Far from the Madding Crowd

by Thomas Hardy

Norman Vance and Dr Keith Carabine

Introduction and Notes by Norman Vance, Professor of English, University of Sussex.

Far from the Madding Crowd is perhaps the most pastoral of Hardy's Wessex novels. It tells the story of the young farmer Gabriel Oak and his love for and pursuit of the elusive Bathsheba Everdene, whose wayward nature leads her to both tragedy and true love.

It tells of the dashing Sergeant Troy whose rakish philosophy of life was ‘…the past was yesterday; never, the day after’, and lastly, of the introverted and reclusive gentleman farmer, Mr Boldwood, whose love fills him with ‘…a fearful sense of exposure’, when he first sets eyes on Bathsheba.

The background of this tale is the Wessex countryside in all its moods, contriving to make it one of the most English of great English novels.

• ISBN10: 1853260673
• ISBN13: 9781853260674
• Publish Date: 5 August 1993 (first published 4 April 1874)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: Wordsworth Editions Ltd
• Edition: New edition
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 368
• Language: English

Reviews

[brokentune]

Review first posted on BookLikes: http://brokentune.booklikes.com/post/888908/far-from-the-madding-crowd

"All the female guests were huddled aghast against the walls like sheep in a storm, and the men were bewildered as to what to do."

Thomas Hardy and I don't gel. Maybe it's the pastoral setting, maybe it's the rather monotonous way he tells a story, maybe it was the endless descriptions of sheep and the use of sheep-symbolism in this book, but Hardy just does not do anything for me.

I get the book. I get Hardy's writing. But, as with Tess, he just does not persuade me to care about any of the characters.

I will persevere with two or three more titles - two on the recommendation of BL friends and Return of the Native because the audio book is read by Alan Rickman.