Thomas Hardy

This has been a good week for lovers of Thomas Hardy. Earlier in the week, there was an excellent documentary about his life and work on TV and today the BBC started its three part adaptation of Tess of the D'Urbervilles. The BBC, as usual, has done an excellent job.

Interestingly, Thomas Hardy first wrote novels like Tess as serials for magazines, and the editors would omit some of his writing because it was considered too scandalous. This was especially true of Tess, and of Jude the Obscure which dealt with subjects that were taboo in Victorian England. He did, however, reinstate some of the censored material when he published the stories as novels.

In his attitudes to sexuality and morality, he was probably out of kilter with his age. But he stayed true to his vision, in spite of the public outcry. It would have been easier to take the easy path and go along with what his publishers wanted, but he wasn't prepared to do that.

Would his books have been so powerful if he had only written what the establishment was prepared to hear?