Complex sentence: Thomas Hardy was born in 1840 in Upper Bockhampton, a hamlet in the parish of Stinsford to the east of Dorchester in Dorset, England, where his father Thomas (1811--1892) worked as a stonemason and local builder.
Split into simpler sentences: Thomas Hardy was born in 1840 in Upper Bockhampton, a hamlet in the parish of Stinsford to the east of Dorchester in Dorset, England. His father Thomas (1811--1892) worked as a stonemason and local builder.