Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy, written by Trevor Johnson, is the detailed journey through the life of one of England’s greatest writers. This biography describes some of the major details of his life such as his family, his education, and his major works.
	Thomas Hardy was born in 1840 at the Village of Upper Bochampton. He was the child of a country stonemason. Hardy was the third Thomas of his family. His mother’s maiden name was Jemima Hand and she and her husband led Hardy to have an unusually happy childhood. His early years were a seed-bed to his later creative development. His mother knew what real poverty was when she was young because she lost her father. Hardy said ‘ she read every book she could lay her hands on’ and she grew up to be a woman of ability, judgment, and ‘ an energy that might have carried her to incalculable issues!’ Many thought she was the dominant influence in Hardy’s life but his father was a man of character also. Even though he didn’t ‘ possess the art of enriching himself by business,’ he was a fine craftsman, and a lover of music. Hardy’s family was never poor and he summed up his happy childhood in a tiny lyric:
She sat here in her chair,
smiling into the fire;
He who played stood there,
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Bowing it higher and higher.
Childlike, I danced in a dream;
Blessings emblazoned that day;
Everything glowed with a gleam;
Yet we were looking away!
	As a young child, Hardy mastered the violin learning over 100 tunes. He also sang in the Stansford Church every Sunday. It seems to be that Hardy and his parents had a good relationship. In 1867 Hardy met Tryphena Sparks who was 16 and a daughter to a family related to his. She was intelligent and made her living as a teacher. She bore a child in 1868 and Hardy fell deeply in love with her. But in 1872 she broke his heart by returning her engagement ring. She then remarried and had two more children before dying in 1890. Tryphena had a great influence on his writing. On March 7, 1870 Hardy took an architectural trip to a church named St. Juliot. He stayed at the rectory and met the rector’s sister-in-law, Emma Lavinia Gifford. She was younger and attractive, and they walked hand in hand through the countryside. They fell half in love and Hardy made many trips back to St. Juliot. In 1874 they were married and proceeded to wander about Europe until they settled in S...
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... as the greatest English author of his time. He received an Order of Merit and many doctorates from universities. His achievements stemmed further from writing by receiving two architectural awards. He was even popular enough to get pestered by nosy neighbors.
	His relationships with other writers were few but important. When he was with Florence Ellen Dugdale, his home was a pilgrimage to young writers like, Edmund Blunden, Robert Graves, T.E. Lawrence,, and Siegfried Sassoon. But perhaps the greatest honor he ever received was when he died. His ashes were scattered in Poet’s Corner in Westminster Abby next to the great Charles Dickens.
Thomas Hardy by Trevor Johnson is a well written, thorough, and easy to follow biography. Leaving out only ancestry and condemnation, it provided a lot of information on major topics. This book is a good description of Hardy and it is a good research reference. By reading this and The Mayor of Casterbridge it is easy to tie together Hardy’s life and Michael Henchard’s. It is clear that Hardy knew of lost love and
experienced the surrounding hardships. Thomas Hardy is a good writer and by Trevor Johnson’s description, he led a good life.
With this, his last novel, Hardy is moving away from the convention of the "inner life of the characters to be inferred from their public behavior" (Howe 513), so, although Sue...
Taking an Ecocritical approach, Hardy seeks refuge in the country and his past. Looking at Hardy’s poems, I conducted the evaluation that has led to the agreement of the statement. Hardy seeks refuge in the country to connect with his past, giving him the safety he physically and emotionally needs due to the grief he feels towards the loss of his late wife: Emma. The three poems that link into the statement are: ‘Under the Waterfall’, ‘Your Last Drive’, and ‘The Going.’ Each one gives a different aspect towards the topic of refuge.
As in all art, each masterpiece has a distinct mark from their specific artist. The literary arts are no exception, with each author leaving a prominent rhythm, style and language. Thomas Hardy is known for his poems of separation. Thomas found love when he was 30 years old, but his relationship went sour when his marriage to Emma Gifford became estranged. Emma later died leaving her husband an outcast. It was not until 1914 when Thomas Hardy married his second wife, Florence, that he understood how much he missed his first wife. In his poems, Hardy focuses on withering love and the being miserable after a loss. Also, he uses rhyme scheme, multiple cesuras and end stops and symbolism to conceal a deeper meaning of the poem. The two poems that connect the two aspects of Thomas Hardy’s style are Your Last Drive and The Workbox.
London’s writing career was not just given to him, he faced many hardships, but he worked hard to become a successful writer. His life was full of illness and addiction that he struggled with. London was a very successful and hard working writer and overcame obstacles that could have held him back, but he was determined to get out of poverty and support his family which he more than succeeded in doing.
The United States has often been referred to as a global “melting pot” due to its assimilation of diverse cultures, nationalities, and ethnicities. In today’s society, this metaphor may be an understatement. Between 1990 and 2010, the number of foreign born United States residents nearly doubled from 20 million to 40 million, increasing the U.S. population from almost 250 million to 350 million people. With U.S. born children and grandchildren of immigrants, immigration contributed to half of this population growth. These immigrants, consisting of mostly Asian and Hispanic backgrounds, have drastically changed the composition of the U.S. population. In 2010, Asians and Hispanics made up 20 percent of the U.S. population, in contrast to a 6 percent share of Asians and Hispanics in 1970. It is predicted that by 2050, the share of immigrants in the United States will increase to one half of the entire population. With this rapid increase in diversity, many citizens have opposing views on its impact on the United States. In my opinion, an increase in immigration does contain both positive and negatives effects, but in general it provides an overriding positive influence on America’s society (“Population”).
