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The Mayor of Casterbridge (Penguin Classics)
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Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Author: Thomas Hardy
Publisher: Penguin Classics
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Our Price: $8.00
You Save: $ ( % )
Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Author: Thomas Hardy
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Average Customer Rating:
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The Mayor of Casterbridge (Penguin Classics) Description
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.8
EAN: 9780141439785
ISBN: 0141439785
Label: Penguin Classics
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 448
Publication Date: 2003-04-29
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Product Release Date: 2003-04-29
Studio: Penguin Classics
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.8
EAN: 9780141439785
ISBN: 0141439785
Label: Penguin Classics
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 448
Publication Date: 2003-04-29
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Product Release Date: 2003-04-29
Studio: Penguin Classics
Editorial Review of The Mayor of Casterbridge (Penguin Classics)
Edited with an Introduction and Notes by Keith Wilson.
Customer Reviews of The Mayor of Casterbridge (Penguin Classics)
Customer Rating: 
Review Summary: Thomas Hardy continues to spread depression
Review: Thomas Hardy, while certainly an extremely talented author, seemingly had the knack of producing Victorian-era soap operas which never fails to depress even the most cheerful soul. Sometimes his depressing stories has a message that produces a somewhat cathartic reading experience (as with Tess of the D'Urbervilles), but with The Mayor of Casterbridge all we get is utter negativity. This mayor is one twisted, selfish and self-loathing individual. He seems to live with a rain cloud over his head, and doesn't quite understand how it is to be loved. Fun guy? Nope. And there isn't even a happy ending.
Bottom line: nice characterizations and fine prose amount to lipstick on a sow. Not recommended.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: favorite Hardy book
Review: Reread this one recently - what a great book. This is my favorite of all Hardy's books. The fascinating part of this novel is the protagonist, because he is such a mix of good and bad. He has good and even heroic impulses and acts, and bad and even evil impulses and acts. The way he manages to sabotage the good things he could get reminds me of Lily in the House of Mirth, although Henchard's sabotage is due to through bad temper and anger and insecurity, while Lily's are due to ambivalence. But the trip downward is quite similar. Basically it ends up being the story of a man's self-destruction. What a crime that Hardy's novels were unpopular when he first wrote them, and the bad reviews discouraged him from writing more! I have them all but wish there were more.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: The Mayor of Casterbidge is a Tragic Tale of a Tormented Soul.
Review: An early fall afternoon in the 1840s bucolic world of Wessex. Michael Henchard, a young hay trusser, sells his wife Susan to another man for the paltry sum of five guineas. The 400 page classic by Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) goes on to chronicle the rise and fall of Henchard. The main characters are:
1. Michael Henchard-The tragic Mayor of Casterbridge who loses all he values in life and all those people he loves to his rival. Henchard is a visible proof of the fact that fiction displays "the human heart in conflict with itself.' He is a Faustian striver who is ambitious in business as a corn chandler; politics as he becomes mayor and love losing the three women who have meant most to him. Henchard dies in an obscure hut near Egdon Heath desiring to be completely forgotten by the world. He has a death wish and wishes to achieve the oblivion of death in a universe controlled by fate, chance and irony. He is one of Hardy's great creations.
2. Sue Henchard is the wife sold by Henchard to a sailor. She emigrates with him to America. When she returns 20 years later to Casterbridge she remarries Henchard but dies soon after the wedding. She is a simple-minded country woman lacking in knowledge and sophistication.
3. Donald Farfrae-While Henchard represents ancient Wessex in folkways and beliefs, Mr. Farfrae is a young Scotchman who soon steals Henchard's supremacy in Casterbridge. He is hired by Henchard to straighten out the latter's business affairs but leaves him to start a successful rival business firm. Farfrae is the second Mayor of Casterbridge in this novel. He marries Henchard's mistress Lucetta. When Lucetta dies after being the center of a scandal caused by old loves letters to Henchard being revealed, Farfrae weds Henchard's stepdaughter Elizabeth Jane. He is a kind man who seeks to help Henchard to no avail.
4. Eliaabeth-Jane-She is an intelligent person who returns from abroad with her mother Sue. She has been raised to believe that Michael Henchard is her father. Elizabeth-Jane becomes a hired companion to Henchard's quondom mistress Lucetta. Elizabeth Jane later weds Farfrae. This young lady learns her real father is the sailor Newson and Sue.
