Wessex Poems and Other Verses, with Thirty Illustrations by the Authur

by Thomas Hardy

Mesmerizing volume of poetry set in the backdrop of Wessex that provided the milieu for most of Hardy’s writings. The poems deal with themes of disappointment in love and life and the struggle to live a meaningful life in an indifferent world. Hardy’s poetry is universally acclaimed for the symphony of subject matter and unique selection of words.

Genres: Poetry, Classics, British Literature, English Literature, 19th Century, Nonfiction, Romance

Library Binding

First published January 1, 1898

About the author

Thomas Hardy, OM, was an English author of the naturalist movement, although in several poems he displays elements of the previous romantic and enlightenment periods of literature, such as his fascination with the supernatural. He regarded himself primarily as a poet and composed novels mainly for financial gain.

The bulk of his work, set mainly in the semi-fictional land of Wessex, delineates characters struggling against their passions and circumstances. Hardy's poetry, first published in his 50s, has come to be as well regarded as his novels, especially after The Movement of the 1950s and 1960s.

The term cliffhanger is considered to have originated with Thomas Hardy's serial novel A Pair of Blue Eyes in 1873. In the novel, Hardy chose to leave one of his protagonists, Knight, literally hanging off a cliff staring into the stony eyes of a trilobite embedded in the rock that has been dead for millions of years. This became the archetypal — and literal — cliff-hanger of Victorian prose.

Excerpted from Wikipedia.

Reviews

[Annelies · Rating 5 out of 5]

So adorable. The Wessex poems are to me a bit like tiny, mini Hardy novels.

[Ian Banks · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great selection of poems that initially confounded Hardy’s fans. The range of quality is vast, of style and topic almost as much. My favourites were To A Lady, Thoughts Of Phena and The Slow Nature, although there were loads of others almost as striking.

(I have this in a complete collection of Hardy’s poetry but I’m going to cheat and review each book as I complete it because I can’t read too much poetry in one go)

[Manik Sukoco · Rating 4 out of 5]

Many reviewers were put off when Thomas Hardy published this, his first collection of poetry, late in 1898 and after swearing off fiction. If "Tess of the D'Urbervilles" and "Jude the Obscure" offended them, "Wessex Poems" confused them - its style and diction seemed clumsy, and its themes did nothing to reassure them. And yet it includes a handful of the poems now acknowledged as among Hardy's best - including "Hap," which begins "If but some vengeful god"-- and announced the beginning of what would turn out to be one of the greatest careers in poetry in the twentieth century. Powerful novelists are rarely powerful poets, but Hardy once again showed himself not to be limited by the constraints and considerations of "smaller" minds.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good collection of poetry - I enjoyed many poems in this collection but I did have four favourites these were: The Burghers, Her Death and After, The Casterbridge Captains and Thoughts of Phena. I would highly recommend this poetry collection.

[emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

the two men was my fave i think

[Green Hoppy · Rating 3 out of 5]

At the preface of Wessex Poems, Thomas Hardy leaves an apology accounting for his use of "ancient and legitimate words of the district." Hardy insists on his use of such words necessary in scenarios wherein the words are "the most natural, nearest and often only expression of a thought." Hardy's insistence upon these words, to me, immediately places Hardy's poetical voice within a place of his own- Allowing for (some of) the poems within the collection to serve as vignettes of the unique England of his novels.
This difference accounts for the largest development Hardy's poems within this collection hold, when compared to his post-Romantic predecessors. Regardless, the poems meander through a few central subjects:

A Romantic series, pertaining to a lost love and her child.
A series of war poems in dramatic verse, mostly pertaining to the Napoleonic Wars.
Remaining vaguely philosophical occasional pieces.

These subjects, and the themes surrounding them, seem to me fairly derivative and bland when compared against Hardy's poetical predecessors. Despite this, the characters within the verses of Hardy's England finely resemble the vivid characters of his novels; the character don't so much as come alive as they seem to ask you a question. They are accessibly envisioned, and realistically felt. The settings and their relationships with the natural world resonates well, throughout Hardy's consistently earthy writing. The descriptions of the natural world perhaps aren't as vividly described as by his poetical precursors, but the images thereof are stimulated by Hardy's accessible choices of diction, alongside the language "of the district". This idea indicates a significant thematic consistency, and peculiarity, within his work. This gritty poetical realism is refreshing against the backdrop of the overtly brooding Romantics of the mid-nineteenth century.

