description: In this classically simple tale of the disastrous impact of outside life on a secluded community in Dorset, now in a new edition, Hardy narrates the rivalry for the hand of Grace Melbury between a simple and loyal woodlander and an exotic and sophisticated outsider. Betrayal, adultery, disillusion, and moral compromise are all worked out in a setting evoked as both beautiful and treacherous. The Woodlanders, with its thematic portrayal of the role of social class, gender, and evolutionary survival, as well as its insights into the capacities and limitations of language, exhibits Hardy's acute awareness of his era's most troubling dilemmas.
language: English
title: Woodlanders
titlecomplete: Woodlanders (New Wessex Ed)
characters: Mrs. Charmond, Grace Melbury, Giles Winterbourne, Marty South, Edred Fitzpiers
genres: Fiction, English Literature, British Literature, Literature, Romance, Classics, Novels, 19th Century, Historical Fiction, Victorian
ratings_count: 16201
places: Little Hintock, Dorset, England, Dorset, England
publisher: St Martins Pr