The English Man of Letters, 'Thomas Hardy'

Thomas Hardy, England's representative 19th-century author.
Raised under a father deeply versed in music
and a mother who always kept books close,
he was one of the most fervent authors in 19th-century England.
Having witnessed in childhood a woman who killed her husband being hanged,
he later poured this memory into the final scene of his work 'Tess.'
Unlike the established authors of the time,
in the conservative Victorian era he wrote works that make one think about the value of humanity,
and especially in the point of acknowledging 'women' as individual subjects,
he held a progressive viewpoint for a man of his day.

In Rochester he devoted himself to books and the violin,
and after crossing over to London,
he would, after lunch, stop by art galleries to view artworks
and study art history in his spare moments,
while at the same time writing papers on architecture, his profession,
and was excellent enough to be recognized by the Royal Society,
but as his health worsened, he ended his five years of London life and returned to Rochester.

He confronted conservatism once through 'Tess,'
and confronted conservatism once more through 'Jude the Obscure,'
but this book was banned, and the religious world burned it.
Worn out by the demands of magazines and editors and the criticism of readers, he gave up writing novels
and turned his heart to 'poetry,'
but readers already accustomed to his prose turned their backs on him.
And only after a long stretch of time had passed
was he recognized again as a 'poet.'

From the time in his childhood when he studied 'architecture,'
Hardy, who was able to satisfy his intellectual desire under good mentors,
always portrayed characters who confront fate and try to overcome it.

'If you want the world to listen to you,
you must do today what people will think and talk about 25 years from now.'
-Thomas Hardy-