Thomas Hardy Selected Writings

This volume in the 21st Century Oxford Authors series offers students an authoritative, comprehensive selection of the work of Thomas Hardy--the first for nearly thirty years. The edition presents the poetry in a new way by giving the texts of Hardy's original volumes, as they first appeared, instead of the revised text he later produced for his Collected Poems. It reveals the range and variety of his output--qualities he later tended to disguise. His most famous sequence, the 'Poems of 1912-13' appears in a radically different form.

Selections from his epic drama, The Dynasts, are given within the chronological sequence of his poetry, illustrating the power of this neglected work. Notebook and journal entries, where Hardy puts forward his understanding of poetry and the role of the poet, are also included.

Uniquely generous in the number of poems it contains, this edition also provides extensive annotation, locating Hardy's work in its cultural context and reading it in the light of the critical reception. The notes direct attention towards Hardy's regional heritage, and they show his response to the issues and debates of his day--to discussions surrounding war, patriotism, the treatment of animals, marriage, and religion, among others. The annotation locates, in addition, how Hardy's work has continued to speak to present-day readers, by addressing present-day concerns--in particular, gender, including the gender(s) of the poetic voice, the global and (or versus) the local, and, thirdly, humanity's place within the natural world.

The edition also includes an Introduction to the life and works of Hardy, and a Chronology.

Ralph Pite, University of Bristol

Ralph Pite is Professor of English at the University of Bristol. He has published extensively on Thomas Hardy, including the biography, Thomas Hardy: The Guarded Life (2007) and Hardy's Geography: Wessex and the Regional Novel (2002). He has also published on classical reception and on ecocriticism, particularly in connection with the Romantic period; he is currently completing a study of the poetry of water. He developed the smartphone app, Romantic Bristol: Writing the City, first launched in 2013, and is a published poet.

