Thomas Hardy, Metaphysics and Music

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-ix

   PDF

2. Introduction

   • Mark Asquith

   Pages 1-17

3. The Road to Norcombe Hill: Hardy’s Musical Evolution

   • Mark Asquith

   Pages 18-31

4. ‘Silent Workings of the Invisible Hand’: Hardy’s Metaphysical Evolution

   • Mark Asquith

   Pages 32-46

5. The Spider’s Web: Metaphysics into Music Drama

   • Mark Asquith

   Pages 47-77

6. The Plucked Harp String: Desire, Courtship Ritual and the Debate Concerning Speech Theory

   • Mark Asquith

   Pages 78-103

7. A Tale of ‘Tragical Possibilities’: Music and the Birth of Consciousness in The Return of the Native

   • Mark Asquith

   Pages 104-122

8. ‘A Tragedy Appropriate for Its Time’: Music and the Story of a ‘Man of Character’

   • Mark Asquith

   Pages 123-146

9. ‘All Creation Groaning’: A Deaf Ear to Music in Jude the Obscure

   • Mark Asquith

   Pages 147-164

10. Conclusion

    • Mark Asquith

    Pages 165-168

11. Back Matter

    Pages 169-234

    PDF

This fascinating new study by Mark Asquith offers an original approach to Hardy's art as a novelist and entirely new readings of certain musical scenes in Hardy's works. Asquith utilizes a rich seam of original archival research (both scientific and musicological), which will be of use to all Hardy scholars, and discusses a range of Hardy's major works in relation to musical metaphors - from early fiction The Poor Man and the Lady to later major works Jude the Obscure, Far From the Madding Crowd, the Mayor of Casterbridge .

• fiction
• metaphysics
• Thomas Hardy
• British and Irish Literature

'One of the best books on Hardy published in recent years...I was struck by how coherent, well-illustrated and informative it is, opening up a world of musicological debate and making sense of it; relating it to the way that the nineteenth century thought about emotion, embodiment and their transmission; and of course applying it in numerous incisive ways to a range of Hardy's work, taking in issues including the Darwinian landscape, social life, courtship and the chorus...An impressive and elegant book.' - Tim Armstrong, Royal Holloway, UK

MARK ASQUITH is a teacher of English at Trinity School in London. He is the author of a number of articles on Hardy and Wagner.

Policies and ethics