The Mayor of Casterbridge (Collins Classics)

Description

HarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics. 'The movements of his mind seemed to tend to the thought that some power was working against him.' When Henchard, an out-of-work hay-trusser gets drunk and sells his wife at a country fair, his life will never be the same. Eighteen years later, his wife and daughter return to Casterbridge to find that Henchard has become Mayor. Although he's spent most of his life attempting to repent for his actions, he remains a rash and impetuous man. Hardy portrays Henchard as a tragic hero, searching for love and acceptance from the community around him, posing the overarching question of whether we shape our own fate, or whether life deals us an inevitable hand.

THOMAS HARDY (1840-1928) was an English author and poet best known for his literary masterpieces Jude the Obscure, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, Far from the Madding Crowd, and The Mayor of Casterbridge. While he achieved success during his lifetime for his novels, Hardy considered himself first and foremost a poet, and his poetry is today recognized as a significant influence on the Movement poets of the 1950s and 1960s.