The briefer occasional pieces do display some of Hardy's greatest (and weakest) work. The poem Hap is still seen as one of the peaks of Hardy's oeuvre. Most of these shorter poems are fairly derivative, and hold little weight.

Although predictable, this collection of poems nostalgically hold the richly-colored, earthy England of Hardy's novels. The poems function as accessible evocations of lost love, and of lost life. But are, for the most part, structurally and thematically unremarkable. They seem to me most notable for their poetical-realism, which clearly illuminates the subsequent emergence of Hardy's literary progeny, in the form of his proto-Edwardian approach.

[Margaret Ennen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this book was really fascinating… so much so that I’m writing a whole research paper on it 😂 I enjoyed some poems more than others, and some poems had me pretty stumped but I really liked the drawings and I think they really add something interesting to the book as a whole.

[Preetam Chatterjee · Rating 3 out of 5]

This volume proved to be the smallest of Hardy’s eight volumes of poetry. It contained just fifty-one poems, many of them being sonnets.

The inflexible, sinewy style of these poems makes a break with tradition; and this break is as startling as the fundamental modernity of their scientific outlook.

The style is often laboured, with awkward inversions, archaisms, and neologisms. However, all the poems reveal, without any doubt, Hardy’s integrity not only in the style in which they are written but also in his thought and his vision of life.

A few of the poems possess a lyrical quality which anticipates Hardy’s highest poetic achievements of the future. The poems in this collection include quite a few poems such as ‘Neutral Tones’ and ‘A Meeting with Despair’, which have won recognition from critics.

This volume includes poems which are expressions of the feelings natural to every considerate young man coming to grips with life for the first time. There is a poem addressed to a beloved who has changed to grosser clay. There is the thought that suffering is more bitter because it falls from blind chance, and not from the action of some spiteful deity; there is a mourn thât Nature is indifferent to human beings; and there is the view that the children of a lady, who has married another man, will not be full of such high aims as they would have been if she had married Hardy.

The feelings do not ring fairly sincere; they are not robustly felt; they are, in truth, outpourings from the weak, undeveloped nature of an intelligent young man.

Only two of these poems, namely ‘The heiress and The Architect’, and ‘Neutral Tones’ show any promise of Hardy’s mature poetic powers.

[Russ · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this on dailyLit.com, where they sent me a poem a day until I was done. It is an interesting way to read, though I'm not sure I'd like reading anything other than verse that way.

Overall, this collection didn't do much for me. A bunch of the poems are what you'd expect coming out of his "Wessex" imagination: grim. There are a few occasional poems that are a bit better, but there isn't much I'd want to commit to memory.

[Timothy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hardy might be my favorite non-modern English language poet so I will probably bump this up to five stars someday when no one is looking. This is his first collection of poetry and though published at the end of the 1890s most of the poems are from the 1860s so his greatest poetry was still ahead of him. I know that's really the only reason I am leaving a star off. Not what I think are the greatest poems from this collection, but a handful of poems that struck me personally and I want to remember:

SHE, AT HIS FUNERAL

They bear him to his resting-place—
In slow procession sweeping by;
I follow at a stranger’s space;
His kindred they, his sweetheart I.
Unchanged my gown of garish dye,
Though sable-sad is their attire;
But they stand round with griefless eye,
Whilst my regret consumes like fire! (187-)


SHE, TO HIM I

When you shall see me in the toils of Time,
My lauded beauties carried off from me,
My eyes no longer stars as in their prime,
My name forgot of Maiden Fair and Free;

When in your being heart concedes to mind,
And judgment, though you scarce its process know,
Recalls the excellencies I once enshrined,
And you are irked that they have withered so:

Remembering that with me lies not the blame,
That Sportsman Time but rears his brood to kill,
Knowing me in my soul the very same—
One who would die to spare you touch of ill!—
Will you not grant to old affection’s claim
The hand of friendship down Life’s sunless hill?

SHE, TO HIM II

Perhaps, long hence, when I have passed away,
Some other’s feature, accent, thought like mine,
Will carry you back to what I used to say,
And bring some memory of your love’s decline.

Then you may pause awhile and think, “Poor jade!”
And yield a sigh to me—as ample due,
Not as the tittle of a debt unpaid
To one who could resign her all to you—

And thus reflecting, you will never see
That your thin thought, in two small words conveyed,
Was no such fleeting phantom-thought to me,
But the Whole Life wherein my part was played;
And you amid its fitful masquerade
A Thought—as I in yours but seem to be.

