The Mayor of Casterbridge (Arcturus Classics) - Softcover

In a drunken stupor, protagonist Michael Henchard mistakenly sells his wife and child to a sailor. Eighteen years later, secrets and lies threaten the protagonist's well-off lifestyle as mayor. The return of his family, the arrival of former lovers, and secrets surrounding that day nearly two decades ago all converge on the town of Casterbridge, forcing Michael to confront his past and his own nature. Perhaps most famous for his novels Far from the Madding Crowd (1874) and Tess of the d'Urbervilles (1891), Thomas Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886) remains worth the read for its comic intrigue and insightful discussion of human character.

The novelist and poet Thomas Hardy was born in 1840 in the Dorset village of Higher Bockhampton. Hardy began novel-writing in the hope that it might finance his transition from architect to poet. The first of his so-called Wessex novels, Far From the Madding Crowd, enabled him to fulfil that hope. A series of Wessex novels would follow, with the later ones (especially Tess of the d'Urbervilles) the subject of much adverse comment by Victorians offended by Hardy's liberal social attitudes. Hardy's work would continue to push the boundaries until his death in 1928.