Page:Life of Thomas Hardy - Brennecke.pdf/15



T is difficult to think of Thomas Hardy without thinking of a definitely circumscribed portion of the English countryside. And yet, when reading his novels, lyrics and dramas, one cannot help noting how universally they apply to all that is most intense in human life, how vividly they image the tragedy of human existence everywhere on our little grey planet.

Like the Athenian dramatists who found in their tiny Mediterranean peninsula a cosmic mirror wherein the whole panorama of what is richest, direst, best, worst, deepest, most colorful in the minds and actions of humanity might be discovered and artistically presented, Hardy has found in the southwestern corner of his Island all the ingredients for a complete literary picture of his time—and, in many senses, of all times.

This, in itself, is not remarkable.

What is remarkable is that Hardy, while making his discovery, has in his creative work achieved such an epic sweep, has so masterfully welded together observation,