SHE, TO HIM III

I will be faithful to thee; aye, I will!
And Death shall choose me with a wondering eye
That he did not discern and domicile
One his by right ever since that last Good-bye!

I have no care for friends, or kin, or prime
Of manhood who deal gently with me here;
Amid the happy people of my time
Who work their love’s fulfilment, I appear

Numb as a vane that cankers on its point,
True to the wind that kissed ere canker came;
Despised by souls of Now, who would disjoint
The mind from memory, and make Life all aim,

My old dexterities of hue quite gone,
And nothing left for Love to look upon.

SHE, TO HIM IV

This love puts all humanity from me;
I can but maledict her, pray her dead,
For giving love and getting love of thee—
Feeding a heart that else mine own had fed!

How much I love I know not, life not known,
Save as some unit I would add love by;
But this I know, my being is but thine own—
Fused from its separateness by ecstasy.

And thus I grasp thy amplitudes, of her
Ungrasped, though helped by nigh-regarding eyes;
Canst thou then hate me as an envier
Who see unrecked what I so dearly prize?
Believe me, Lost One, Love is lovelier
The more it shapes its moan in selfish-wise. (1866)


SAN SEBASTIAN (August 1813)

“Why, Sergeant, stray on the Ivel Way,
As though at home there were spectres rife?
From first to last ’twas a proud career!
And your sunny years with a gracious wife
Have brought you a daughter dear.

“I watched her to-day; a more comely maid,
As she danced in her muslin bowed with blue,
Round a Hintock maypole never gayed.”
—“Aye, aye; I watched her this day, too,
As it happens,” the Sergeant said.

“My daughter is now,” he again began,
“Of just such an age as one I knew
When we of the Line and Forlorn-hope van,
On an August morning—a chosen few—
Stormed San Sebastian.

“She’s a score less three; so about was she—
The maiden I wronged in Peninsular days . . .
You may prate of your prowess in lusty times,
But as years gnaw inward you blink your bays,
And see too well your crimes!

“We’d stormed it at night, by the vlanker-light
Of burning towers, and the mortar’s boom:
We’d topped the breach; but had failed to stay,
For our files were misled by the baffling gloom;
And we said we’d storm by day.

“So, out of the trenches, with features set,
On that hot, still morning, in measured pace,
Our column climbed; climbed higher yet,
Past the fauss’bray, scarp, up the curtain-face,
And along the parapet.

“From the battened hornwork the cannoneers
Hove crashing balls of iron fire;
On the shaking gap mount the volunteers
In files, and as they mount expire
Amid curses, groans, and cheers.

“Five hours did we storm, five hours re-form,
As Death cooled those hot blood pricked on;
Till our cause was helped by a woe within:
They swayed from the summit we’d leapt upon,
And madly we entered in.

“On end for plunder, ’mid rain and thunder
That burst with the lull of our cannonade,
We vamped the streets in the stifling air—
Our hunger unsoothed, our thirst unstayed—
And ransacked the buildings there.

“Down the stony steps of the house-fronts white
We rolled rich puncheons of Spanish grape,
Till at length, with the fire of the wine alight,
I saw at a doorway a fair fresh shape—
A woman, a sylph, or sprite.

“Afeard she fled, and with heated head
I pursued to the chamber she called her own;
—When might is right no qualms deter,
And having her helpless and alone
I wreaked my will on her.

“She raised her beseeching eyes to me,
And I heard the words of prayer she sent
In her own soft language . . . Seemingly
I copied those eyes for my punishment
In begetting the girl you see!

“So, to-day I stand with a God-set brand
Like Cain’s, when he wandered from kindred’s ken . . .
I served through the war that made Europe free;
I wived me in peace-year. But, hid from men,
I bear that mark on me.

“And I nightly stray on the Ivel Way
As though at home there were spectres rife;
I delight me not in my proud career;
And ’tis coals of fire that a gracious wife
Should have brought me a daughter dear!”


“I LOOK INTO MY GLASS”

I look into my glass,
And view my wasting skin,
And say, “Would God it came to pass
My heart had shrunk as thin!”

For then, I, undistrest
By hearts grown cold to me,
Could lonely wait my endless rest
With equanimity.

But Time, to make me grieve;
Part steals, lets part abide;
And shakes this fragile frame at eve
With throbbings of noontide.

