'Tremendous...utterly absorbing' Independent

Proud, passionate Eustacia Vye marries Clym Yeobright in the hope that he will help her escape her cramped rural existence. But when their relationship falters and her old lover Damon Wildeve reappears with an unexpected inheritance, Eustacia is faced with a series of decisions upon which multiple lives depend. In a world where misunderstandings can be fatal, Hardy's atmospheric tragedy moves inevitably towards a disastrous climax on the brooding wilds of Egdon Heath.

'Hardy's novels hold a Shakespearean power of creating a unique world' John Bayley

See also: Jude the Obscure

'Eustacia Vye was the raw material of a divinity...She had the passions and instincts which make a model goddess, that is, those which make not quite a model woman' Return of the Native

About the Author
Thomas Hardy was born on 2 June 1840. His father was a stonemason. He was brought up near Dorchester and trained as an architect. In 1868 his work took him to St Juliot's church in Cornwall where he met his wife-to-be, Emma. His first novel, The Poor Man and the Lady, was rejected by publishers but Desperate Remedies was published in 1871 and this was rapidly followed by Under the Greenwood Tree (1872), A Pair of Blue Eyes (1873) and Far from the Madding Crowd (1874). He also wrote many other novels, poems and short stories. Tess of the D'Urbervilles was published in 1891. His final novel was Jude the Obscure (1895). Hardy was awarded the Order of Merit in 1920 and the gold medal of the Royal Society of Literature in 1912. His wife died in 1912 and he later married his secretary. Thomas Hardy died 11 January 1928.

Reviews
Throbs with a very Victorian sense of geologies, pre-histories and even astronomy; you can feel the planet moving under the feet * Daily Telegraph *
Inimitably brooding style * The Times *
Besides my complete identification with its heroine, I loved the sheer relentless power of the writing. -- Maeve Haran * Independent *
Splendid * Daily Telegraph *
The Return of the Native is . . . thoughtful, valedictory, poetic, tinged with the somberness of an uncertainty which seems to well up from the depths of the author's own subconscious . . . Hardy's sense of the tragic life of human beings, mere small fragments of consciousness in a vast uncaring universe, comes directly from his own youthful awareness of the place and circumstances described in the novel. -- John Bayley



Book Information
ISBN 9780099518983
Author Thomas Hardy
Format Paperback
Page Count 512
Imprint Vintage Classics
Publisher Vintage Publishing
Weight(grams) 351g
Dimensions(mm) 198mm * 129mm * 30mm