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BROWN, JOANNA CULLEN [Edited by]: : Figures in a Wessex Landscape - THOMAS HARDY's picture of English country life

LONDON.ALLISON & BUSBY,1987.

ISBN 0850313732.

UK,8vo HB+dw/dj,1st edn.FINE/NFINE.Neat,ink owner inscrptn to front pastedown behind and hidden by front inner dw/dj flap,and no price-clip to dw/dj.Glossy,colour pictorial wrap-around illustrated artwork by Henry Moule [Dorset County Museum]; with negligible shelf-wear and minimal creasing to edges - no nicks or tears present - though spine/backstrip is lightly sunned/faded.Top edge lightly dust-soiled and minimally marked,fore-edge bright and clean; contents bright,tight and clean also. Clean,dark green paper-covered boards with bright,blocked gilt letters to spine/backstrip and immaculate plain green endpapers.UK,8vo HB+ dw/dj,1st edn,1-344pp includes half-title+title pages,contents+illustrations lists/tables, author's introduction,two parts comprising 18 chapters,33 contemporary b/w scenic+ portrait photographs,8pp of Henry Moule watercolour paintings in two blocks of 4pp between pp136/37 and pp264/65 respectively,notes,list of Hardy's works and an index. Thomas Hardy is one of Britain's best-loved writers,not least because of his exquisite descriptions of rural life in the 19thC.His accounts are based on observation and experience - he believed that:"At the dates represented in the various narrations things were like that in Wessex:the inhabitants lived in certain ways, engaged in certain occupations, kept alive certain customs, just as they are shown doing in these pages. . . " Even some apparently far-fetched incidents like wife-selling were taken from local newspaper accounts.Written with often painfully unsentimental realism,his accounts offer probably the most comprehensive and authentic picture of country life in all English literature. Hardy wrote fourteen novels,about a thousand poems,two poetic dramas,many articles and over forty not-so-short stories - a daunting body of work for any but the most dedicated student.In this beautiful book Joanna Cullen Brown has collected and linked passages from his extensive writings to provide a full but accessible picture of life in the English countryside in the late Georgian and Victorian era.These extracts are arranged according to theme; there are sections,for example,on folklore,medicine and disease, music,dialect,the law,power and poverty,farming,poaching and rural skills, religion and education,entertainments,eating and drinking and love. A brilliantly written and lovingly assembled picture of Dorset life - the country year,the people and their activities and attitudes.The book is further enhanced by the watercolours of Henry Moule. A close friend of Thomas Hardy,Moule painted many of the scenes that Hardy described,and indeed the two considered collaborating on a book of Dorset life.It was never done in their life time and Moule's paintings are here published for the first time. Please contact seller,because of the weight (in excess of 1Kg unpackaged!) of this item,for correct,insured shipping/P+p quotes - particularly ALL overseas buyers - BEFORE ordering through the order page! N.B. ALL buyers please note,stocks' actual shipping/P+p costs are adjusted and any difference is refunded,after order's receipt and before the order's despatch,especially if the item(s) are offered either P+p included/FREE.               ** N.B. US/Canada customers please be aware: Standard AIRMAIL postage from UK to these destinations can now cost more than the price of the book! If speed is not of the essence,then Economy rate is recommended - at approx. anything from a 1/3rd to 1/2 of the standard US AIR quote/rate - sometimes arriving sooner than the 42 days - but not always. **

UK,8vo HB+dw/dj,1st edn.
Not SIGNED.

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