Tess of the D'Urbervilles

The Penguin English Library Edition of Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy "I would be content, ay, glad, to live with you as your servant, if I may not as your wife; so that I could only be near you, and get glimpses of you, and think of you as mine ... I long for only one thing in heaven or earth or under the earth, to meet you, my own dear! Come to me - come to me, and save me from what threatens me!" When Tess Durbeyfield is driven by family poverty to claim kinship with the wealthy D'Urbervilles and seek a portion of their family fortune, meeting her 'cousin' Alec proves to be her downfall. A very different man, Angel Clare, seems to offer her love and salvation, but Tess must choose whether to reveal her past or remain silent in the hope of a peaceful future. With its sensitive depiction of the wronged Tess and powerful criticism of social convention, Tess of the D'Urbervilles is one of the most moving and poetic of Hardy's novels. The Penguin English Library - 100 editions of the best fiction in English, from the eighteenth century and the very first novels to the beginning of the First World War.

Formerly a prize-winning architectural student, Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) went on to become a prolific novelist and poet. Tess of the D'Urbervilles, set in the 'partly real, partly dream-country' of Wessex, was at first refused publication and then published in censored form, shocking readers in the challenge it posed to social and sexual mores. Hardy's novels Under the Greenwood Tree, Far From the Madding Crowd, The Return of the Native, Two on a Tower, The Mayor of Casterbridge and Jude the Obscure are also published in the Penguin English Library.