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Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy
- War makes rattling good history; but Peace is poor reading.The Dynasts (1904) pt. 1, act 2, sc. 5
- It is hard for a woman to define her feelings in language which is chiefly made by men to express theirs.Far from the Madding Crowd (1874)
- Done because we are too menny.Jude the Obscure (1896) pt. 6, ch. 2
- Some folk want their luck buttered.The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886) ch. 13
- Dialect words—those terrible marks of the beast to the truly genteel.The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886) ch. 20
- She whose youth had seemed to teach that happiness was but the occasional episode in a general drama of pain.The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886) ch. 45, closing words
- Patience, that blending of moral courage with physical timidity.Tess of the d'Urbervilles (1891) ch. 43
- ‘Justice’ was done, and the President of the Immortals (in Aeschylean phrase) had ended his sport with Tess.Tess of the D'Urbervilles (1891) ch. 59
- Good, but not religious-good.Under the Greenwood Tree (1872) ch. 2
- When the Present has latched its postern behind my tremulous stay,
And the May month flaps its glad green leaves like wings,
Delicate-filmed as new-spun silk, will the neighbours say,
‘He was a man who used to notice such things’?‘Afterwards’ (1917) - ‘Peace upon earth!’ was said. We sing it,
And pay a million priests to bring it.
After two thousand years of mass
We've got as far as poison-gas.‘Christmas: 1924’ (1928) - In a solitude of the sea
Deep from human vanity,
And the Pride of Life that planned her, stilly couches she.‘Convergence of the Twain’ (1914) - The Immanent Will that stirs and urges everything.‘Convergence of the Twain’ (1914)
- At once a voice outburst among
The bleak twigs overhead
In a full-hearted evensong
Of joy illimited;
An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,
In blast-beruffled plume,
Had chosen thus to fling his soul
Upon the growing gloom.‘The Darkling Thrush’ (1902) - There trembled through
His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
And I was unaware.‘The Darkling Thrush’ (1902) - If way to the Better there be, it exacts a full look at the worst.‘De Profundis’ (1902)
- I am the family face;
Flesh perishes, I live on,
Projecting trait and trace
Through time to times anon,
And leaping from place to place
Over oblivion.‘Heredity’ (1917) - Only a man harrowing clods
In a slow silent walk
With an old horse that stumbles and nods
Half asleep as they stalk.‘In Time of “The Breaking of Nations” ’ (1917) - Let me enjoy the earth no less
Because the all-enacting Might
That fashioned forth its loveliness
Had other aims than my delight.‘Let me Enjoy’ (1909) - Yes; quaint and curious war is!
You shoot a fellow down
You'd treat if met where any bar is,
Or help to half-a-crown.‘The Man he Killed’ (1909) - What of the faith and fire within us
Men who march away.‘Men Who March Away’ (1914) - Woman much missed, how you call to me, call to me.‘The Voice’ (1914)
- This is the weather the cuckoo likes,
And so do I;
When showers betumble the chestnut spikes,
And nestlings fly.‘Weathers’ (1922) - When I set out for Lyonnesse,
A hundred miles away.‘When I set out for Lyonnesse’ (1914) - The business of the poet and novelist is to show the sorriness underlying the grandest things, and the grandeur underlying the sorriest things.notebook entry for 19 April 1885
