• ISBN13: 9788126900909
• Binding: Hardcover
• Subject: English Literature
• Publisher: Atlantic Publishers & Distributors (P) Ltd
• Publisher Imprint: Atlantic
• Publication Date: August 20, 2014
• Pages: 352
• Original Price: INR 995.0
• Language: English
• Edition: N/A
• Item Weight: 370 grams
• BISAC Subject(s): General

Thomas Hardy was equally eminent as a novelist and a poet and thus holds a unique place in English Literature. More than seven decades after his death, Thomas Hardy is still surprisingly alive if uninterrupted critical attention is a test. The nineteen essays included in the volume — thirteen on Hardy’s fiction, five on his poetry, and one on general overview — cover a broad range of critical perspective on Hardy’s fiction and poetry, which include the comparative, the Freudian, the existentialist, the absurdist, the ‘psychospatial,’ the feminist, the aesthetic-artistic, the historicist, the dialectical, the mythical, the symbolic, among others. The collection will be relevant and useful to both students and scholars of English literature as it brings into focus a wide spectrum of interesting sidelights on, and illuminating analyses of the various dimensions of Hardy’s works; some of the papers are refreshingly original and perceptive in their approach to and treatment of the respective subjects. As a ‘great’ writer Hardy has remained problematic, demanding that his readers wrestle with him. The present volume claims to have joined that unbroken wrestle — more than a century-old — with the words and meanings of Hardy’s works. Contributions from the eminent scholars in the field have enhanced the value of the collection.

Dr. Rama Kundu is a full Professor of English. She has been teaching in the Post-graduate Department of English, Burdwan University, West Bengal, since 1976. She is the author of three books : Vision and Design in Hardy’s Fiction, Wrestling With God : Studies in English Devotional Poetry, and a Bengali book Anandamath O Sampradaikta on Bankimchandra Chattopadhyay. She has also edited an anthology of research papers on Rabindranath Tagore’s Home and the World, and translated a book of poems into English — On the Revolving Stage. She has written a large number of research papers (73) published in scholarly journals and anthologies in India and abroad. Professor Kundu has participated and chaired sessions in a large number of National and International Conferences including three stints in Europe.

• Section I

• Critical Perspectives on Fiction
• 1. The ‘Idiot’ in Wordsworth and Hardy–Sobha Chattopadhyay
• 2. Hardy’s Tragic Character : ‘The Children of Light’–Usha Walters Kishore
• 3. The Quest for Self-identity in Thomas Hardy with Special Reference to his Novel The Return of the Native–Vinod Kumar Maheswari
• 4. Egdon as Psycho-space–Suman Jana
• 5. Thomas Hardy’s Egdon Heath and Naguib Mahfouz’s ZuqÈq Al-Midaqq : A Comparative Study of the Protagonist –Ayyoub M.A. Othman
• 6. A Mother-Obsessed Son –S.M. Chanda
• 7. ‘Motherhood’ in The Mayor of Casterbridge : A Feminist Reading–Sneha Mishra
• 8. Hardy’s Women : A Feminist View–Santosh Chakrabarti
• 9. A Fresh Look at Thomas Hardy’s Henchard –Subha Tiwari
• 10 . Tess of the d’Urbervilles : Hardy’s Vision of Life–S.P. Swain
• 11. Hardy’s Poetic Vision in Tess of the d’Urbervilles–Dipak Jyoti Baruah
• 12. The Problem of Love and Marriage in Jude, the Obscure–Basavaraj Naikar
• 13. Hardy-Pierston : The Breakdown of Fiction–Rama Kundu

• Section II

• Critical Perspectives on Poetry
• 14. Thomas Hardy as a War-Poet–Mohit K. Ray
• 15. Thomas Hardy and the Aesthetics of Dialecticism–Ranjan Ghosh
• 16. Hardy and Housman : A Comparative Study–Mallikarjun Patil
• 17. ‘The Weeping Woman of Calvaria’ : Demeter : Tryphena–Rama Kundu
• 18. The Poetic Corpus of Thomas Hardy : An Evaluation–C.L. Khatri

• Section III

• An Overview of Hardy’s life and Works
• 19. Thomas Hardy’s Life and Works : An Overview–T.M.J. Indra Mohan
• A Select Reading List
• List of Contributors