5. Seaman Newson-The real father of Sue who returns to find her twenty years after the deal of exchange he made to purchase Sue as his wife from Michael Henchard.
6. Lucette-The Jersey miss who had an affair long ago with Michael Henchard. Lucette is sexy and exotic. She weds Donald Farfrae dying after details of her affair with Henchard lead to scandal.
The characters in this ironical novel are all puppets in an uncaring universe.The last word in the novel is "pain"! There is plenty of pain to share among all the characters.
As with all of Hardy's classic novels, the descriptions of the town folks and the flora and fauna of Wessex are beautifully written. Hardy is the best regional novelist in all of English literature.
The Penguin Edition of the novel contains excellent illustrations by Robert Barnes which were included in the original edition. A helpful chronology of Hardy's life; discussion of the textual history of the novel and a useful introduction by Dr. Keith Hardy are included. The novel is one you should read and enjoy.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Dark, depressing, and fascinating
Review: Read this novel after Far From The Madding Crowd and Return of the Native. It's a very bleak and depressing novel - without the comic flourishes and moments of his earlier work.
The story follows Michael Henchard, a hay-trusser, who sells his wife and child for five guineas in an 'auction' during a fit of inebriety. He spends the next 21 years regretting his action, but during that time he does well for himself, becoming mayor of Casterbridge, a rural town. Years later, his wife and daughter reappear. This starts a chain of events that leads to Henchard's fall. He eventually ends up losing everything because of his pride, passion and stubborness. The main character isn't very likeable, but there is something of the tragic about him that commands your attention.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: The Downward Spiral
Review: Michael Henchard (yep - - later he's the Mayor, all right), having sold his wife and baby early in the novel for 5 guineas while in a drunken rage, gets what he deserves despite his valiant efforts at atonement years later after an initial rise in fortune and a 'chance' reunion with his long-abandoned wife and daughter. Not that an example of Divine retribution is Hardy's intention; Hardy was an atheist. But he stacks the cards so heavily against Henchard that it's hard to believe he isn't a True Believer after all. Chance? Irony? Coincidence? (Synchroncity?? Gadzooks!) Divine retribution? All grist for Hardy's deterministic mill, and a grinding mill it is for Henchard. It ultimately doesn't matter - - to prove his point Hardy orchestrates the narrative so obviously and nothing can stop Henchard's downward spiral, of course. Everywhere in the novel, it's plain he's doomed. Hardy created this character whose final wish, as Hardy has him spell out in his will, is that he be forgotten. And then Hardy titles the novel after him for the ages. Did I hear someone say 'Omniscient Narrator'? Pretty divine, I'd say.
Review Summary: Thomas Hardy continues to spread depression
Review: Thomas Hardy, while certainly an extremely talented author, seemingly had the knack of producing Victorian-era soap operas which never fails to depress even the most cheerful soul. Sometimes his depressing stories has a message that produces a somewhat cathartic reading experience (as with Tess of the D'Urbervilles), but with The Mayor of Casterbridge all we get is utter negativity. This mayor is one twisted, selfish and self-loathing individual. He seems to live with a rain cloud over his head, and doesn't quite understand how it is to be loved. Fun guy? Nope. And there isn't even a happy ending.
Bottom line: nice characterizations and fine prose amount to lipstick on a sow. Not recommended.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: favorite Hardy book
Review: Reread this one recently - what a great book. This is my favorite of all Hardy's books. The fascinating part of this novel is the protagonist, because he is such a mix of good and bad. He has good and even heroic impulses and acts, and bad and even evil impulses and acts. The way he manages to sabotage the good things he could get reminds me of Lily in the House of Mirth, although Henchard's sabotage is due to through bad temper and anger and insecurity, while Lily's are due to ambivalence. But the trip downward is quite similar. Basically it ends up being the story of a man's self-destruction. What a crime that Hardy's novels were unpopular when he first wrote them, and the bad reviews discouraged him from writing more! I have them all but wish there were more.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: The Mayor of Casterbidge is a Tragic Tale of a Tormented Soul.
