The Fiddler of the Reels and Other Stories: 1888-1900

by Thomas Hardy, Keith Wilson, Kristin Brady

The eleven short storiesin this collection range from those with the Wessex setting familiar from Hardy's novels, to aristocratic historical fantasies set in the 17th and 18th centuries, and tragic or ironic contemporary dramas. Enormously readable in their own right, thestories can also be seen as a rich testing ground for ideas and themes that receive more sustained treatment in Hardy's most innovative and controversial novels.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Genres: Classics, Short Stories, Fiction, 19th Century, Literature

400 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1893

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

[Eleanor]

A curious story of a woman seduced by the melodies played by the fiddler, which leads to her downfall, and dooms her subsequent marriage to another.

I read this as a stand alone story rather than as part of a collection.

[Brian Willis]

The second of a duo of collections from Penguin (divided chronologically by composition), these later stories reflect the concerns and themes of the late tragic novels. Still investigating the tragic romantic entanglements and familial fate of their protagonists, Hardy seems to find different combinations of those moments - those singular moments - in our lives when a choice is made that determines our days. These are a little darker than the first volume but also richer and even more accomplished. I liked them both and I like Hardy. This is "depressing" stuff for some readers, but literature often reflects the little tragedies of personal character and momentous decisions that we all face and make, the disappointments of our lives. Setting them in Dorset instead of London or another major city liberates the storytelling to focus on the simple lives of rural folk, whose own problems are placed into distinct relief free from municipal economies. You have milkmaids, farmers, and agricultural occupations but they are often incidental to the main thrust of the story. If you are a serious reader of classic literature and/or the short story, a vital and essential collection.

[Forked Radish]

The best line: "...She was like another domestic article, a cheap tea-pot, which often brews better tea than a dear one."

[FaithfulReviewer (Jacqueline)]

I listened to this as a standalone story read by Nigel Lambert. Once again Hardy excels in his observations of the human condition.

[Frank]

Copious notes, great introduction – I think I prefer it to Susan Hill’s Penguin anthology.

[Sarah]

Thomas Hardy really excels at writing tragic stories caused by misunderstandings between people, and people who are fundamentally mismatched but cannot break free of each other. Set in a rural England that no longer exists, the tales are still as timeless as the human condition.

[Diana]

Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) was an English novelist who wrote such classics as Tess of the d’Urbervilles, Far from the Madding Crowd, Jude the Obscure, and The Woodlanders. He was also a poet (Wessex Poems) and short story writer. Hardy’s collection of ten or so short stories is compiled in The Fiddler of the Reels & Other Stories, Penguin Classics, and I am sharing my thoughts on three of them from this collection below. These are tales of romance, tragedies, and fate working in mysterious ways.

The Fiddler of the Reels [1893] – ★★★★

“Crowds of little chromatic subtleties, capable of drawing tears from a statue, proceeded straightway from the ancient fiddle, as if it were dying of the emotion which had been pent up within it ever since its banishment from some Italian city where it first took shape and sound…” (Thomas Hardy).

This is a story about eccentric fiddler “Mop” Ollamoor who can make any woman swoon with his almost devilish in its effectiveness fiddle-playing, and one of the “victims” who fell for his charm is young woman Car’line Aspent of Stickleford, who is already engaged to Ned Hipcroft, a mechanic. What began as one-sided romance soon morphed into something else – something more. We see in this story Hardy’s common love triangle – a woman chooses between a down-to-earth, hard-working man of practicality (Ned) and a visually-striking, albeit unreliable, man of shiny appearances and whimsies of all kinds (“Mop”). Hardy writes with elegance, passion and humanism, and this heart-breaking story, that is also set against the backdrop of the Great Exhibition of 1851, reminds very much of his other, heavier tragedies. Even in his short stories, Thomas Hardy can provoke us, surprise greatly, and deeply move.

A Tragedy of Two Ambitions [1894] – ★★★★

Two brothers, Cornelius and Joshua Halborough, had a humble upbringing, but set their minds to become high-ranking clergy, so went out into the world with this purpose, while carrying for their younger sister, Rosa. Their good-for-nothing, heavy-drinking father seems to be the only impediment to their success in life, especially since he also once stole their inheritance (the money left for their studies by their late mother) and now also married a gypsy. No person can become a respectable member of the clergy if they have such a wayward father, the brothers think. Now that their father arrives from Canada and hears that Rosa is about to marry a well-to-do farmer, young widower Fellmer, the brothers are horrified that the man could spoil their future plans for life and finally spot a chance to put a distance between themselves and their father once and for all. But, how to live with the horrifying consequences and the suffocating secret?

Since this is a short story, Hardy evidently compressed big events, like his characters crossing countries, into almost guesses to be made as we read on, which may cause some confusion, and the ending is almost anticlimactic, but this is still one vivid tale with Jude the Obscure-inspired characters and thought-provoking themes of destiny, societal standing and limitless individual ambition.

A Changed Man [1913] – ★★★★

This is a memorable tale of disillusionment, marriage troubles, and coming to terms with one’s predicament. At the heart of this story is Hardy’s usual theme of spirituality/morality battling materialism/frivolity. Dashing Captain Maumbry is a coveted bachelor in town until his marriage to Laura, the town’s worldly coquette. After the marriage, Maumbry becomes friends with local priest Mr Sainway, who has been working on his military friend’s mind for some time, undoubtedly instructing it on religious matters. Then, suddenly and unexpectedly to all, Captain Maumbry declares that he would like to become his town’s new curate. Naturally, this development does not sit well with Laura, who sees the prestige only in being married to some handsome military man. By the end, the story may as well be titled A Changed Woman, and I detected more than a whiff here of what would later become Maugham’s The Painted Veil.

[#DÏ4B7Ø Chinnamasta-Bhairav]

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To SEE a WORLD in a Grain of Sand,
And a HEAVEN in a Wild Flower,
Hold INFINITY in the palm of your hand
And ETERNITY in an Hour"
~ William Blake ~

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Form is Emptiness; Emptiness is form.
Form is not different than Emptiness;
Emptiness is not different than form
~ Heart Sutra ~

Like the ocean and its waves,
inseparable yet distinct

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" I and The Father are one,
I am The Truth,
The Life and The Path.”

Like a river flowing from its source,
connected and continuous

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Thy kingdom come.
Let the reign of divine
Truth, Life, and Love
be established in me,
and rule out of me all sin;
and may Thy Word
enrich the affections of all mankind

A mighty oak tree standing firm against the storm,
As sunlight scatters the shadows of night
A river nourishing the land it flows through

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[Max Wightwick]

Penguin ought to have varied the selection of themes, contained within this collection of short stories. The consequences of fey love was repetitious - at times. I say this, as, when it worked, Hardy delivered an affective tale of misfortune. Fiddler of the Reels was almost folkloric, with there being a supernatural element to this devious character.

[Jeff Hobbs]

Read so far:

The melancholy hussar of the German Legion--
*A tragedy of two ambitions--
The first countess of Wessex--
*Barbara of the House of Grebe--
For conscience's sake--
*The son's veto--
*On the western circuit--
*The fiddler of the reels--
An imaginative woman--
A changed man--
*Enter a dragoon--
***
Absent-mindedness in a parish choir--3
The grave by the handiest--3
Squire Petrick's lady
The superstitious man's story--2
Tony Kytes, the arch-deceiver--

[Jim]

Nice intro to Hardy

[Sean]

Was the title story ever shocking!

[Renita]

-Audiobook