Reading Thomas Hardy
Aug 14, 2006
Many years ago, a fiery literature professor taught me to love the writing of Thomas Hardy. And not because I wanted to. Return of the Native was looooonnnnnggggg and seemed tedious at first, but within a few nights' reading, I was hooked. His prose whisked me away to worlds unknown unlike any other writing, and it was less the stories than the actual writing that won my admiration. (Although his stories are compelling in their own right.)
His work is sensuous in the truest sense, grasping all five sense in one's imagination. It requires you to slow down and absorb all the things your mind can comprehend, leaving nothing unstudied. It's easy to get lost in vivid, often unexpected, descriptions of country wilds, pastoral landscapes, and simple human interactions.
Today, I've been listening to, rather than reading, Far from the Madding Crowd, and I hate to admit what joy I had long forgot. If only textbooks could be written so well and recorded for easy listening. Ah, to dream...
Blech. There are VERY few writers that I totally abhor, but he is DEFINITELY one of them. This does not make me a bad person. Nor does it make me think YOU are a bad person. Just a person of extremely bizarre taste ;)
By the way, researchers speculate that his wife wrote most of "his" work. It just wasn't a time condusive to women writers being successful.