Review: An early fall afternoon in the 1840s bucolic world of Wessex. Michael Henchard, a young hay trusser, sells his wife Susan to another man for the paltry sum of five guineas. The 400 page classic by Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) goes on to chronicle the rise and fall of Henchard. The main characters are:
1. Michael Henchard-The tragic Mayor of Casterbridge who loses all he values in life and all those people he loves to his rival. Henchard is a visible proof of the fact that fiction displays "the human heart in conflict with itself.' He is a Faustian striver who is ambitious in business as a corn chandler; politics as he becomes mayor and love losing the three women who have meant most to him. Henchard dies in an obscure hut near Egdon Heath desiring to be completely forgotten by the world. He has a death wish and wishes to achieve the oblivion of death in a universe controlled by fate, chance and irony. He is one of Hardy's great creations.
2. Sue Henchard is the wife sold by Henchard to a sailor. She emigrates with him to America. When she returns 20 years later to Casterbridge she remarries Henchard but dies soon after the wedding. She is a simple-minded country woman lacking in knowledge and sophistication.
3. Donald Farfrae-While Henchard represents ancient Wessex in folkways and beliefs, Mr. Farfrae is a young Scotchman who soon steals Henchard's supremacy in Casterbridge. He is hired by Henchard to straighten out the latter's business affairs but leaves him to start a successful rival business firm. Farfrae is the second Mayor of Casterbridge in this novel. He marries Henchard's mistress Lucetta. When Lucetta dies after being the center of a scandal caused by old loves letters to Henchard being revealed, Farfrae weds Henchard's stepdaughter Elizabeth Jane. He is a kind man who seeks to help Henchard to no avail.
4. Eliaabeth-Jane-She is an intelligent person who returns from abroad with her mother Sue. She has been raised to believe that Michael Henchard is her father. Elizabeth-Jane becomes a hired companion to Henchard's quondom mistress Lucetta. Elizabeth Jane later weds Farfrae. This young lady learns her real father is the sailor Newson and Sue.
5. Seaman Newson-The real father of Sue who returns to find her twenty years after the deal of exchange he made to purchase Sue as his wife from Michael Henchard.
6. Lucette-The Jersey miss who had an affair long ago with Michael Henchard. Lucette is sexy and exotic. She weds Donald Farfrae dying after details of her affair with Henchard lead to scandal.
The characters in this ironical novel are all puppets in an uncaring universe.The last word in the novel is "pain"! There is plenty of pain to share among all the characters.
As with all of Hardy's classic novels, the descriptions of the town folks and the flora and fauna of Wessex are beautifully written. Hardy is the best regional novelist in all of English literature.
The Penguin Edition of the novel contains excellent illustrations by Robert Barnes which were included in the original edition. A helpful chronology of Hardy's life; discussion of the textual history of the novel and a useful introduction by Dr. Keith Hardy are included. The novel is one you should read and enjoy.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Dark, depressing, and fascinating
Review: Read this novel after Far From The Madding Crowd and Return of the Native. It's a very bleak and depressing novel - without the comic flourishes and moments of his earlier work.
The story follows Michael Henchard, a hay-trusser, who sells his wife and child for five guineas in an 'auction' during a fit of inebriety. He spends the next 21 years regretting his action, but during that time he does well for himself, becoming mayor of Casterbridge, a rural town. Years later, his wife and daughter reappear. This starts a chain of events that leads to Henchard's fall. He eventually ends up losing everything because of his pride, passion and stubborness. The main character isn't very likeable, but there is something of the tragic about him that commands your attention.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: The Downward Spiral
Review: Michael Henchard (yep - - later he's the Mayor, all right), having sold his wife and baby early in the novel for 5 guineas while in a drunken rage, gets what he deserves despite his valiant efforts at atonement years later after an initial rise in fortune and a 'chance' reunion with his long-abandoned wife and daughter. Not that an example of Divine retribution is Hardy's intention; Hardy was an atheist. But he stacks the cards so heavily against Henchard that it's hard to believe he isn't a True Believer after all. Chance? Irony? Coincidence? (Synchroncity?? Gadzooks!) Divine retribution? All grist for Hardy's deterministic mill, and a grinding mill it is for Henchard. It ultimately doesn't matter - - to prove his point Hardy orchestrates the narrative so obviously and nothing can stop Henchard's downward spiral, of course. Everywhere in the novel, it's plain he's doomed. Hardy created this character whose final wish, as Hardy has him spell out in his will, is that he be forgotten. And then Hardy titles the novel after him for the ages. Did I hear someone say 'Omniscient Narrator'? Pretty divine, I'd say.