FROM WESSEX POEMS AND OTHER VERSES (1898)
Preface [extract]
The Temporary the All
Hap
A Confession to a Friend in Trouble
Neutral Tones
She
Her Initials
Her Dilemma
She, to Him, I
a ? , II
a ? , III
a ? , IV
Ditty
Valenciennes
San Sebastian
The Stranger s Song
The Burghers
Leipzig
My Cicely
Friends Beyond
Thoughts of Ph a
Middle-Age Enthusiasms
In a Wood
To an Orphan Child
Nature s Questioning
The Impercipient
At an Inn
In a Eweleaze near Weatherbury
I Look into my Glass
FROM POEMS OF THE PAST AND THE PRESENT (1901)
Preface [extract]
War Poems
Embarcation
The Dead Drummer
A Wife in London
The Souls of the Slain
The Sick God
Poems of Pilgrimage
Genoa and the Mediterranean
Shelley s Skylark
In the Old Theatre, Fiesole
Rome: Building a New Street in the Ancient Quarter
Lausanne: In Gibbon s Old Garden
Miscellaneous Poems
The Mother Mourns
A Commonplace Day
At a Lunar Eclipse
The Subalterns
God-Forgotten
The Bedridden Peasant to an Unknowing God
Mute Opinion
To an Unborn Pauper Child
The Well-Beloved
A Broken Appointment
Between us now
A Spot
His Immortality
The Superseded
An August Midnight
Winter in Durnover Field
The Last Chrysanthemum
The Darkling Thrush
Mad Judy
A Wasted Illness
The Ruined Maid
The Respectable Burgher on the Higher Criticism
Her Late Husband
The Self-Unseeing
De Profundis I.
De Profundis II.
De Profundis III.
The Lost Pyx: A Mediaeval Legend
Tess s Lament
The Supplanter : A Tale
Imitations, etc.
From Victor Hugo
Retrospect
I have Lived with Shades
Memory and I
a???????? ????
FROM THE DYNASTS (1904-08)
Part 3, Act VI: scene viii: the road to Waterloo (extract)
Part 3, Act VII, scene ix: The Wood of Bossu
Part 3, After Scene (extract)
From Select Poems of William Barnes. chosen and edited by Thomas Hardy (1908)
Preface [extract]
FROM TIME'S LAUGHINGSTOCKS AND OTHER VERSES (1909)
Preface [Extract]
Time s Laughingstocks
The Revisitation
A Trampwoman s Tragedy
A Sunday Morning Tragedy
Bereft
The Rejected Member s Wife
The Farm-Woman s Winter
Autumn in the Park
Shut out that Moon
The Dead Man Walking
Love Lyrics
The Division
On the Departure Platform
The Phantom
The Night of the Dance
The Voice of the Thorn
The Minute before Meeting
He abjures Love
A Set of Country Songs
Let me Enjoy
At Casterbridge Fair
I: The Ballad Singer
II: Former Beauties
III: After the Club-Dance
VII: After the Fair
The Dark-eyed Gentleman
To Carrey Clavel
The Spring Call
Julie-Jane
Pieces Occasional and Various
A Church Romance
The Christening
A Dream Question
By the Barrows
A Wife and Another
The Roman Road
After the Last Breath
In Childbed
The Pine Planters
One We Knew
Before Life and After
New Year s Eve
His Education
Panthera
The Unborn
The Man He Killed
Geographical Knowledge
One Ralph Blossom Soliloquizes
G. M., 1828-1909
FROM THE BOOK OF BABY BEASTS (1911)
The Polar Bear
The Rat
The Calf
FROM THE BOOK OF BABY BIRDS (1912)
The Yellow-Hammer
The Duckling
The Tropic Bird
FROM SATIRES OF CIRCUMSTANCE, LYRICS AND REVERIES WITH MISCELLANEOUS PIECES (1914)
Lyrics and Reveries
In Front of the Landscape
Channel Firing
The Convergence of the Twain
The Ghost of the Past
When I set out for Lyonnesse
A Thunderstorm in Town
Beyond the Last Lamp
Lost Love
My spirit will not haunt the mound"
Wessex Heights
The Place on the Map
Where the Picnic was
Satires of Circumstance
I: At Tea
II: In Church
VIII: In the Study
X: In the Nuptial Chamber
XI: In the Restaurant
XIV: Over the Coffin
XV: In the Moonlight
Lyrics and Reveries (continued)
The Year s Awakening
Under the Waterfall
The Spell of the Rose
St Launce s revisited
Poems of 1912-13
The Going
Your Last Drive
The Walk
Rain on a Grave
I found her out there
Without Ceremony
Lament
The Haunter
The Voice
His Visitor
A Circular
A Dream or No
After a Journey
A Death-day recalled
Beeny Cliff
At Castle Boterel
Places
The Phantom Horsewoman
Miscellaneous Pieces
The Wistful Lady
The Woman in the Rye
The Re-enactment
The Newcomer s Wife
A King s Soliloquy
A Week
Had you wept
Bereft, she thinks she dreams
In the British Museum
In the Servants Quarters
Regret not me
The Telegram
The Moth-signal
Seen by the Waits
Exeunt Omnes
Postscript
Men who march away
FROM THE BOOK OF BABY PETS (1915)
About Lizards
FROM MOMENTS OF VISION AND MISCELLANEOUS VERSES (1917)
Moments of Vision
