Thomas Hardy 
Far from the Madding Crowd 

Hardy’s fourth novel and first major literary success tells a story of love in all its guises. Gabriel Oak is a shepherd struggling to get ahead when Bathsheba Everdene moves next door. Though he loves her, she sees him as a friend and rejects him for two other suitors. After she leaves town, she and Gabriel are reunited years later, though now everything has changed. Hardy depicts the English countryside as idyllic, but also hard and unforgiving, much like the Victorian mindsets of the day. A timeless literary love story.

About the author

Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) was an English poet and novelist who wrote during both the Victorian and Modernist periods. A realist influenced by Romanticism, he is the author of numerous short stories, a wealth of poetry, and fourteen novels, including Tess of the d’Urbervilles, Far from the Madding Crowd, and Jude the Obscure. Known for his investigation of tragic characters, difficult circumstances, and fate, he used his writing to critique the Victorian societal conventions that created an array of social constraints.