- Published: 15 November 2016
- ISBN: 9780345804013
- Imprint: Knopf US
- Format: Paperback
- Pages: 384
- RRP: $22.99
The Mayor of Casterbridge
One of Hardy's greatest works, now in a beautiful Vintage Classics package--the story of the dramatic rise and fall of a brooding and brutal man.
The Mayor of Casterbridge, one of Thomas Hardy’s most powerful novels, opens with a scene of shocking heartlessness. In a fit of drunken rage, Michael Henchard, an out-of-work laborer, sells his wife and baby daughter to a passing sailor. When the horror of what he has done dawns on him the next day, he determines to set his life on a different path, and through years of hard work and ambition rises to become the rich and respectable mayor of his town. Secret guilt continues to haunt this proud and brooding man, however, and when his wife and grown daughter return to Casterbridge, Henchard is set on the path to a dramatic confrontation with his own deeply flawed nature. Hardy’s keen insight into the course of wayward lives and his instinctive feel for the beauty of the rural landscape come together in this unforgettable portrait of a tragic hero.
- Published: 15 November 2016
- ISBN: 9780345804013
- Imprint: Knopf US
- Format: Paperback
- Pages: 384
- RRP: $22.99
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About the author
Thomas Hardy was born in Dorset in 1840 and became an apprentice architect at the age of sixteen. He spent his twenties in London, where he wrote his first poems. In 1867 Hardy returned to his native Dorset, whose rugged landscape was a great source of inspiration for his writing. Between 1871 and 1897 he wrote fourteen novels, including Tess of the D'Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure. This final work was received savagely; thereafter Hardy turned away from novels and spent the last thirty year of his life focusing on poetry. He died in 1928.
