This Reader's Guide analyses the critical history of two of Hardy's major tragic novels, from the time of their publication to the present. Simon Avery traces the changing critical fortunes of the texts and explores the diverse range of interpretations produced by different theoretical approaches.

Acknowledgements
Introductions
Contemporary Reviews
Establishing Lines of Critical Enquiry, 1890-1949
Developing Critical Approaches: Criticism of the 1950s and 1960s
Critical Expansion: Criticism of the 1970s
The Impact of High Theory: Criticism of the 1980s
Recent (Re-)Readings: Criticism from 1990 to the Present
Re-Representations: Film and Television Adaptations
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index

SIMON AVERY is Senior Lecturer in Literature at the University of Westminster, UK. He is co-author (with Rebecca Stott) of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (2003), editor of Lives of Victorian Literary Figures II: The Brownings (2004).