...enal poet who received credit where it was due and till this day continues to amaze the different fields of literary arts, and was a brilliant man whose life was shaped by the tragedies and tribulations caused by rough childhood and the death of many loved ones.
The beauty is that we even share cultures day to day and speak different languages. There is an enormous variety amongst ourselves and there has to be a place here in the states for anyone to enjoy. Immigration policies can utterly destroy all of this and ruin the authentic mixture of cultures the states are known for. “The ethnic, religious, and cultural diversity brought by immigrants in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries has shaped American history and politics.”
This is also the year that Hardy married his first wife, Emma Gifford. Their marriage lasted until her death in 1912, which prompted Hardy to write his collection of poems called Veteris Vestigiae Flammae (Vestiges of an Old Flame). These poems are some of Hardy's finest and describe their meeting and his subsequent loss. In 1914 Florence Dugdale became Hardy's second wife and she wrote his biography after he died in Dorchester, on January 11, 1928.
Jack London is the name you can hear everywhere, his writing appealed to millions of people all around the world. London was an American novelist and short-story writer, who wrote passionately about questions of life and death, surviving. The writer had a lot of adventures, experienced the life at sea, or in Alaska, or in the fields and factories of California, all of these influenced his writing style. Jack London descended from the family of his mother Flora and astrologer and journalist William Chaney. The writer has got his education by himself and with help of a librarian Ina Coolbrith - he has a passion to read books at public libraries. Later in life, Jack finally graduated from high school in Oakland. Jack London's work carrier was so variable, he has been a laborer, factory worker, and oyster pirate on the San Francisco Bay, member of the California Fish Patrol, sailor, railroad hob, and gold prospector. Yes, gold prospecting was the big part of his life, when the young writer with his brother-in-law sailed to join the Klondike Gold Rush where he would set his first successful stories. Jack London was a hard-worker, he tried never miss his early morning 1,000-word writing stint, what helped him to write over fifty books between 1900 and 1916. In addition to it, he corresponded with his readers, and made huge researches for improving his writing style, what is, obviously, genius. The consequences of such a hard work became the fact that Jack London had become the best selling, highest paid and most popular American author of his time. Many authors and social advocates have been inspired by Jack London’s heartfelt prose, and readers travel and experience so much through his books.
Thomas Hardy was writing around from 1870 and gave up novel writing in 1895 after receiving harsh criticism. In those times the laws were very different. For instance women could not vote at all which could have made a difference if they did vote. After Emma died - which was Hardy's first wife he wrote poems that were for her or about her when they were married. Section 2 - Content, Tone and Theme =
While people immigrating to the United States are often searching for better economic situations or to be reunited with family members, they are instead thrown into a system that has had a history of retaliating against them for searching for a better life. The United States has always had a difficult relationship with immigration, both needing it to promote growth in economic and demographic spheres while also using it as an easy scapegoat for many of the country’s problems. Once within the U.S. borders, immigrants are expected to conform, or assimilate, to the country’s standards and ideals, which also includes adapting to the racialized system that controls much of the politics and day to day life of American citizens. Suddenly, immigrants
“Beauty lay not in the thing, but in what the thing symbolized.” Thomas Hardy believed beyond the physical element of object, their lies a more important symbolic meaning. Thomas Hardy was a renowned transitional poet with a style between classicism and romanticism. He was born in the mid-1800s in Higher Bockhampton, an English village. Hardy’s upbringing contributed greatly to his views on the world around him, in a symbolic manner. His father was a stonemason and a violinist, and his mother encouraged him to follow his passions. Hardy was first married for 38 years to Emma Gifford, who inspired many of his poetic ideas. He later married his secretary Florence Dugdale two years after Emma died. (http://www.universalteacher.org .uk/poetry/hardy.htm#13)
The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy is a novel about the rising and plummeting of a complex man named Michael Henchard. Michael Henchard does not just have one characteristic or just one personality for that matter. His personality can be described as thoughtful and strong-minded but also as ruthless, stubborn and cold. Henchard's impulsiveness, aggressive attitude, childishness and selfish nature made failure and misery inevitable in his life. The essence of his character is the root of his demise and misery.
Hardy originated from a working class family. The son of a master mason, Hardy was slightly above that of his agricultural peers. Hardy’s examination of transition between classes is usually similar to that of D.H. Lawrence, that if you step outside your circle you will die. The ambitious lives of the characters within Hardy’s novels like Jude and Tess usually end fatally; as they attempt to break away from the constraints of their class, thus, depicting Hardy’s view upon the transition between classes. Hardy valued lower class morals and traditions, it is apparent through reading Tess that her struggles are evidently permeated through the social sufferings of the working class. A central theme running throughout Hardy’s novels is the decline of old families. It is said Hardy himself traced the Dorset Hardy’s lineage and found once they were of great i...
Thomas Hardy was a famous author and poet he lived from 1840 to 1928. During his long life of 88 years he wrote fifteen novels and one thousand poems. He lived for the majority of his life near Dorchester. Hardy got many ideas for his stories while he was growing up. An example of this was that he knew of a lady who had had her blood turned by a convict’s corpse and he used this in the story ‘The Withered Arm’. The existence of witches and witchcraft was accepted in his lifetime and it was not unusual for several people to be killed for crimes of witchcraft every year.