had any exposure to his 'great' works. And don't give up with them! Although his style is moderately cumbersome, I'm sure you will find his socially-aware ideas surprisingly modern and unbelievably brutal in their rawness. Hardy is a classic writer who no one should miss reading. If you want a brilliant introduction to his work (but beware, reading these stories will drain you!) I highly recommend this collection. You will also enjoy it immensely if you've only experienced Hardy the novelist. A note to teachers: I am a high school student, and I know that my peers would have appreciated Hardy much more if he had been presented to them through these tremendous stories, rather than through his novels. I am a devout Hardy fanatic, but know people with short attention spans have difficulty appreciating his novels. Introducing Hardy to your students through his stories (I particularily recommend the Fiddler of the Reels) might allow you to cover more ground.
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