The Voice of Things
Why be at painsa
We sat at the window
Afternoon Service at Mellstock
Apostrophe to an Old Psalm Tune
At the Word Farewell
The Day of First Sight
Heredity
You were the sort that men forget
She, I, and They
Near Lanivet, 1872
Copying Architecture in an Old Minster
To Shakespeare
Quid hic agisa
Timing Her
The Blinded Bird
The wind blew words
The Riddle
To my Father s Violin
The Change
The Young Churchwarden
Lines to a Movement in Mozart s E-flat Symphony
In the seventies
The Pedigree
The Peace-offering
Something Tapped
The Wound
A January Night
The Announcement
The Oxen
An Anniversary
Transformations
The Last Signal
Great Things
The Figure in the Scene
Love the Monopolist
At Middle-field Gate in February
The Head above the Fog
Overlooking the River Stour
The Musical Box
On Sturminster Foot-bridge
The Last Performance
Logs on the Hearth
The Caged Goldfinch
The Five Students
The Wind s Prophecy
During Wind and Rain
He prefers her Earthly
Looking Across
The Pedestrian
Who s in the next rooma
At a Country Fair
Paying Calls
Everything Comes
Midnight on the Great Western
The Clock-winder
Old Excursions
In a Whispering Gallery
On the Doorstep
The Clock of the Years
The Shadow on the Stone
An Upbraiding
The Young Glass-Stainer
While drawing in a Churchyard
Poems of War and Patriotism
His Country
The Pity of It
In Time of the Breaking of Nations
Before Marching and After
A Call to National Service
I looked up from my writing
Finale
Afterwards
FROM LATE LYRICS AND EARLIER WITH MANY OTHER VERSES (1922)
Apology [Extract]
Weathers
The Maid of Keinton Mandeville
Summer Schemes
Faintheart in a Railway Train
The Garden Seat
The Curtains now are drawn
According to the Mighty Working
Going and Staying
The Dissemblers
The Old Gown
A Duettist to Her Pianoforte
Where Three Roads joined
And There was a Great Calm
The Woman I met
On Stinsford Hill at Midnight
The Fallow Deer at the Lonely House
The Wanderer
At Lulworth Cove a Century back
At the Railway Station, Upway
Side by Side
The Beauty
On the Tune called the Old-hundred-and-fourth
The Opportunity
The Rift
Voices from Things growing
By Henstridge Cross at the Year s End
The Chapel-Organist
Fetching her
Could I but will
After a Romantic Day
He follows Himself
Without, not within Her
The Little Old Table
Last Words to a Dumb Friend
On One who lived and died where He was born
Outside the Casement
The Passer-by
I was the midmost
The Whitewashed Wall
The Seven Times
The Sun s Last Look on the Country Girl
An Ancient to Ancients
After reading Psalms XXXIX, XL.
Surview
FROM THE FAMOUS TRAGEDY OF THE QUEEN OF CORNWALL (1924)
Could he but live for me
FROM HUMAN SHOWS, FAR PHANTASIES, SONGS, AND TRIFLES (1925)
Waiting both
Any little Old Song
The Turnip-hoer
Circus-rider to Ringmaster
The Later Autumn
Let me
An East-end Curate
Coming up Oxford Street: Evening
A Spellbound Palace
When dead
Sine Prole
Ten Years since
A Sheep Fair
Snow in the Suburbs
Ice on the Highway
Queen Caroline to her Guests
The Weary Walker
Last Love-word
Nobody comes
In the Street
So, Time
Last Look round St. Martin s Fair
A Leader of Fashion
When Oats were reaped
She opened the Door
The Harbour Bridge
Vagrant s Song
The Shiver
At the Aquatic Sports
At the Mill
Alike and Unlike
The Thing unplanned
Retty s Phases
He inadvertently cures his Love-pains
Known had I
Shortening Days at the Homestead
The Paphian Ball
The Bird-catcher s Boy
Song to an Old Burden
Why do Ia
FROM WINTER WORDS IN VARIOUS MOODS AND METRES (1928)
Introductory Note [extract]
The New Dawn s Business
Proud Songsters
Thoughts at Midnight
I am the One
A Wish for Unconsciousness
To Louisa in the Lane
The Love-letters
Throwing a Tree
Her Second Husband hears her Story
Yuletide in a Younger World
Lying awake
Childhood among the Ferns
A Countenance
Silences
To a Tree in London
The Dead Bastard
The Mongrel
Concerning Agnes
We Field-Women
A Practical Woman
He never expected much
Standing by the Mantelpiece
Christmas: 1924
Family Portraits
We are getting to the End
He resolves to say no more
FROM FLORENCE HARDY, THE EARLY LIFE OF THOMAS HARDY, 1840-1891 (1928)
Domicilium
TH s remarks on poetry from journals and diaries
FROM FLORENCE HARDY, THE LATER YEARS OF THOMAS HARDY, 1892-1928 (1930)
TH s remarks on poetry from journals and diaries