Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy, OMwas an English novelist and poet. A Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, especially William Wordsworth. Charles Dickens was another important influence. Like Dickens, he was highly critical of much in Victorian society, though Hardy focused more on a declining rural society...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth2 June 1840
clear common remarkably seemed sky stars
The sky was clear -- remarkably clear -- and the twinkling of all the stars seemed to be but throbs of one body, timed by a common pulse.
family flesh time trace trait
I am the family face; / Flesh perishes, I live on, / Projecting trait and trace / Through time to times anon, / And leaping from place to place / Over oblivion.
listen silence wonderful
Silent? ah, he is silent! He can keep silence well. That man's silence is wonderful to listen to.
love paths smile
Smile out; but still suffer: / The paths of love are rougher / Than thoroughfares of stones.
dreads elf final half lest maiden modest rise
There's not a modest maiden elf / But dreads the final Trumpet, / Lest half of her should rise herself, / And half some sturdy strumpet!
victim
Once victim, always victim -- that's the law!
drops families hang
And meadow rivulets overflow, And drops on gate-bars hang in a row, And rooks in families homeward go, And so do I
dawning next passing seemed somebody unknown
Who's in the next room? - who? / I seemed to see / Somebody in the dawning passing through,/ Unknown to me.
faith fire growing leaving march men night within
What of the faith and fire within us / Men who march away / Ere the barncocks say / Night is growing gray, / Leaving all that here can win us?
voice tree woods
To dwellers in a wood, almost every species of tree has its voice as well as its feature.
change time surprise
Time changes everything except something within us which is always surprised by change.
love-you heart flames
You have never loved me as I love you--never--never! Yours is not a passionate heart--your heart does not burn in a flame! You are, upon the whole, a sort of fay, or sprite-- not a woman!
summer autumn thinking
That it would always be summer and autumn, and you always courting me, and always thinking as much of me as you have done through the past summertime!
integrity morality ethics
Do not do an immoral thing for moral reasons.