Review by Choice Review
As Hardy himself might have said, collections such as this one have the defects of their qualities. Unified neither by theme nor by theoretical approach, this volume includes ten essays--all by respected Hardy scholars, most delivered as lectures at the International Thomas Hardy Conference. Although all of the essays are valuable, noteworthy contributions include Pamela Dalziel's analysis of Hardy's revisions to The Mayor of Casterbridge (and the extent to which they were influenced by the illustrations in the serial version) and Richard Nemasvari's treatment of masculine identity in Tess, which he compares to Herman Melville's Billy Budd. The volume's highlight, however, is Michael Millgate's informal history of the earliest Hardy scholars and collectors. The volume's scholarship is uniformly excellent, but the development of these arguments and the level of their engagement with Hardy criticism reveal their origins as conference papers. Mallett (Univ. of St. Andrews)--also editor of The Achievement of Thomas Hardy (2000) and a scholarly edition of Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge)--provides a useful introduction and a brief index. ^BSumming Up: Optional. Research libraries and undergraduate libraries building comprehensive Hardy collections. R. D. Morrison Morehead State University
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