[Jack · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have a copy of Jude the Obscure waiting on my bookshelf, but aside from that this is my first contact with Thomas Hardy, and since I picked up a cheap Wordsworth collection of his poetry, I’ll be sure to dig into more. The star rating is a little frivolous when it comes to poetry. Even among ardent readers I doubt a poetry collection is likely to capture a reader’s passions with every poem. I enjoyed only a scant few poems in this collection, but I liked those well.

Hardy works with many forms of rhyme that I don’t have the names at hand for - anyone interested in 19th century pessimism and ambivalent portrayals of nature as something beautiful, yet cruel, will find something to appreciate here. I look forward to reading on while comparing Hardy’s life-works — his poems — with his novels, all the more famous.

[Sonja Charters · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have read a few of Hardy's novels over the years and absolutely love the lyrical writing and so thought I'd give this collection of poetry a read too.

This was quite a varied selection of poems with a range of themes and styles.

There were some pieces that were much longer than the standard poetry I'm used to and these were really nice to read through as they flowed well, much like the novels that I'm used to.
Some even being taken from and used in the better known novels.

I think that I much prefer the shorter poems, however, as this is more like the poetry I've read before.

I always find it quite difficult to interpret very personal poems, but lots in this collection had clear themes and were very descriptive.

A lovely collection to dip into.

[Thomas George Phillips · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've read Hardy's "Far From The Madding Crowd," but never have I read any of his poems until now. His "Her Dilemma" was an especially favorite of mine. The first stanza reads: "The two were silent in a sunless church, Whose mildewed walls uneven paving stones, And wasted carvings passed antique research; and nothing broke the clock's dull monotones."

[Kit Hall · Rating 2 out of 5]

I love Hardy’s Wessex novels but this collection didn’t work for me. Setting a poetry collection in a fictional world is too abstracted. It works for a novel but, for me, poetry needs to be more directly connected to emotion and all the emotional grunt in this collection is second-or third- hand leaving it distant and ungraspable.

[Lindsay Whalen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I made the mistake of reading this on Kindle. The formatting of the verse lines is all off and makes it quite a trial to get into and through. No fault of Hardy's, just the publishing.

On the text, you have to love a writer who titles one of his poems, "To A Lady Offended By A Book Of The Writer's".

[Eileen · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.75 stars (ok)

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I agree with the summary of Goodreads.

[Heath Creel]

Super interesting book of poetry—bizarre that he went from writing Jude to writing this

[Alicia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ik ben dol op het ritme dat Hardy gebruikt, maar de meeste gedichten roepen geen herkenning op.

[Shounak Mallik · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good poems

[Saksham · Rating 2 out of 5]

For Poetry collections, I often like to just leave one of my fav poems in review

Her Immortality

Upon a noon I pilgrimed through A pasture, mile by mile, Unto the place where I last saw My dead Love's living smile.

And sorrowing I lay me down Upon the heated sod: It seemed as if my body pressed The very ground she trod.

I lay, and thought; and in a trance She came and stood me by-- The same, even to the marvellous ray That used to light her eye.

"You draw me, and I come to you, My faithful one," she said, In voice that had the moving tone It bore ere breath had fled.

She said: "'Tis seven years since I died: Few now remember me; My husband clasps another bride; My children's love has she.

"My brethren, sisters, and my friends Care not to meet my sprite: Who prized me most I did not know Till I passed down from sight."

I said: "My days are lonely here; I need thy smile alway: I'll use this night my ball or blade, And join thee ere the day."

A tremor stirred her tender lips, Which parted to dissuade: "That cannot be, O friend," she cried; "Think, I am but a Shade!

"A Shade but in its mindful ones Has immortality; By living, me you keep alive, By dying you slay me.

"In you resides my single power Of sweet continuance here; On your fidelity I count Through many a coming year."

- I started through me at her plight, So suddenly confessed: Dismissing late distaste for life, I craved its bleak unrest.

"I will not die, my One of all! - To lengthen out thy days I'll guard me from minutest harms That may invest my ways!"

She smiled and went. Since then she comes Oft when her birth-moon climbs, Or at the seasons' ingresses Or anniversary times;

But grows my grief. When I surcease, Through whom alone lives she, Ceases my Love, her words, her ways, Never again to be!

[GONZA · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Channel Firing"

That night your great guns, unawares,
Shook all our coffins as we lay,
And broke the chancel window-squares,
We thought it was the Judgment-day

And sat upright. While drearisome
Arose the howl of wakened hounds:
The mouse let fall the altar-crumb,
The worms drew back into the mounds,

The glebe1 cow drooled. Till God called, “No;
It’s gunnery practise out at sea
Just as before you went below;
The world is as it used to be:

“And all nations striving strong to make
Red war yet redder. Mad as hatters
They do no more for Christés sake
Than you who are helpless in such matters.

“That this is not the judgement-hour
For some of them’s a blessed thing,
For if it were they’d have to scour
Hell’s floor for so much threatening. . . .

“Ha, ha. It will be warmer when
I blow the trumpet (if indeed
I ever do; for you are men,
And rest eternal sorely need).”

So down we lay again. “I wonder,
Will the world ever saner be,”
Said one, ‘than when He sent us under
In our indifferent century!”

And many a skeleton shook his head.
“Instead of preaching forty year,”
My neighbour Parson Thirdly said,
“I wish I had stuck to pipes and beer.”

Again the guns disturbed the hour,
Roaring their readiness to avenge,
As far inland as Stourton Tower,
And Camelot, and starlit Stonehenge.

[Victoria Ellis · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book begins with a note from Hardy telling us, as readers, that this is a collection of miscellaneous poems. He was not wrong. There's no way to believe this is in any traditional way a collection of poetry. If you're reading these relatively close together, as I was for Victober 2021, the miscellaneous nature is unavoidable. Despite being warned, I did struggle to read the book as a whole because of this reason. Having read one of Thomas Hardy's novels, The Return of the Native, I did have certain expectations for these poems. One of which was a strong sense of place. I wanted to feel the earth beneath my feet as I read these poems. However, I did not get a sense of place at all, let alone one of any such strength. I did not enjoy the majority of poems, and I can't say that many stood out to me. I struggled to grasp the flow of the rhyme scheme, which varied from poem to poem, even when I tried to read them aloud. It wasn't long before I was reading just for the sake of finishing the book, which is always a disappointing position to be in. I would like to try another of Hardy's novels in the future, but I don't think his poetry is for me. This was not the best way to end Victober.

[Diana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wessex Poems and Other Verses [1898/2017] - ★★★★1/2

I thought this was a wonderful collection of Thomas Hardy's poems, touching on such themes as country life and romance, human character, doomed love, relative fleetness of youth and beauty, death and attempts to reconcile the depth of love with the passing of a loved one. There were a number of "supernatural" and "otherworldly" poems in this collection too, which makes it a perfect reading for a cosy autumn evening or near Halloween. Melancholic, full of longing and simply beautiful, some of my favourites included Unknowing, the She, to Him series of poems and Her Immortality. Others are narratively interesting too, for example, The Dance at the Phoenix is about a woman of sixty who is swept by her memories when she hears the King's-Own Cavalry is in town and goes dancing to unpredictable or maybe and sadly, predictable results, and in The Two Men, Hardy shows how two men are bound to meet the same destiny having the same schooling and similar inner beliefs.

[Sarah Allen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was surprised by how much I enjoyed Wessex Poems. Hardy's work is heartfelt, of course, but there's a surprising amount of positivity, especially in the earlier poems. It's a moving work all together.

[J.A. Ironside · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like Hardy's poetry but I'm not impressed with this collection. Where was all his beautiful nature verse or his scathing commentary on war? This was almost entirely internal wrangling about the bonds between men and women, about extra marital relations and some quite immature stuff conflating sexual desire with lasting love, with a few thin examples of songs and verses written for his books thrown in. You have to look askance when 'Wessex Poems' doesn't really discuss Wessex (Dorset) and doesn't include Darkling Thrush or Drummer Hodge.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

An enjoyable collection of poems. Some I wasn't too fussed on, but quite a few I really enjoyed. My favourites were Hap, Revulsion, In a wood, and The Impercipient.

"Why thus my soul should be consigned
To infelicity,
Why always I must feel as blind
To sights my brethren see,
Why joys they've found I cannot find,
Abides a mystery."

[T P Kennedy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really wanted to like these more. His novels and some of the later poems are fantastic. However, these were of limited appeal to me. Some seemed laboured and gave the sense of a poet finding his feet. Others were supplemental to the masterful novels. A very mixed bag unfortunately.

[Notcathy J]

"To Cathy--from LaRue with love--May 1992" WIth a card at the poem, "Confession To A Friend In Trouble": "Cath-- I like this one especially, LaRue."

[Mii · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a great read!